Breakbone – is this a love letter?

As the day almost certainly draw shorter, and summer has passed, the world seems to be precariously balanced for the long, dark winter ahead. The long list of suffering, victims of war, famine and poverty continues to grow.

I found myself watching a production called ‘Breakbone’ at the Rosemary Branch in Haggerston, which explores the plight of just one of these topics: dengue fever in the Dominican Republic. Thank you to Teatro Utopia for giving me a couple of tickets to see this production.

So far this year – according to the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) – 9,153 cases have been reported and sadly 9 people have lost their lives. And perhaps knowing this context, I’d have better prepared myself for this one-person play.

The lead, Victor Arcturus Estrella, plays a Dominican artist suffering through severe hallucinations to explore this fever. It’s abstract, conceptual and jumps across many styles of performance, such that you never quite know what’s coming next. Estrella’s energy, seamlessly transitioning through the different scenes was formidable as he brought an audience on this journey.

There is no linear narrative to this piece in line with the characters vivid hallucinations, and it challenges the viewer to truly engage, which isn’t always easy, especially when – perhaps it’s naive of me to admit – there isn’t much awareness of dengue fever in contemporary Britain. At points, I therefore found myself lost in the moment, yet enjoying the multidisciplinary performances, testament to the creative team behind the piece.

In particular, there were a few moments that stayed with me afterwards. One was about visiting a cemetery and buying flowers and the other was a scene where Estrella’s character uses ice to soothe mosquito bites, lamenting his fear of the disease.

Of course, we should also speak about the use of the set, lighting and sound design helps transport us into the vivid imaginations of Estrella’s character. The dynamism of utilising different lighting techniques and a cacophony of sounds, sometimes so harsh that our protagonist can barely be heard above the noise or seen through the darkness add to a feeling of eeriness.

Ultimately as a viewer, I wondered the politics of this performance and asked myself is question: Is this a love letter to the Dominican Republic in spite of dengue, a call for global intervention to end the suffering, or simply a comment on the realities faced by those who have been infected.

Cast Victor Arcturus Estrella; Directed and devised by Francisco Noulibos; Written and devised by Victor Arcturus Estrella; Scenic and Costume Design by Christophe Eynde; Lighting and Video Design by Conor Costelloe; Original Music by Adriano Sang; Photography by Sim Ahmed; Produced by Valeria Suaste and Victor Arcturus Estrella.