We take a look at how critics have been reacting to the production directed by Sacha Wares.
The Guardian: **** “The problem, as is so often the case with productions about social justice, is to do with reach. The Young Vic’s Maria theatre feels like a back-room space. This material should be front and centre so that those who still talk about “benefits cheats” are forced to encounter it.”
The Stage: ***** “Shattering VR experience explores the human cost of austerity.”
All That Dazzles: **** “Described as a blend of theatre, history and humanity – A place to reflect on the past and confront the future, it does exactly that, creating a unique and profoundly moving experience. Can I say I enjoyed it? Enjoy would be the wrong word – this is an experience that is designed to shine a light on the failings that have happened previously and make you sit up and take notice.”
WhatsOnStage: ***** “It’s a stark and angry piece of activist theatre. In a space that serves as a waiting room and a quiet moment to process afterwards, there is a timeline of austerity on the wall. It lays out in facts and figures and damning UN reports the politicians who are the architects and upholders of austerity, whose decisions and callousness are still wreaking untold harm. While arguably the people who most need to see this will not, there is no one who should feel they can look away.”
British Theatre Guide: “Each story grabs our attention despite the disturbing nature of its content. This unusual theatrical event is a thoughtful, unexpected way of learning about people that might only ever appear to us as statistics. They are linked together by the shared cruelty of the benefit system. Not all eight can be viewed in the thirty-five-minute time allocation, and visitors are counselled on ways to manage this potentially traumatic experience.”
Broadway World: *** “The production doesn’t need melodrama to make its case. The architecture of the piece – minimal, reverential, cold – tells you what you’re standing in. You’re not in a gallery. You’re in a hall of state-sponsored murders.”
Time Out : *** “All in all it feels like technologically transitional work: in five years time there will doubtless be something out there that’s like this, but better. Still, it could do with sharper storytelling, that tells a bigger story about austerity Britain. But it’s a bold idea, and the individual accounts within are powerful.”
The Standard: ** “The framing of these people as mute, inert exhibits has a distancing effect that goes beyond the exposure of our complicity in their plight. Ditto the clunky VR imagery and equipment, which remains the antithesis of a live theatrical experience, and which gives the “cast” (there’s no acting involved, obviously) a plasticized look as if they’ve been generated by computer.”
The Reviews Hub: **** 1/2 “Surprisingly, for an experience so short, with a headset that is not entirely comfortable, using rigidly flat-textured holograms, Museum of Austerity is one of the most emotional and format-altering works available in London. It feels mandatory viewing for all citizens. It should, at the very least, be mandatory for every MP.”
Museum of Austerity continues to play at the Young Vic Theatre until the 16th January.