Review: Timely, powerful INCIDENT AT VICHY at Head Trick Theatre

Arthur Miller's 1964 drama explores how fascism paralyzed even those who considered resistance; this production at the Head Trick Theatre strips the play to its bones, focuses on the characters, and delivers a visceral punch.

The 90-minute one-act script follows ten everyday people in 1942 Vichy France picked up in a police dragnet, nominally to check their papers. Miller uses the tension and suspicion -- with the atrocities of the Nazi regime still just whispers -- to explore how Petain's collaborationist regime allowed its citizens to be brutalized. And, taking a page from Hanna Arendt, how the "banality of evil" wormed its way into every corner of society.

Director Rebeca Maxfield reduces the play to its essence: the theatre is a black box with no furniture, no decor, only a handful of props, and a looming door through which characters disappear to be interrogated. Not many return. Maxfield's gender-blind casting helps to update what was a strictly male cast in Miller's text, but is occasionally jarring in a work that specifically references the inspection of genitalia.

The ensemble credibly creates the sense of tension and fear that drives the work, and there are some standout moments, particularly between the psychoanalyst Leduc (played with sensitivity by Blanche Case) and the Austrian prince Von Berg (Neal Leaheey). Andrew Conley turns in a finely nuanced performance as a deeply conflicted army officer pressed into service as part of the interrogation squad.

Miller's text can come across to contemporary ears as a bit expositional and preachy, but Maxfield's direction keeps the action brisk and doesn't dwell on those moments. Instead, she trusts the audience to get the larger message: fascism succeeds by othering and incrementally peeling off targets of opportunity: socialists, Romani, Jews, intellectuals...until there is no one left. The disbelief and fear the remaining population feels provides the space for such dictators to operate. It can't be that bad, everyone tells themselves, wishfully thinking their imprisonment is only a simple check of their papers. "They rely on our own logic to immobilize ourselves," as Leduc says at one point.

Without being overdetermined, Maxfield and the cast offer an object lesson for society today, where the scapegoats may have changed but the methods are all too familiar. "Nothing any longer is forbidden," warns the Austrian prince. If you have never seen this show produced, this is a good time to invest the 90 minutes.

Incident at Vichy, directed by Rebecca Maxfield at the Head Trick Theatre, Thurs 6/22 thru Sun 7/2; 7:30pm evenings; 2pm Sunday matinees. Tickets $25 (Thursday performances are "pay what you can.")   Sunday matinees are followed by talkbacks. Mathewson St. Black Box Theatre/134 Collaborative, 134 Mathewson St. Providence, RI. Online at https://www.headtricktheatre.org/incident-at-vichy/ or at the door.

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