Cumbernauld Theatre, 1 March 2011, and touring

IT IS billed as a play inspired by the story of the wolf-boy of Aveyron, a child who ran wild in the woods of southern France until his discovery in 1800. The unexpected twist of Pamela Carter’s Wild Life, however, is that the wolf-boy makes no appearance – at least, not in three-dimensional form. Rather, in this production for Magnetic North, Carter imagines the effect such a feral creature could have  on a modern-day couple who have banished all traces of wildness from their comfortable, middle-class lives.

David Ireland and Lesley Hart in Magnetic North's Wild LIfe (photo Kirsty Nichol)

If there is one reason to see Nicholas Bone’s production as it tours to Banchory, Tobermory and Dunkeld, it is the perfectly judged performances by Lesley Hart and David Ireland. They have an understated feel for Carter’s living-room chatter, projecting a sense of a couple lovingly in tune with each other. There are no showy displays of passion and no malice behind their disagreements; they’re just two people getting on with the ordinary domestic business of ordering take-away pizza and deciding what dreary film to watch on television.

Ordinary, that is, except for the conversation that leads them to invent a child for themselves. It starts as a casual question: “Is a happy child what you really want at the outset?” From there, they decide what they’d really like is an unfortunate child, one for whom they could be sympathetic and extra caring. Before we know it, they’ve created a feral boy, Tamagotchi-style, on their laptop. Like the wolf-boy of Aveyron, he is called Victor; like the similar case of Ukrainian girl Oxana Melaya, he has been neglected by his alcoholic parents. Let loose on the internet, he seems to take on a life of his own.

Scene from Magnetic North's Wild LIfe (photo Kirsty Nichol)

Carter’s interest, however, is not in how such children survive or what it means to inherit the characteristics of wild animals. Rather, it is in the disruptive effect that the idea of wildness has on a couple who have sealed themselves off from the outside world. Living an atomised life made possible by computers, televisions and CD players, they have become risk averse, cut off from society and scared of anyone they can hear beyond their window.

The idea is strong enough – and the performances well judged enough – to hold the attention for perhaps three-quarters of this good-looking production. Beyond that, it is hard to stay interested in a character who exists only virtually – however disruptive he may be – and in a couple whose political awakening is only just beginning.

© Mark Fisher, 2011

Links

• Magnetic North
• Mark Fisher