Play an eye-opener - Northern Advocate - 5th April 2010 (Pat & Warren Slater)

When a play is deemed controversial, you feel you must see it for yourself to form an opinion. That’s what took five of us to a play, “The Eight” (Reindeer Monologues), on Tuesday night. To be honest, after a lady had written about it recently, we were all a little reluctant and felt we may not be able to cope. However, our perception was very different to what had been described. As we all see things differently, some things are simply factual, what they are, the time, the sun rising in the east etc, etc, but dramas provoke all sorts of emotions and thoughts. Our backgrounds also play a large part of how things can impact on us. The lady, who felt this play was unacceptable, obviously has good reason to feel that way and one sympathizes with the rawness of her feelings. If she reads this I hope she realizes that what we witnessed from the audience, young and old and from varied backgrounds, was that they had their eyes opened. The crowd’s behavior was never raunchy, as one could have expected. We believe they too realized we all need to look closer at what is happening to many in our community, perhaps next door and not just someone else’s street and to all types of people.

Perhaps now more people are aware that even those thought of as ‘good guys’ can have a real dark side to them. There were a few laughs in the house, but mostly people were quietly listening, focused on intense messages each reindeer portrayed and on a couple of occasions you could have heard a pin drop.

It was not a light hearted drama, but we felt it did have its benefit. It made us think and talk about a subject that needs more attention paid to it, abuse! The only downfall is, although we are all adults, Santa may be seen in a different light!

Pat & Warren Slater

Maunu