Review: INCARNATION - MARIA CARUSO, Theatre Royal Drury Lane

One person shows aren't easy things to do, and the Theatre Royal Drury Lane is a big space to fill, so Maria Caruso has all the cards stacked against her for her new solo performance Incarnation.

The show is a continuation of her 2022 work Metamorphosis, and the first 10 minutes of Incarnation features projected footage of the former performance with Caruso's voice booming throughout the whole theatre.

She talks of many things, shares difficult news of personal losses, but largely tells us of how well Metamorphosis was received and what Incarnation promises. In retrospect the footage content is literally repeated in the new show; Caruso in all kinds of worlds of trouble in different dresses flailing around bits of material.

And that's basically how things unfold for the next 50 minutes. Little build, little to no variation, and, dare I say, little to no obvious point. I've no interest in being unkind, and it's clear that Caruso is a capable, professional dancer, but the show's overall premise and associated content need some serious rethinking.

The set is sparse: two chairs, one table, a clothes rack and a mirror. The rack has numerous dresses hanging on it and Caruso uses them to signify the beginning of new interludes. 

She first appears in a shirt and trousers, gagged and tied to a chair, she struggles for a while and then releases herself. Next she enters in a dressing gown sorting through her mail and a pattern emerges: she sits and pens a letter of which we understand the content via Caruso’s own voice, pre-recorded and narrated in the moment and then puts a (different) dress on and has a bit of a dance.

Certain moments include the addition of props. The first white dress solo sees Caruso use two pieces of shimmering silver material à la Loie Fuller to add to the swishy agenda. Of course what Fuller did was groundbreaking - this isn't the same situation.

A black dress number follows which sees more swishy swirling with a piece of thin black net adding to the proceedings. A red dress moment is next with the addition of a ball of light signifying a positive shift, and a final off white one is the closing number.

As mentioned, a letter is written by Caruso before each movement interlude. They range from evident positivity to serious disillusionment, yet the prose doesn't seem to impact the dance language that follows in any profound way. Yes we may get a slight range in dynamic and facial expression but the choreographic vernacular is literally the same throughout. A combination of triplets, step kick, arabesque pose and pirouette. Caruso covers space, adds the odd moment of floorwork and at one point ballroom dances with the mirror on wheels. But fundamentally speaking we get a few seconds of content endlessly repeated in slight variation with no obvious start, finish or reasoning.

It's obvious Caruso is working through some baggage, but nothing feels seriously addressed, physically or philosophically. I wonder if this is the kind of work one should do alone, or with professional support, as opposed to on stage in front of a paying audience. It all feels a tad self-indulgent in the moment.

After much waiting and obvious frustration Caruso finally receives a letter rather than sending one. And as the content is narrated to us (again) it's clear the bigger message is about self belief and self-love, as Caruso is actually the writer as well as the reader. In this sense Incarnation has a worthwhile underpinning, however the current rendition isn't matching the imagined intention at all. 

Incarnation runs until 3 October at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane

Photo credit: Paulo Lieber