The Letter Writer

As their second Arts Festival entry (Mary Stuart being their first), Wellington’s Circa Theatre presents the New Zealand premiere of The Letter Writer, written and directed by Juliet O’Brien. Created in collaboration with France’s Plateforme Théâtre in 2008, The Letter Writer is O’Brien’s theatrical return to her Kiwi homeland and tells the story of a young man desperate to make a better life for himself by leaving his country for another. In exile, he employs a professional letter writer who helps him appeal for political asylum and also sends messages to his lover back home.

Peter Hambleton leads the New Zealand/French cast as the titular character Mr. Rouvesquen, a curmudgeonly professional who gave up his dreams of becoming an author for a career spent penning wedding toasts and obituaries. His office is a glum headquarters where he sits, drinks wine, and listens to the same piece of classical music over and over again in search of a ‘correct’ recording. A deeper loss is hinted at below his precise surface, and although Mr. Rouvesquen attempts to remain detached from his refugee client he is ultimately devastated by the young man’s plight.

O’Brien sets her drama in an imagined world, separating the action from contemporary politics. The Letter Writer plays like an extended metaphor, the conceit revolving around an inability for characters to communicate on their own without Mr. Rouvesquen’s semantic abilities. It is hard to believe a modern scenario wherein the 19th century figure of a letter writer would be so pivotal. Certainly in our Skype generation it is difficult to fathom outsourcing one’s love letters to an intermediary stranger – especially one who works only in English while you speak a different language (one that sounds strangely Eastern European).

As an allegory, The Letter Writer might work better if the politics were not overshadowed by these key incongruities in the plot. At the beginning of the play, Lansko departs from his lover Leila in search of a new homeland and we are left to wonder why he would leave her behind, especially with the vague threat of impending danger so close by?

The malleable props used in The Letter Writer were dwarfed by the Mary Stuart set which is still installed on the Circa stage. This forced the action downstage, and almost into audience – a gripping effect. O’Brien choreographed beautiful moments of transition to blend the world of Mr. Rouvesquen’s office with the ‘other’ land where Leila struggles against an unknown oppressor. Set to the original compositions of Stephen Gallagher, The Letter Writer works best in these moments of physical montage, expressing love and loss better than any dialogue could. In a very tender sequence the two lovers find each other beneath the sheets, and O’Brien uses theatrical magic to make characters appear and disappear – these superb transformations perhaps indicative of her French training.

Ultimately the script for The Letter Writer seemed a bit lost in translation, while the movement and style of the piece suggests a far deeper and more nuanced soul. The ambiguities distract from the heart of the play, a story about the power of language and a wordsmith whose latest job affects him far more personally than he has planned. At one point, Mr. Rouvesquen pulls a book from his desk drawer and stares into it as it begins to glow and light up his face. In that moment I wondered, what does he see?

The Letter Writer

7 – 21 March, 2010