I Woke Up Feeling Electric Vault Festival

‘An intriguing start to Bloomer’s tenure’: I WOKE UP FEELING ELECTRIC – Hope Theatre

In London theatre, Musicals, Opinion, Plays, Reviews by Ian FosterLeave a Comment

Hope Theatre, London – until 22 February 2020

Incoming artistic director Kennedy Bloomer’s reign at the Hope Theatre begins with this quirky little thing from first time writer Jack Robson. In an ever increasingly digital age, I Woke Up Feeling Electric takes the step of anthropomorphising the AI assistants who now adorn many of our homes and devices and asks what life might be like on the other side of the technological divide.

The play starts strongly, all kinds of comic mileage extracted Robson’s conception of Bertie (such is this Siri-like figure named) as a digital Jeeves, responding to any and every request from his unseen owner for information or alarm snooze or calendar reminder with a patient smile and chirpy demeanour. But at the moment when he’s asked to sync with a new, faster, sleeker device – Vita – trouble starts brewing and not the sort you can fix just by turning it off and on again.

As a comedy, I Woke Up… works well, mainly due to Robson’s easy charm and the immediate charge that the arrival of Christine Prouty’s Vita brings. And there’s also a darker thread that lies just beneath the surface, pointing to our over-reliance on tech and our wilful ignorance of the implications of the terabytes of personal data it collates  and how it can be abused. Then, as the AI rivalry kicks in, notions of consciousness arrive and start to scramble your brain with their possibilities.

Jacopo Panizza’s production navigates this struggle with a keen eye, aided immeasurably by the evocative elegance of Giorgia Lee Joseph’s sleek production design. And both Robson and Prouty impress as the power balance slowly but inexorably shifts in favour of the shiny and new. An intriguing start to Bloomer’s tenure which promises much.

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Ian Foster
Since 2003, Ian Foster has been writing reviews of plays, sometimes with a critical element, on his blog Ought to Be Clowns, which has been listed as one of the UK's Top Ten Theatre Blogs by Lastminute.com, Vuelio and Superbreak. He averages more than 350+ shows a year. He says: "Call me a reviewer, a critic or a blogger, and you will apparently put someone or other's nose out of joint! So take it or leave it, essentially this is my theatrical diary, recording everything I go to see at the theatre in London and beyond, and venturing a little into the worlds of music and film/TV where theatrical connections can be made."
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Ian Foster on FacebookIan Foster on RssIan Foster on Twitter
Ian Foster
Since 2003, Ian Foster has been writing reviews of plays, sometimes with a critical element, on his blog Ought to Be Clowns, which has been listed as one of the UK's Top Ten Theatre Blogs by Lastminute.com, Vuelio and Superbreak. He averages more than 350+ shows a year. He says: "Call me a reviewer, a critic or a blogger, and you will apparently put someone or other's nose out of joint! So take it or leave it, essentially this is my theatrical diary, recording everything I go to see at the theatre in London and beyond, and venturing a little into the worlds of music and film/TV where theatrical connections can be made."

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