The ‘absence of consent’ has been around as long as mankind, and can be found in theatrical texts from The Women of Troy to Titus Andronicus. Closer to home, there has been a growing necessity for modern plays to still tackle the issues of consent, sexual assault and violence, with Imogen Butler-Cole’s Foreign Body, Liv Warden’s Anomaly and Abi Zakarian’s Fabric being some of the best examples of approaching this subject. Esther Simkiss’ Philautia is another worthy addition to this list, in a compact show that’s designed to make the audience ‘feel’.

Darkness. For what seems like a significant amount of time, we hear breathing – not the sort that is calm, relaxed, but laboured, ‘trying to keep it together’. From one corner of the stage walks in Simkiss to the sound of a woman trying to tell a man in no uncertain terms to *go away*. Overlapping with this, we hear women’s experiences how they have been violated in some shape or form. Each anecdote describes a specific set of circumstances, highlighting the many different ways that women have been raped or threatened by men in everyday life.

But while this aural mosaic is taking place, we see Simkiss standing there bare for all to see, vulnerable and symbolic of the way women are viewed as prey by those of a rapacious disposition. For much of the rest of the show, while the audience takes in all the anecdotal evidence, Simkiss sits on a sheet and after dippng her hands at first in a bowl of water, places them in a bowl of coffee granules so that the moist powder sticks to her. She then smears the sticky granules all over her body to give herself a ‘grubby’ complexion. When we see this repeated action in conjunction with the anecdotes playing, we easily see the connection between the women feeling ‘dirty’, violated and the externalisation of these feelings. The dark patches on the skin could also symbolise bruising when violence has been exerted.

There are two things in particular that have really stuck with me from the performance. Firstly, while a number of statistics are mentioned, one woman’s anecdote mentions four of her five best friends have been raped. Think about that. The other thing that’s stuck with me is the anecdote about a predatory man at a party who sized up who was the most inebriated woman there. Even after steps were made to safeguard the incapacitated woman, the man in question went out of his way to find her…

The show doesn’t make for comfortable viewing, but then it isn’t supposed to. In some ways ‘simple’ in its execution, the juxtaposition of the aural and visual elements elicit the appropriate feelings of unease and contemplation.

© Michael Davis 2023

Philautia ran at The Cockpit Theatre as part of the Camden Fringe Festival on 7th and 8th August.