FT: My Name Is Rachel Corrie, Playhouse Theatre
By Sarah Hemming
Published by the Financial Times
4 out of 5 stars
In a sense, this production shouldn’t be here. It should be in New York, at the off-Broadway Theater Workshop. But that showing has been withdrawn, so here it is in the West End instead. Good news for London, but this is a piece that should still be seen in New York, whether it ruffles feathers or not.
Rachel Corrie was a 23-year-old American student who joined the International Solidarity Movement in Gaza in 2003. She was run down and killed by an Israeli bulldozer. This piece for theatre (first shown at the Royal Court last April) is composed from her writing – journals, jottings, e-mails – edited and shaped by Katharine Viner and Alan Rickman (who also directs). Every word in it is Rachel’s and so carries the force of authentic experience.
It does not pretend to be impartial – Rachel points out that she has deliberately chosen to help the Palestinian people and it is their perspective she encounters. But the power of the piece arises from its honesty. It presents a shocked, first-hand account of conditions in Gaza, and it offers a portrait of a young woman who left her safe, liberal home to put herself in the line of fire.
Emails from Rachel’s parents and friends make us painfully aware of how worried they were. But this is, rightly, a one-woman show, remarkably delivered by Megan Dodds. Dodds’ superb performance, skilfully shaped by Rickman, fills the theatre, bringing out the intelligence and spirit of her young charge. Rachel can be compassionate, funny and wise, but also naive, bombastic and even infuriating. The last word is given to Rachel herself. The show finishes with a video of her as a 10-year-old, galvanising her schoolmates with a speech about world hunger. We are left with her direct, questioning voice.
