In Context: Escaped Alone

Playwright Caryl Churchill returns to BAM for the first time in 15 years with this by-turns hilarious and unsettling daydream directed by frequent collaborator James Macdonald. Context is everything, so get closer to the production through our series of curated links, videos, and articles. After you've attended the show, let us know what you thought by posting in the comments below and on social media using #EscapedAlone.

Escaped Alone—Dark Imagination

Linda Bassett. Photo: Johan Persson

By Rob Weinert-Kendt

“And I only am escaped alone to tell thee,” a line from the Book of Job that Melville used to begin his epilogue to Moby-Dick, hovers questioningly over Caryl Churchill’s new play Escaped Alone, which opened a year ago at London’s Royal Court Theatre and comes to BAM’s Harvey Theater from February 15 to 26. Does Churchill’s title refer to Mrs. Jarrett, played by Linda Bassett, who for roughly half the play’s 50-minute running time stands in abstractly framed darkness downstage, coolly describing a series of ecological and social disasters that only she seems to have lived to tell about?

According to the play’s director, James Macdonald, the title may also suggest a more general state of being and nothingness among a quartet of women, including Mrs. Jarrett, who are seen in the play’s other half chatting amiably, if often at cross purposes, in a sunny backyard.