By BRUCE DENNILL
Roland’s Cave / Directed by Shireen Hollier / Theatre On The Square, Sandton, Johannesburg
A rich businessman out on a hike gets caught in bad weather and needs to take shelter in a cave. Stuck there for a while, he finds his mind wandering through his present situation and then delving into his past, processing the events that have brought him to this point in his life – successful in worldly terms but regretful when it comes to the state of some important relationships and the place of his true passions in his life.
Writer and solo cast member Jürgen Hellberg, a former PACT (Performing Arts Council of the Transvaal) member, returns to the stage after many successful years in television and film to meander through musings about ideas, feelings and situations that may apply to his character, Roland, as easily as they apply to him in reality. That perceived grounding in authenticity pervades the piece, beginning with the confirmation in the script (for those who don’t do much hiking) that Roland’s Cave is a real shelter along a trail in the Drakensberg.
The pace and intensity grows as Hellberg grows into the character and the character grows into the narrative. It’s a little uneven up front as the concept is established: he’s just a guy in the middle of nowhere, talking to himself and trying not to be weird while talking about banalities like a roll of toilet paper left in the cave. But as Roland unpacks layers of his psyche he hasn’t confronted until now, Hellberg invests in the character arc with ever more commitment to physical theatre and the music Roland deeply loves but has left behind as he focused on his career. The heart and soul the actor pumps into that part of the performance is engaging, with anyone in the audience who loves art of any kind and has had to sideline that devotion being able to relate to the pain of that broken connection.
Focusing a spotlight on this aspect of the existence of so many (however the individual details differ for people) is important, and Roland’s Cave is a sincere, enthusiastic acknowledgement of an emotional and vocational thread too many don’t spare the energy to investigate.