When Dramaten and Stockholm City Theater are driven to collaborate because of the renovation of their regular main scenes, it becomes so luxurious that I bax. Almost twenty people on stage, an ensemble of perfectly outstanding actors, who could almost all play a leading role, but instead work collectively in a very excellent orchestrated work. It is difficult to determine whether it is the subject, Arthur Miller's text or the respect for each other that does, but I have rarely seen so many actors work with such humility before each other and their material.
One by one , they step into the action and into the simple stage room consisting of church benches, a planer bench and a huge light rig. Those who have previously been on stage give way to new voices - The Witch Hunt is a large ensemble work, which Alexander Mørk-Eidem has directed, not to say directed with great brilliance.
The play may have been placed in the witch-persecution's Salem in the 17th century and written as a result of McCarthyism in the 1950s, but no one can avoid drawing parallels to more current events. Or to other works, such as Ibsen's An Enemy of the People or, for that matter, Lars von Trier's Dogville - these too tell about how a mob of racers creates mass hysteria with devastating consequences. When the latter was set up at the Folkteatern in Gothenburg, it was also us in the audience who sat in the church benches and were allowed to form a congregation.
Abusing power is nothing new under the stars. The great thing about this set is that the black and white image of right and wrong is complicated by full-fledged characters and a director with great human knowledge. Here you can find sympathy for most people, most probably with Shanti Roney's John Proctor who goes to death rather than lying.
As a spectator, you can be horrified by the unfounded rumor spread, the questioning, the guilt and the stating, but when the many spotlights are turned on the audience at the end of the play, it is a clear call to us to examine ourselves around our own role as the drive goes.