[Review] A Surreal, Shapeshifting Night with Sight Lines’ The Pillowman

Last Friday evening, I went to the KC Arts Centre expecting a emotive piece of theatre from Sight Lines for their production of The Pillowman, a 2003 play by British-Irish playwright Martin McDonagh. Sight Lines ended up delivering more than I expected presenting something different from previous productions that is not just unsettling, but also thought-provoking.

With only three days left before the show closes on May 24, I can safely say that this version of McDonagh’s critically acclaimed play is well worth catching, especially if you are drawn to dark, complex storytelling that pushes the boundaries of theatrical form.

Directed by Chong Tze Chien, this Pillowman is not looking to neatly immerse the audience in a single cohesive story. Instead, it fractures the narrative, almost like shattering a mirror and asking us to study each shard. Six male actors rotate through all the roles in the play, swapping parts seamlessly in front of us as a gauzy front curtain and jagged stage divide reinforce the sense that we are constantly shifting between layers of consciousness.

I read up about The Pillowman before coming in. It is a disturbing psychological thriller about a writer named Katurian, who is being interrogated over a series of gruesome child murders that echo the twisted fairy tales he writes.

Sight Lines’ presentation is different from the usual. Rather than grounding each character in emotional continuity, the production deliberately sacrifices consistency for something far more surreal. Each version of Katurian that appears brings out a different facet of the character. For instance, Krish Natarajan’s appears earnest, Shrey Bhargava’s appears more hollowed out, while Joshua Lim’s take appears surprisingly sympathetic. Watching each actor step in and out of the same skin, again and again, added a new layer of discomfort. The lines between guilt and innocence, fiction and reality, began to dissolve.

The thematic disorientation was amplified by Grace Lin’s haunting set design. A narrow, triangular platform formed the front of the stage, where the interrogations took place, but behind a translucent curtain, other scenes seemed to play out in parallel. Sometimes it felt like we were witnessing memory, sometimes imagination, sometimes delusion. In one moment, the backstage space became a shadowy echo chamber for the re-enactments of Katurian’s nightmarish stories. In another, it suggested a more sinister truth lurking just behind the surface of things. Sound designer Jing Ng’s jarring lullaby-like score and prison ambience sealed the unease in.

While the conceptual ambition of rotating cast roles was thrilling, it did introduce some moments of inconsistency. Some transitions were sharper than others. Not every portrayal landed with the same emotional weight. Nonetheless, these were small tradeoffs in an otherwise impressive ensemble effort.

This production is not looking to give you all the answers. It does not try to tie up the play’s moral and emotional questions neatly, and that’s exactly what makes it so effective, in my view. You will walk out of theatre with several question marks hanging over your head and it makes for long philosophical discourse with whoever you chose to watch this play with.

Sight Lines’ The Pillowman

With only a few performances remaining, Thursday and Friday at 8pm, and Saturday at 3pm and 8pm, The Pillowman is a production that should not be missed.

Tickets range from $38 to $88.

For those wanting a deeper dive, you can enhance your experience with an additional $60, which gets you behind-the-scenes access, a backstage tour, meet-the-cast sessions, and an autographed souvenir programme.

More details are available via the official website.