Review: Crowdfunded Play PSYCHO-LOG Premiere

It's becoming more and more common in Israel for independent theatre artists to use a crowdfunding platform in order to bring their work to life. A recent project that was successfully funded thanks to such a platform is the new play Psycho-Log, written and directed by Ofek Levy, which premiered this week in Tel Aviv.

The play tells about 25 years old Roy who suffers from a psychiatric disorder called Depersonalization, a disorder where the person experiences feeling disconnected or estranged from one's self, as if they are an outside observer of their own thoughts or body. Roy arrives to his weekly session with his psychologist, Udi. During the session, Udi notices deterioration in Roy's mental condition and realizes he will have to confront Roy with the incidents that caused that mental disease and therefore puts him in a state of a deep trance, a condition that enables Roy to go back to those meaningful events in his past.

It's not as common to see plays written on disorders such as Depersonalization, a very original and yet complicated subject to present, and while the play is written in a most personal, deep and varied way, it could have been even better to see and learn more about such a disorder before seeing its results on Roy's life.

Rami Kashy plays Roy with an impressive ability to express the script of almost the entire play and in an intensive role which requires him to present many layers- a task that he handles brilliantly. Every time Roy is taken back to different events from his past by his psychologist Udi, played by Asi Itzhaki, he is joined on stage by the two dancers Yael Averbuch and Noam Liberman, who provide a major dimension to the play with both their dancing and acting skills as they present the brilliant work created by choreographer Edya Stern with her exquisite, unique and risk taking choreography. The rest of the excellent creative team includes assistant director Yuval Gerstner, set designer Ron Bar, lighting designer Daniel Jagendorf and video art creator Assa Danon.

In a short speech given by Ofek Levy during the special curtain call, he said: "I chose to be a theatre creator because I believe that in this way I can make a difference. I can influence others. As a theatre artist what I'm most curious about is to research the human being. His soul, his surrounding, his motives and behaviors. And most importantly, to investigate and present the breaking points without filters and in a sharp and uncompromising way"

It isn't obvious that a play about such a profound subject could be created thanks to crowdfunding and it's inspiring to see such a skillful production being made thanks to the risk their backers took. Let's hope many more productions could become possible and make a difference thanks to such platforms giving a stage to artists like these.

Additional performances of the play will take place in November.

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