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created by Rebecca Northan & Bruce Horak with Ellis Lalonde

Spontaneous Theatre, Stratford Festival, Studio Theatre, Stratford

October 18-November 1, 2025

Kragva: “Pretending is stupid”

If you thought that Goblin:Macbeth was funny, just wait till you see Goblin:Oedipus. Both pieces are the creations of Rebecca Northan and Bruce Horak, Co-Artistic Directors of Spontaneous Theatre. Spontaneous Theatre has just finished its run of the hilarious Murder-on-the-Lake at the Shaw Festival, making it the first company in history to be represented at both major theatre festivals in Ontario in the same season. In Goblin:Macbeth the Goblins mooted the notion of performing Oedipus. To see them actually do it is a wildly rumbustious experience that, strangely enough, also provides insight into what makes theatre so exciting.

Goblin:Macbeth introduced the same three Goblins – Kragva, Moog and Wug – who appear in Goblin:Oedipus. (Their real names intentionally remain a mystery.) Goblin:Macbeth focussed primarily on how goblins are different from humans (e.g., they have 17 different genders) and on the Goblins’ attempt to understand humans by performing a play by the playwright that human’s acclaim as their best (i.e., Shakespeare). Goblin:Oedipus repeats some of the introduction to the earlier, such as their hatred of how Tolkien portrays them, but here the Goblins are more intent on understanding the nature of theatre itself. For that reason, they go back to the fons et origo of European theatre, namely Ancient Greece. The Goblins noted that during their Macbeth, the heart rates and breathing of the members of the audience became synchronized. They wonder whether it was only because of Macbeth or whether all plays produce that effect.

As in Goblin:Macbeth, Moog plays only one part in the play, here the Messenger from Corinth. Otherwise, Moog provides the live soundscape and sound effects to accompany the play. Again, Wug plays the title role and Kragva is assigned all the other roles. This time, however, the Goblins decide to treat their acting as a competition with the audience left to vote at the end to choose the winner. If Wug wins, we all go home safe and sound. If Moog wins, they will allow him to produce a Christmas play since he’s so fascinated by the idea. If Kragva wins, she will have sex with a pre-selected member of the audience.

After the Goblins have explained their plans, they are ready to begin stating that in Ancient Greece theatre festivals began with a public orgy. Unfortunately, before we can start, stage manager Meredith Johnson (the actual stage manager of the show), steps in and tells the Goblins that such behaviour is forbidden since it is illegal. Much put out, the Goblins give in to the stage manager’s irrational demand. A similar incident occurred in Goblin:Macbeth where the Goblins, especially Wug lamented that the killing in the play could not be real. Thematically, we see the two Goblin plays are complementary with Goblin:Macbeth centred on killing and Goblin:Oedipus centred on sex. The Goblins make a salient point of this last by entering the theatre carrying a giant phallus which remains on stage throughout the performance. This serves as a concrete reminder that Dionysus, to whom Greek tragedies were dedicated, was the god of both theatre and sex.

The greatest different between the two Goblin plays is that Goblin:Oedipus makes much greater use of audience participation. The most obvious example is that the Goblins encourage the audience to boo characters or decisions it doesn’t like and to applaud those it does like, rather as if the show were a panto for adults. (The themes and language of the play make it suitable only for those 18+.)

Besides this, there is a kind of audience on stage in the form of a 12-member Chorus whom the Goblins recruit from the regular audience members. The Chorus is trained by Kragva to give illustrative responses to key words in the play such as “light”, “dark”, “blood”, “death” and “suffering”. The Chorus does have a couple speeches they must deliver in unison, but the humour of their role proceeds from seeing how alert they are to the text and how rapidly they respond.

The action of the play moves forward in John Murrell’s English adaptation albeit with numerous interruptions. Sometimes Wug and Kragva deem Moog’s music inappropriate, and often Kragva complains about having to switch from character to character. One of Kragva’s most important complaints comes when Wug delivers an extraordinarily long speech (lines 769-829 in the original) describing how he fled Corinth, where he grew up, for Thebes and met an old man along the way whom he slew because of his insolence.

Kragva complains that all Wug is doing is talking. She reminds Wug that the word “theatre” comes from the Greek word θέατρον which is derived from verb θεάομαι, to behold. She says we are not “seeing” anything. So, despite the fact, as Wug points out, that depictions of violence in Greek theatre were banished from the stage, Kragva enlists the help of various members of the Chorus to enact the incident that Oedipus is describing. This is, perhaps, the most hilarious section of the play not only from the sympathetic pleasure of watching non-actors act so enthusiastically but also because they are given pool noodles to fight with.

Depicting Oedipus’ encounter with the Thebans is chaotic fun, but, oddly enough, it does serve to prove the Greeks right in trusting the description of a violent scene to be more effective than actually staging it. As Wug notes, the description is meant to appeal to the imagination of the audience and the action we imagine will generally be superior to what can be shown on stage. The Greeks were not alone in this idea. As the Chorus in Shakespeare’s Henry V tells the audience, “Think, when we talk of horses, that you see them / Printing their proud hoofs i’ th’ receiving earth”.

It is even more remarkable is that, despite all the interrupting arguments and silliness, when Wug and Kragva play the conclusion of the tragedy straight, we are pulled right into it. With all the distractions, metatheatricality and changes of tone, you might think this was impossible. It is not, first, because Oedipus is such a powerful story and, second, because when Wug and Kragva, Goblins as they are, set aside fooling and speak the words with feeling, they are such fine actors they elicit our sympathy.

Wug has a large, resonant voice with a bit of a rasp to it that he can use to make Oedipus sound bombastic or, at the end, riddled with fear and shame. Kragva might complain about having to play so many characters but in reality, her ability to differentiate them so completely through accent and gesture is a marvel. Moog’s role is primarily to underscore the action of the play and this he does with great imagination. Moog not only makes Foley sounds using the microphone itself but he plays several unusual instruments – an aulos (a Greek double flute), a hulusi (a Chinese gourd flute) and a pandura (a three-stringed Greek instrument) – that give the play the aura of a ritual from long ago. The few times Moog speaks he ingeniously bends the tale of Oedipus toward the Christmas story he is so keen on telling.

The entire show disproves Kragva’s initial statement that “Pretending is stupid”. The Goblins’ pretending makes us laugh and even gain insight into the nature of theatre. Their encouragement of audience participation encourages our pretending, releasing us from any of the staidness we might have had before entering the theatre. When at the end the blinded Oedipus asks the audience to heap him with insults, the glee with which the audience did so, hitting on a particularly apt 12-letter epithet, proved that the desire to pretend, to act, to play, lies in everyone one of us. Goblin:Oedipus is a delight to see and the highlight of this year’s Stratford Festival.

Christopher Hoile

Photo: Wug as Oedipus, © 2025 Terry Manzo; Moog, Kragva and Wug, © 2024 Tim Nguyen; Wug as Oedipus, © 2025 Ted Belton.

For tickets visit: www.stratfordfestival.ca.