Oedipus Hex

By T.E.K.

VICTIMS OF DUTY by Eugene Ionesco

Ionesco believes that the irrational is man's intuitive form of vision. Everything that claims to be rational and realistic is a distortion of that vision, a shield raised against the absurdity of existence.

The anti-hero of Victims of Duty, a character named Choubert (John Marolakos), mocks the theatrical classics as refined detective drama: "All the plays that have ever been written, from ancient Greece to the present day, have never really been anything but thrillers. Drama's always been realistic and there's always been a detective about. Every play's an investigation brought to a successful conclusion." The twist in Ionesco's "thriller" is the conclusion that every man is his own criminal.

The play begins in the humdrum way with which Ionesco likes to put his audience at false ease. The middle-aged Choubert is reading a newspaper and his wife Madeleine is darning socks. A knock on the door brings in a detective. Shyly he asks if Choubert knows a man named Mallot whose name ends either with a t or a d. Soon the questioning and the tone turn inquisitional.

The quest for Mallot becomes an exorcising journey into Choubert's subconscious past. Wife becomes mother, man becomes boy. The conclusive finding: Choubert hated his father and adored his mother. Some critics regard Victims of Duty as a parody of both the Oedipal myth and the Oedipus complex. This off-Broadway revival blunts all the wickedly comic points. The people involved may be thanked for doing Ionesco, but not for doing him in. --T.E.K.

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