Norwegian playwright Jon Fosse is not so well known in the United States, but that has not stopped Scena Theatre from presenting his work. The 2019 staging of Sea featured a cast of characters who couldn’t agree whether they were on water or land. So while absurdism was to be expected when Scena first announced plans to present the U.S. premiere of Fosse’s 2021 play Strong Wind, few probably could have predicted that he would receive the Nobel Prize in Literature on Oct. 5.
The play begins with the Man, played by Stas Wronka, who descends the aisle steps, dressed in a brown shirt, khakis, and jacket. The space is black except for the grids projected on the walls to imply a darkened room illuminated only by what comes through the window panes. The Man says he has stood, or sat, by—he is uncertain of which—the window, peering out. It occurs to him that he has looked out many windows in the many places he has lived over the years. “The important thing is that it is me who looks out the window,” he tells the audience.
Much like French philosopher and scientist René Descartes, the Man seems to be engaged in a project to reconstruct his world from that one point of certainty: He looks out the window, even if he is uncertain about whether he looks out the same window twice or if whatever he saw out the window is the same thing he saw last time.
The Man starts to express his disgust for the term “wink-of-the-eye,” and considering his confusion between winking and blinking (one of a few simple gestures and philosophical concepts Wronka mines for physical comedy), it becomes evident that Fosse is satirizing much of the history of Western philosophy. The wink is gesture of amusement or shared secret, but “Blink-of-the-Eye” is a key term in German philosopher Martin Heidegger’s 1927 work, Being and Time, signifying the instant in which a person experiences their own authenticity in the flux of time. At least the Man is certain that God is eternal.
Of course, the Man is not the only person in his world. He is in an unfamiliar place, inhabited by the Woman (Sissel Bakken), whom he loves. She moved to a 14th floor apartment in an unnamed city while he was traveling (to where and for what purpose is unknown). He does not like the new apartment at all. It is too far up, the winds at that height are too strong, they are surrounded by glass buildings, and he cannot see the ground when he looks out the window. At first the only explanation the Woman offers for the move is, “I had to.” Over her dark blue dress she wears a tunic of red, gold, and violet stripes—the first bright colors to appear on stage.
Very soon an explanation arrives in the form of the Young Man (Robert Sheire), the woman’s new lover. Whereas the Man is clean shaven with a conservative haircut, his rival is bearded with long hair. The Man is conservatively dressed; his rival wears skinny jeans with ripped knees, a striped shirt, and a faux sheepskin coat—without question, costume designers Carolan Corcoran and Mei Chen have given each character a unique personal style.
Ever the phenomenologist, the Man narrates his confusion as he witnesses the lovers kissing and writhing together, and he narrates incredulously as he watches the lovers engaging in a new kink. He simply cannot comprehend why the Woman takes pleasure in the Young Man biting her foot or why he desires to bite it. It’s as if the concept of a kink is altogether foreign to the Man. Perhaps it is the occupational hazard of a certain mode of philosophy by which the thinker disconnects from their own emotions and yet expects the world to comply with those unacknowledged feelings.
Despite the very small audience of 12 when I attended a Sunday matinee (I am told that opening night was in front of a packed house), once the premise was clear, the laughter was nearly constant. Fosse may call what he has written “a scenic poem,” and poetry may be an apt description of his stylized language (translated by May–Brit Akerholt), but on stage it becomes an existentialist sex farce. Director Robert McNamara and the cast have embraced the comedy in the over-the-top choreography of undulations, finger weaving, and kisses and biting between the Woman and her lover. In between the couple’s attempts to encourage the Man to leave, the Young Man proposes some compromises that are entirely too kinky for the now jilted husband. The Man simply wants to live in a world where reality lines up with the facts he’s constructed and organized his own life around: The Woman is his wife; she loves him; he is the one who sleeps with her. To the Man, these facts are as certain as to him God’s eternal nature and that he is the one looking out the window.
Composers Roger Doyle and Andrew Bellware provide an intriguing score of electronic and electroacoustic music for this production.
Fosse’s Strong Wind is weird and philosophical, kinky and comedic; he knows that every strong farce needs an ending that seems inevitable: a Chekhovian window, wind, and existential crisis.
Scena Theatre presents Strong Wind by Jon Fosse, translated by May-Brit Akerholt and directed by Robert McNamara, at DC Arts Center. scenatheatre.org. $15–$38.25.