Many years ago, I
discovered the story of Joan of Arc in the school
library and was struck by the innocence and the passion, the overwhelming
sense of conviction (in every sense of the word) that lay at the heart of her
story. While I was later to rediscover her in Bernard Shaw’s Saint
Joan (very much the ‘definitive’ portrait), Paul
Gilchrist’s Joan, Again – playing at
the Old Fitz Theatre – gives us a new imagining of The Maid of Orléans, a
more mercurial, personal and contemporary Joan than we have met before.
As its title
suggests, Joan, Again is not the story
of the girl who became the legend. Set in 1441, ten years after Joan was burnt
at the stake, it is a play about truths and lies, stories and legends,
identity, fame and Being. While a historical drama in the loosest sense of the
term – that is, being a drama that is based in historical events – it never
purports to be history, and should not be mistaken for such; rather, it is a
clever, smart and enchanting play that asks us if we are truly who we say we
are, if we can believe everything we see or hear, and whether in the end we are
all just stories to be told to other people.
