Trifling Over Trifles

Trifling Over Trifles

A Cory Vincent Column

Looking at Trifles, one might assume that there is no way the play can be done in anything but a naturalistic or realistic setting. The play focuses on such sharp and contrasting details and clues that to think of doing it without the immense number of props involved seems impossible. Yet I argue this is exactly what can be done to create a very powerful performance.

The language of Trifles is vast. They spend much time describing the quality of that dead bird, and that quilt pattern. They talk about how she was in that chair, just staring at him, all dead-like as he was. This language isn’t by accident. This language allows there to be a lack of sensory information. A blank white blanket can suddenly transform into a powerful quilt. An empty can now be filled with a bird who has been murdered. In fact, performing the play in this way is possibly even more powerful than it would be if all the details were presented. For starters, each discovery would happen at the same time for the performers as it would for the audience. If the quilt and the cage were there from the beginning, then the audience might spy it out long before the characters do. Then some of that surprise is gone. But if they can’t know the answer before then, it is suddenly much more powerful. Another key fact to consider is that sharing these discoveries would help the audience get more on board with the women. They would get wrapped up in the “hat will they find next?” kind of aspect, instead of “what will happen next in the play?” That subtle shift means all the difference sometimes.

However, doing a production in this bare bones structure will take away some of the super-sleuthing elements of the production. Having all those things there means you CAN figure out the answer before the play gives it to you. It is an extremely rewarding feeling to solve the “crime” before the characters tell you the answer. Without those objects, you remove that ability from your audience, which may be detrimental to some. Still, the chance of anybody figuring out the mystery is an outside possibility, so in my opinion, the play doesn’t lose very much.