Disgusted by "Blasted"

  I was fairly certain I was not going to like Sarah Kane’s play, “Blasted,” after reading the short synopsis on Wikipedia. Unfortunately, my prediction was correct. There is an incredible amount of violence in the play; rape, suicide, war, and cannibalism, among others. I understand Kane’s desire to portray the inhumanity of war but I don’t think the play is entirely successful. So many events in the play seemed unnecessary. For example, when the soldier stands on the bed and urinates on it while saying, “This is our land now,” it seemed pointless. We get it, the soldier with the sniper gun has all the control in the room. Watching the following rape scene was also unnecessary. It certainly shocked the audience, myself included, to have to watch this for several minutes but to what effect? We’re disgusted by the play itself and how we are forced to be voyeurs instead of being solely shocked that the rape occurs. When the soldier later eats Ian’s eyes I saw several people in the row in front of me get up and leave. Kane didn’t seem to see the line between what is shocking and what is unnecessarily disgusting. It’s hard to say what the most gruesome scene in the play is, but it might just be when Ian eats the dead baby Cate tried to bury in the floorboards. I definitely felt like I was going to puke as he spit out pieces of the baby onto the stage. I made sure to close my eyes after a while. Is there anyone who would want to see this?

While I detested the plot of the play, I found that the actors did a very good job. Lydia Wilson was convincing as Cate, a young girl who is Ian’s epileptic and unwilling former girlfriend. Danny Webb portrayed Ian and was as terrible and disgusting as the character needed to be. Aidan Kelly also did a fantastic job as the violent soldier. I’m not sure why these actors would choose to do this play, but they were well-suited to their roles. It was interesting to see a play with so few characters on stage, it allowed for a lot of awkward silence during many of the scenes. 

The first scene of the play takes place in a fancy hotel room and I thought the set design was very good. For the rest of the play the set design consisted of the hotel bed alone, but the play really didn’t need much more. Lighting played a crucial role in the play and it definitely added to the scenes. I was unhappy with the ending of the play as it seemed unnatural and abrupt. As audience members, we couldn’t tell if it was the end of the scene or the end of the play. When it became apparent that this was indeed the end, I wasn’t even sure I wanted to applaud. Clapping for such a violent and often painful to watch performance seemed wrong. I left the theatre feeling disgusted and I definitely did not want to talk about it. Perhaps this was Kane’s goal, to make everyone leaving the theatre feel like a soldier who’s seen the tragedies of war and is unwilling to talk about it when they return home. 

Mandy Licata

UCSD