Smock Alley Black Box

***

For the most part, Benjamin Verdonck’s show is, literally, a piece of abstract theatre. The Belgian actor may be the creator of the work and its sole performer, but the real star is the scaled-down wooden stage on which he manipulates geometric forms with a visual sensibility so minimalist it makes a Mondrian painting seem rococo.

On one level, this has all the dramatic impact of a DIY enthusiast pottering about his man cave, particularly when the performance’s other elements have a ramshackle feel to them. Verdonck sets the scene by reciting a Borges poem while dressed as a coat on a hanger – the only time he speaks – before attempting a balancing trick that might warrant a few cent if executed by a street artist but that might not merit shelling out €15 to see in a theatre.

But gradually, proceedings take on a quietly hypnotic hue. Triangular shapes being moved across a plane may not be a promising premise for depth of emotion, but Verdonck somehow imbues this movement with feeling and an offbeam humour.

Cryptic captions about a meeting in a Berlin bar with a man called K tumble from the rafters periodically, which would seem achingly significant were it not for Verdonck’s silently laconic presence: a wry smile is never far away. By the end, when colour fields burn brightly in a darkened room, it is reminiscent of Mark Rothko’s mesmerising images. But even then, Verdonck undercuts any earnestness with a wittily human intervention.

What this all adds up to is another matter – for all the portentous title (from a JRR Tolkien poem), the visual motifs and the echoes of Beckett’s ludic obsessions, there are times when the rough magic and shaggy-dog presentation is ultimately more akin to a Tommy Cooper show. Which is a good thing, obviously.