Neanderthal Arts Festival: Chairs – A Parable

Imagine a world where everyone was equal, where hierarchy and institutions of power didn’t exist.

Seriously, picture it.

In that same place, imagine yourself not having to answer to anybody but yourself, and only had to worry about lounging next to your closest friends outside. Pretty awesome, huh?

I saw this very world during the hilarious production of Chairs: A Parable by ITZAZOOProductions at the Cultch, as part of the Neanderthal Arts Festival. Chairs took its audience on a journey, accurately detailing what happens when three men attempt to build themselves a civilized existence through team work on a barren wasteland. The hilarious trio (played by Sebastien Archibald, Coby Wilson, and Cameron Anderson) begin the play by living contently with their uneventful and very equal life consisting of sitting in the sun, and protecting one an other when it rains. After one of the men becomes furious with his idle life, he decides to build something – a ‘chair’- which puts him in a place of power among his friends. Now being able to check out the land beyond the hills that they were all once so accustomed to, his position and abuse of power tests his friends,and causes them to take drastic measures into their own hands…by building a second chair! What happens after that is ensuing hilarity and an accurately depicted tale displaying what happens when such people rise to power and discard all traces of equality and fairness.

Written by Sebastien Archibald, Chairs brought a combination of theatre, animation, and sound. The comedic timing was dead on, and I was that person in the audience who found every single joke funny because of it.

Seriously, though. I laughed out loud at just about everything because the actors’ delivery of their lines were so clean and unexpected. For example, when the word “fuck” was introduced to them for the very first time, they used it nonsensically and threw it within every couple of words. It was hysterical, especially how excited they became when it was introduced to them.

Overall, Chairs is a show that gets you asking: is sitting amongst equality the perfect world, or do we need some sort of order and power to get things done? Thank you to the Neanderthal Arts Festival for accommodating Youth in 57 Minutes, and the best of luck to the cast and crew of Chairs!

Photo credit: Review Vancover

About the Author: Racquel Belmonte

Racquel is a struggling voice over actress who will be starting her third year as a Communications Major and Publishing Minor at SFU in the fall. Aside from sounding like a ten year old boy, she prides herself in being able to find lightness and humour in any given situation and considers every opportunity an opportunity for laughter and fun. Racquel is very interested in youth culture, most specifically how youth is represented in media and how youth are marketed. She likes most people and loves meeting and working with a diverse range of individuals. When she?s not doing essays, hanging out with friends, or stalking celebrities on Twitter, Racquel is learning how to sing so that she will land a role on Glee as the love interest of any of the show's characters...ANY of them.

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