Moral thriller investigates the thin line between hate and freedom of speech
Both in Europe and in the USA the politics of the last decade has been dictated by ever polarising division as nations have leaned towards populist leaders and ideas. Our institutions of learning have always been where these ideas are discussed and dissected. Power of Sail, a play by Paul Grellong pivots its action around the invitation of a controversial speaker to attend Harvard and now gets its European debut, writes Christopher Peacock.
Benjamin Carver, a holocaust denier and white supremacist, has been invited to speak at Professor Charles Nichols’ annual symposium at Harvard. Nichols insists the invite is to put Carver on the stage where his ideas can be dismantled in front of everybody. Nichols readily comments that “the only way to combat hate speech is with more speech”.
Amy Katz, a Jewish Dean and Nichols’ favourite alumnus, Baxter Forrest, both try to dissuade him and retract the invite. The leaking of Carver as a speaker snowballs and angry protests sweep across campus. Two favoured grad students and fellowship applicants, Lucas Poole and Maggie Rosen come to discuss with their professor the merits and rights of free speech and how best to deal with the impending visit.
In a face to face meeting between Carver and Nichol at a compound in Maine, with fellowship contender Poole in tow, another student protest ends tragically. What is then revealed in the final scenes are the motives that everybody has kept hidden.
Grellong’s playing with the narrative structure and combative direct language are the tools for this examination of ethics and is the play’s strength. Julian Ovenden as Charles Nichols does feel a little young in the casting but does well with the characterisation of a man who feels like he is losing touch with the cutting edge of academia. Paul Farnsworth’s design has the set spinning and turning from office to train platform and bar, with social media projections on the set in these scene changes it does add to the disquiet feeling.
What I found is that there was a lot of ground the play wants to cover in a short space of time and in the end, rather than giving time for us to see more from the characters, the show moved on. This then meant that the dramatic reveals did not pack as much of a punch as they had intended. Never wanting to achieve resolution, Power of Sail does certainly commit to the task of entertaining and wanting to make its audience think about the themes after the curtains close.
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