Review: Kipupiste

Helsinki City Theatre: Pain Point (3.10.2013)

What? – Pain Point, written by Bengt Ahlfors and Johan Bargum. Translated by Liisa Urpelainen, directed by Kari Heiskanen

Who or who? – Helsinki City Theatre.

How? – Kipupiste tells the story of playwright Lars Norén’s (Jouko Klementtilä) prison theatre project at the end of the last millennium. The idea for the project came from three of Sweden’s most dangerous prisoners. Carl (Niko Saarela), Mats (Sampo Sarkola) and Tony (Tommi Rantamäki) manage to turn the suspicious Norén’s head and the hugely popular performance 7:3 is born, which is also decided to be taken outside the prison, on a tour at Riksteatern.
The manuscript by Bengt Ahlfors and Johan Bargum is based on Elisabeth Åsbrink’s book Smärktpunkten.

What was successful? – Kari Heiskanen’s direction and adaptation is intimate and quite successful. For 1.5 hours, Heiskanen offers a concise presentation that does not contain too much extra or unnecessary. Heiskanen has eliminated unnecessary pathos from the performance, everything is clinical and thus threatening. One of the most successful scenes is the shooting incident narrated by the police, which is executed in a subtly stylized way.
The actors have embraced Heiskanen’s direction well. Saarela, Sarkola and Rantamäki form an electric trio in terms of atmosphere. Leenamari Unho and Marjut Toivanen are convincing as representatives of the prison.
The auditorium of the small stage is set up in a circle around tragic events. Antti Mattila’s set design rests on one level, benches, a table and a car. The use of the pyörö gave rhythm and brought interesting perspectives to the performance.

What is not? – Towards the end of the performance, the dramaturgy begins to fall apart. For example, the speech of the policeman’s common-law wife remains quite detached.

What did you get out of it? – The show ended suddenly. It felt like I had only seen a scratch of the surface of the performance. I would have liked to see more! The prison theatre project seemed interesting, and it would have been interesting to hear what happened to the prisoners after the project.

Thought/thought/question? – There were regrettably few spectators at Thursday night’s performance. Don’t these kinds of proposals appeal to the majority population? At least I can warmly recommend the performance to the sceptics: go and see a well-made drama!

Stars? – Four stars. Thank you