In her one woman show on the life of Zelda Fitzgerald, wife of The Great Gatsby author F.Scott, Kelly Burke presents insanity as not only powerfully convincing but somehow attractive, says Dominic Mattos.
One woman, one hour, one room and one extraordinary life – that of Zelda Fitzgerald, wife, muse and sometime ghost-writer of F. Scott Fitzgerald. It’s a difficult premise, and one which doesn’t instantly fuel expectations of a good evening. One worries it could be too arch, too filled with melodrama and slightly awkward bursts of the Charleston. Thankfully, it isn’t.
What emerges from Kelly Burke’s sophisticated presentation – she not only stars but also created the piece from Zelda’s writings – is instead a deft examination of the ‘sanity of madness’, and a fascinating window into the life of a great literary figure.
As we enter the space Burke is already on the bed in the middle of the stage, writing hurriedly. Once things have begun it is somewhat difficult to engage, until Zelda gently drawls that it’s fine our being here inside her head; ‘they tell you you’re a schizophrenic and it gives you certain privileges’. This is the first of many keenly observed moments of humour, and it is the high frequency of this deeply human humour that staves off mawkishness and gives Burke’s Zelda a strange element of gravitas.
We learn that Zelda is in a psychiatric hospital against her will, and that she is writing a novel about the Fitzgeralds’ time on the French Riviera. It is the novel that would become Save Me the Waltz, the other side of the coin to Scott’s own Tender is the Night. Burke cleverly illustrates the ‘in tandem’ development of the two novels, and the moments where Zelda recalls Scott’s possessiveness over the literary plundering of their joint memories are quite spell-binding. So too is Zelda’s obsessive turn towards ballet at the age of 27, when she describes the blue bruising at the back of her knees where the muscles have torn after hours of stretching it is almost impossible not to shiver with pain.
Whilst the piece is not without its problems – the only real sense of progression comes from Zelda finishing the novel, and things take a while to get going – there is something rare to be admired in the way Burke presents Zelda. This is not a crazed and silly woman, but a creature whose madness is powerfully convincing and deeply attractive. When, towards the end of the piece, Zelda remarks that on arrival at the hospital she didn’t want to get rid of a vase of red roses because they looked ‘so stern that they might shout at her’ the comment, nonsensical as it seems, makes perfect sense. This is partly because Burke gives a pitch-perfect performance as Zelda, and partly because the material she has amassed brings us to a real understanding of her subject.
Zelda runs at Trafalgar Studios until October 4th
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