Emily Hughes in ‘Goodbye Esther’, Photo by Kaylens Photography
Goodbye Esther, an intimate and ambitious circus-theatre-clown show, is a haunting examination of one woman’s headspace as she navigates memory and grief. It is a relatively short experience, but creator Emily Hughes and her collaborators have packed it with so much ominous, wistful and whimsical detail, the atmosphere is abundantly rich and textured.
The immersive pre-show installation that guides audience members into the space feels very Nuit Blanche. We are each given a sheet of paper and invited to draw a face that will take its place on a wall of crude portraits. A Billie Holliday record plays as we pass through. Esther herself is huddled in a chair as we rifle through her drawers, explore her collection of trinkets; she doesn’t seem to mind.
Hula hoops, torn out feathers, and dirt establish the motif of an earthy, foreboding circus that defines the performance. Vaguely creepy Bird Beings (who also serve as tech crew) nudge elements of the set and properties into an alignment that satisfies them. Esther enters, anxious and vulnerable yet entirely determined. With her cumbersome collection of bags, makes her way along the thick rope strewn across the stage. She precariously negotiates its twists and turns, dreading the points in her journey that put her in direct contact with some yawning, awful void.
We get the sense of rules and a timeline in this metaphorical space. The Bird Beings are strict yet compassionate as they enable Esther to heal from, atone for, come to terms with… some awful thing that has happened. She’s lost someone important. The name Gertrude comes up; perhaps she was the bird-like trapeze artist Esther lovingly recalls. Esther herself is on borrowed time.
Hughes combines elements of clown and mime in her emotive portrayal of the elderly Esther. She coaxes the audience into complicity as she tries to cheat the system, then face her trauma and finally allow herself to transcend and evolve as part of a cycle of death and regeneration. Some of these themes are explicit, but others must be grasped at intuitively as Esther engages with a diverse array of familiar and uncanny phenomena.
Esther has fond memories of and a great affinity for Big Top pageantry. We are treated to some juggling and trapeze, though Hughes’ work with aerial fabrics is an astonishing highlight. As she ascends and descends, wraps and unwraps herself, it functions as both elegant spectacle and an evocative abstraction. Esther is caught in life’s relentless tendrils, but she cavorts within them for her own delight as well as ours.
Hughes and her design team immerse us in Esther’s experience with simple yet fanciful stagecraft. Images projected onto shifting surfaces, explosions of feathers and glowing orbs help maintain a dreamlike vibe. It’s very spooky and sad, but also hilarious. When Hughes portrays a gross, distrustful alchemist, her grumbling gibberish and disgusting potion is some of the funniest stage business of recent memory.
She also fosters a potent communal atmosphere. The audience immersion is gentle and sparing, but substantial enough to not feel like a gimmick. Depending on where you sit, you may find yourself in direct interaction with Esther or her clan of quirky, eldritch oddballs.
The mise en scène and non-verbal aspects of the performance are deeply resonant, but the straight spoken segments that fell flat for me. Hughes is a master of interpretive flourishes that feel authentically human; the conventional text is, by contrast, a little banal and detracts from all that redolent, allusive magic.
On the whole, Goodbye Esther is innovative, insightful, moving and genuinely fun.