123 School Work

Game between Director and Actor Metadrama and Role playing in Sharon Pollocks Blood Relations

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  Metadrama is self-reflexive drama; such is the case in Sharon Pollock's play, Blood Relations. Blood Relations uses metatheatre or metadrama to explore the historical deaths of Andrew and Abbie Borden whose daughter Lizzie is suspected of their murders. Pollock chooses not to retell the story through a direct narrative by Lizzie, but instead, to send Lizzie on a self-reflexive journey acted out by an anonymous Actress, in which Lizzie will "paint the background" (Wyile 191) of the deaths. In this way, "Pollock writes scenes for an actor playing an Actress playing Lizzie Borden" (Wyile 193). Pollock sets the play ten years after the murders, creating what she calls, a "dream thesis" (Stone-Blackburn 171), as the characters from 1892 are imaginary, except the Actress, Lizzie, and Emma. The audience is introduced to a "game," in which an "Actress," under Lizzie's guidance, will undergo the same circumstances that led Lizzie to the supposed murder of her parents. The Actress ultimately, chooses the same supposed fate as Lizzie does, the murder of the Bordens. In this way, Pollock sets out to demonstrate that anyone in Lizzie's circumstances would do as Lizzie had supposedly done. The play within the play and the role-playing between the Actress and Lizzie creates ambiguity throughout the work as the lines of identity between the two characters are blurred. Pollock, through metadrama, can explore the circumstances that Lizzie faced leading up to the Borden murders without ever having to answer the question: "Did you Lizzie?..