Review: Quantum Theatre’s 'Far Away' brings thought-provoking theater to your living room

While live theater has struggled in the shifting landscape of the pandemic, always-experimental Quantum Theatre has taken the difficulties in stride and created a digital season.

Its current production, “Far Away,” which is available for at-home streaming until March 7, flourishes within the video medium, showing a bleak, abstract portrait of a dystopian society at war with itself and everything in it.

Written by Caryl Churchill, “Far Away” is a compact, 45-minute play in three sections. It follows three characters, Joan, Harper and Todd, through their lives in a hyper-partisan society where everything, even inanimate objects, appear to be embroiled in a life-or-death battle. The characters are forced to confront the ever-shifting moral questions of a spiraling political landscape.

This is not a play for a cozy Saturday night on the couch, but it is a challenging and empathetic piece that sticks in the mind long after the credits roll.

The three actors, Lisa Velten Smith (Joan), Ingrid Sonnichsen (Harper) and Andrew William Smith (Todd), are magnetic in their roles, especially Velten Smith, who deftly acts the subtle earthquakes of several traumatic moments. Sonnichsen, whose decades of acting experience are evident in her multifaceted performance, plays Joan’s aunt, Harper, with contrasting force and compassion. Smith’s Todd is subtle and human, but is the audience’s best surrogate, reaching a broken crescendo by the play’s close.

The dialogue is often subtle, but at other times shocking, and there are sparks and pops of riveting tension. It is important to pay attention to every second, as each moment is crucial in such a short play. This is a time when video is advantageous, giving small-but-crucial transitional scenes the importance they deserve.

Video also allows the play’s creative team more freedom to bring a foreign-but-familiar world to life. The lighting design by Sydney Asselin shines, ranging from the familiar glow of a homey living room on a cold night to the stark bleakness of a city that’s become a battlefield. The musical and sound choices also provide an air of tension and foreboding that heightens the production’s increasingly anxious atmosphere.

Director of photography Joe Seamans and cinematographer Mark Knobil open up the play’s scope while still maintaining its theatricality. “Far Away” is directed by Karla Boos, Quantum Theatre’s founding artistic director.

It would be difficult to discuss “Far Away” without mentioning the elephant in the room. The play was written more than 20 years ago, and it may take place in a much scarier landscape than our current one, but it is nearly impossible to avoid a profound sense of recognition. In her final monologue, Joan says, “Who’s going to mobilize darkness and silence? That’s what I wondered in the night.” In this dystopia, everything, from computer programmers to deer to rivers, has been divided into “our side” or “the other side.”

There is a timeless-yet-timely political and social message to be found within these characters’ struggles. At the beginning of the first section, a young Joan witnesses a frightening incident perpetrated by her uncle while visiting Harper, and Harper is able to convince her that, despite how the incident appeared, they are all on the right side. By the end of the play, the lines of right and wrong have been so blurred that even the characters don’t know which side they’re on.

Dystopian media has found mainstream popularity over the past decade or so, and this production will definitely feel familiar for fans of works like “1984” and “The Hunger Games.” The play doesn’t excel at fleshing out the world that these characters inhabit, mostly because of its length, but the glimpses that the audience does get pack quite a punch. Parts of the material feel abstract, even poetic, and it can be hard to tell what’s real and what’s surreal.

As with many things over the past year, I have to wonder how big of a difference a live performance of this show would make, especially with the inventive and often immersive staging for which Quantum Theatre is known. That being said, there isn’t as strong a sense of separation from the actors as I was expecting when watching through a screen instead of inside a theater. While “Far Away” is unmistakably meant to be a play, with set design that invokes that medium, the actors were able to lend more subtlety to their performances than would be expected in a staged show.

Digital productions also allow a wider audience to experience theater. After purchasing access, viewers have 72 hours to watch the show, and ticket prices are set at several pay-what-you-can levels.

Especially considering its current relevance, Quantum Theatre’s production of “Far Away” is a worthy watch. It may not be a light-hearted romp, but if you are looking for an innovative and thought-provoking theater experience in the comfort of your own home, Quantum Theatre can deliver.

Alexis Papalia is a Tribune-Review contributing writer.