Delirium

by Martin Dockery, Brooklyn, NY

Review by A.J. Sage

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Like all the best Fringe shows, Martin Dockery's Delirium is difficult to place into a tidy box of genre.  The hour-long extravaganza of storytelling reminds one variously of dramatic monologues, slam poetry and standup comedy - Dockery's urgent cadence of voice flying his audience from one emotional station to another with brilliant verve and tenacity. 

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The Brooklyn based artist carries the type of veteran stage presence that simultaneously feels comforting and dangerous.  In other words, you can tell you're in good hands...but don't think for a second that those hands will be coddling you.  

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Delirium consists of three independent stories that dovetail subtly together with common themes of intimacy, hope and surrender in the face of an often cruel world.  Love, Dockery reminds us, is our greatest weapon against the vast indifference of the universe and this theme is satisfyingly explored through his stories' most buoyant moments and their most tragic ones too.

 

Dockery serves dessert first, offering the sweet tale of his engagement to his unseen yet always present partner Vanessa.  Next comes the immersive account of his time at Burning Man, during which his cheeky idea for a "restaurant" that serves only strawberry sandwiches puts him into random contact with a man haunted by a particularly heartbreaking story of his own.

 

Last is the real beauty - an epic of dogs, death, monarch butterflies, and a truly hilarious run in with a rude man on an airplane.  Not to be missed.

 

The genius of this show is keyed by Dockery's obvious passion for language. The vocabulary flows trippingly off his tongue and puts a spell on his audience.  I dare say it's entirely impossible to sit anywhere but the edge of one's seat.