The Promise of authenticity
by Caitlin Murphy
I have often thought that the greatest existential torture I could ever experience would be false imprisonment. How would you possibly sustain yourself when your inner truth and imposed reality were so diametrically, diabolically opposed? The Third Eye Ensemble explores this very question in The Exonerated, a piece of documentary theatre by Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen. With a cast of 11, the play is a symphony of voices, and though it hits a few notes very well, the range is limited. What it does, it does quite well, but I don’t think it does enough.
“Culled from interviews, letters, transcripts, case files and the public record,” The Exonerated, directed by Kent McQuaid, gives voice to six death row inmates who were eventually acquitted. Their stories of false imprisonment for the most specious of reasons serve largely as a history lesson in America’s racist, homophobic past. Third Eye Ensemble, founded primarily by recent Dawson and Concordia graduates, first presented this play last year in a limited sold-out run, and chose to do a full re-mount this year, in part to honour the script’s tenth anniversary.
