The Cocoon

The Cocoon, an immersive theatre experience, written and directed by New-Yorker-turned-Melbournian Kotryna Gesait, is about the binding energy of love. Part of the Melbourne Fringe Festival 2017, this performance challenges its audience on the societal constructs of romance, gender and sexuality.

The show is presented in a series of vignettes, where performers act out scenes of various romantic relationships, depicting the most intimate moments of the human romantic experience. It took place at The Portable on Dawson Street in Brunswick, where the space was transformed into a webbed cavern, within which the audience were allowed to choose where they wanted to watch and interact from.

The Cocoon provides a raw, intimate view into these relationships, as the actors take turns to act out the experiences in the middle of the room around and on a particularly large piece of Glad-wrapped ‘web’. A young woman performs a monologue about unrequited love. A couple argues, on the verge of a break-up. A middle-aged gay couple goes through transition. A young lesbian couple falls in love for the first time.

The performers break the fourth wall, engaging the audience in their heartbreak, their infatuation, their thoughts and their tears, which helps cut the tension that would otherwise have been stifling in a piece with such intense emotion.

As a straight, cis-gendered woman, the diverse sexualities in this performance provided refreshing viewpoints that didn’t just involve a guy and a girl (just like effing Disney – wink for the people who saw The Cocoon.) In the current political climate, this performance brought to attention important themes around love that shouldn’t be such a hard concept to grasp.

I felt at certain points that I was intruding on these relationships, thinking that these details were the very kind I’d save for my most trusted confidantes. The familiarity of the emotions portrayed and the voyeuristic nature of the pieces stirred up discomfort. But that same familiarity is what allowed the audience to react expressively to the performers, because you felt like you had felt those emotions and been in those situations.

I left The Portable that night feeling very philosophical about the relationships in my life and those of my friends and family, comforted by the idea that we weren’t completely alone in love.

The Cocoon  
Melbourne Fringe Festival 2017
melbournefringe.com.au