Body and Soul

Judith Rudakoff is an associate professor of theatre arts at York
University at the co-editor of Dangerous Traditions: A Passe Muraille
Anthology.

In Body and Soul, John Mighton, with his characteristic wit and wisdom,
blueprints the immense and specific differences between beauty and
attraction. In a world of detachment and longing, characters sift
through the detritus of their psychological universes to find some shred
of individuality, to revive some synoptic evidence of the possibility of
connection or interaction. In a swift and satisfying series of quests,
goals are identified, pursued, and, to varying degrees, attained by
Mighton’s primary characters: Jane, a necrophiliac adult who bears the
emotional scars of a childhood guided by misandrysts; Henry, a
self-centred philosophy junkie unable to convert idea into reality;
Sally, an individual wholly defined by others’ impressions and
judgments of her, unable or unwilling to relate content (her
soul-identity) with form (her body).

This dance along the fine line that divides perception and projection
raises a question, perhaps the question for the encroaching millennium:
What is reality, if not a series of guarantees and tangible examples
that communication and interaction are still possible? Without relying
on the very technology it plays with, Body and Soul presents a clear and
terrifyingly funny picture of a world that is all too real and not real
at all, populated by inhabitants who may be surreal in their outlook and
activity, but seem all too familiar and recognizable. This is a play for
the 1990s.