SHANIQUA IN ABSTRACTION - REVIEW OF WATSON’S PLAY AT CROW’S THEATRE

Reviewed by James Karas

Shaniqua in Abstraction is a new play written and performed by bahia watson. It is a solo performance and watson deserves huge credit for a bravura performance. Shaniqua is a woman of mixed race with blond hair and dreadlocks. watson takes on half a dozen or more personalities from a modern woman to a nineteenth century slave, to a young mother and microphone-in-hand performer. She adopts different accents, does dance steps and acts with ferocious energy when necessary and more quietly when need be. The performance lasts about 75 minutes without intermission.    

bahia watson as Shaniqua. Photo by Roya DelSol

What the play is about is more difficult to describe. “In abstraction” of the title may indicate that this is not a straight narrative about Shaniqua. There is much said about black and mixed-race women in an impressionistic way so that we get  numerous vignettes but rarely a concrete picture. Watson deals with the relations between black men and white women, black men and black women and white men with black women.

Like a chameleon, watson takes us through the time periods indicated above and the different personalities but being an abstract or an impressionistic portrait there is no coherent narrative. It often sounded like a stream-of-consciousness recitation of memories, or expressions of thoughts that went through Shaniqua’s mind that she shared with us.

The production is done in the small Studio Theatre and there is liberal use of lighting effects and projected videos including some news reports about black women. Warson wears an orange exercise outfit and portrays the many facets of Shaniqua's life or the lives of black and mixed-colour women but the details provided are too numerous, quick and opaque for me to retain more than an impression of what I was watching.

The set by Echo Zhou consists of a chair and a bench with the rear of the stage  used for projections  of shimmering lights, videos of news reports and some titles designed by Kimberly Purteil.

watson’s performance is worth seeing, otherwise be prepared for impressionistic, abstract, stream-of-consciousness theatre.   

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Shaniqua in Abstraction by bahia watson. a Crow’s Theatre production in association with   paul watson productions and Obsidian Theatre Company,  continues until April 28, 2024, in the Studio Theatre of Streetcar/Crowsnest Theatre, 345 Carlaw Avenue, Toronto, Ontario.  http://crowstheatre.com/