In the Waiting Room of Power: The Dumb Waiter Delivers Masterful Tension
It’s really difficult to write about this show because it’s one of those where the less you know about it going in, the better. This is theatrical storytelling that rewards the unprepared viewer, where discovery becomes part of the dramatic architecture. What I can tell you is that you'll spend seventy minutes in a basement room with two men: Ben and Gus, brought to compelling life by Brent Palmer and Jock Kleynhans, and by the end, you'll have witnessed something that feels both deceptively simple and profoundly unsettling.
RemDog Productions' staging of Harold Pinter's The Dumb Waiter, directed by Fleur du Cap Award-winner Aidan Scott, is the kind of production that reminds you why live theatre remains an irreplaceable art form and why Johannesburg's theatre scene continues to surprise and challenge audiences with its bold programming choices.
The genius of Pinter's 1957 one-act lies in how it transforms the mundane into the menacing. Scott's direction understands this implicitly, allowing the playwright's famous pauses to breathe without ever feeling indulgent. These silences, pregnant with possibility and dread, don't just punctuate the dialogue; they become characters in their own right, drawing the audience deeper into a world where what isn't said often carries more weight than what is.
Palmer delivers a performance of controlled authority as Ben. His portrayal captures the character's need for order and hierarchy while revealing the cracks beneath the surface. Kleynhans, as the more questioning Gus, provides the perfect counterpoint, his naturalistic approach creating moments of genuine vulnerability that make the rising tension all the more palpable. While there were occasional moments where the Cockney accents slipped slightly, these minor technical details pale against the emotional truth both actors bring to their roles.
What struck me most powerfully about this production was how contemporary it felt. Written in the late 1950s, The Dumb Waiter might ostensibly be about two men in a particular profession, but Scott's vision reveals something more unsettling: a meditation on obedience, routine, and the systems we navigate without questioning. In our age of algorithmic authority and institutional opacity, Pinter's exploration of how we follow orders, even absurd ones, from unseen powers feels unnervingly prescient.
The production design by Muiren Kok creates an environment that is simultaneously claustrophobic and expansive in its implications. The basement setting becomes a kind of bureaucratic purgatory, where the mundane rituals of tea-making and newspaper-reading take on the weight of sacred ceremony. Robyn Louw's costume design reinforces the characters' working-class authenticity while subtly highlighting their position within larger, invisible hierarchies.
There are moments when the energy dips - periods of deliberate stillness that some might find challenging. But this isn't a flaw; it's integral to Pinter's vision. These quiet interludes force us to sit with discomfort, to feel the weight of waiting, of being caught between instruction and understanding. When the tension does escalate, these moments of calm make the eruptions all the more startling and effective.
Scott's direction demonstrates remarkable maturity in his handling of Pinter's complex rhythms. He resists the temptation to rush toward revelation, instead building atmosphere through accumulation - small details, repeated gestures, and the growing sense that something fundamental is shifting beneath the surface of routine. This is direction that trusts both the text and the audience, allowing meaning to emerge organically rather than forcing interpretation.
The collaboration between Scott and Kleynhans, who initially conceived this production together, has resulted in something that feels both historically grounded and urgently contemporary. This programming treats audiences as intelligent participants rather than passive consumers. As I left Theatre on the Square, I found myself thinking about the systems we navigate daily, the orders we follow, the questions we don't ask. The Dumb Waiter doesn't provide answers to these concerns, but it does something perhaps more valuable: it makes them visible, urgent, and impossible to ignore.
The team involved have delivered something genuinely special: a production that honours its source material while speaking directly to our contemporary moment.
Don't miss this one. Just don't expect to leave unchanged.
The Dumb Waiter is on until the 24th of August at Theatre on the Square.
Get your tickets at Webtickets.