Theatre really can be radical

I once said to an activist friend of mine that I was tired of having to defend theatre—and immediately felt embarrassed because she's dedicated her life to fighting for a better future, and what have I done? But she said she didn't understand how anyone would think theatre isn't important. And yes, some playwrights are more overtly political but (she said) we don't all have to be Vaclav Havel to be making theatre that is engaged, provocative and heart-opening. I thought of her when my lovely publishers Nick Hern Books sent me this story about the Occupy the London Stock Exchange protestors doing a reading of Jerusalem. I loved Jez Butterworth's play. It said so much about what I think we all long for—an atavistic connection with landscape and wilderness, a sense of magic, myth and ritual, and an anarchic questioning of how things are. (I'd tried to write about these longings myself with the tree sit in Cling To Me Like Ivy.) And this protestors' story shows just how radical the play really is. When a play's really exciting, the conversation goes on long after the curtain falls (not that it has yet, on Jerusalem...you've got till January) And it keeps on going; my friend Matthew Morrison's written about it too.