Bernard-Marie Koltès’ Roberto Zucco (translated by Martin Crimp) is currently playing at Buddies in Bad Times in a production directed by ted witzel. It’s a piece from the 1980s, written as Koltès was dying of AIDS and set in the mean streets of the less salubrious part of a European city, perhaps Paris.

Zucco is a killer.  He is imprisoned for killing his father and then escapes from jail.  He then kills his mother, a detective and the 15 year old son of a bourgeoise who becomes infatuated with him.  Along the way he encounters a dysfunctional family and rapes the fifteen year old younger daughter.  The drunken father, ineffectual mother and maudlin elder sister prove useless and  the brother decides that the appropriate reaction to his sister’s rape is to sell her into prostitution.  Zucco is eventually rearrested and dies trying to escaper from jail.  Chuck in a couple of brutal, corrupt and incompetent cops, a few whores and some prurient bystanders and that’s pretty much it.  Par for the course for a French intellectual dying of AIDS?

To be fair to the cast and crew though they made a real effort to create something theatrically worthwhile.  The set design (Michelle Tracy) was clever and flexible, the lighting (Logan Raju Cracknell) and sound design (Dasha Plett) was spectacular and the acting was good across the board with the ensemble cast of Samantha Brown, Jakob Ehman, Fiona Highet, Daniel MacIvor, Kwaku Okyere and Oyin Oladejo mostly playing multiple roles except for Ehman who played Zucco.

That said, an hour and a half of brutal nihilism is not my thing.  YMMV.

Roberto Zucco plays at Buddies in Bad Times until October 5th.

Photo credits: Jeremey Mimnagh.