Words: Jacqueline Ross
Image: Carter Ferguson

5 Stars

HESS is a seriously impressive piece of solo acting coupled with an excellent psychological script that explores the complexities of the German Nazi leader Rudolf Hess, friend and confidante of Adolf Hitler. The piece is deep and engaging throughout.

We meet HESS in his final years, he is an old man, in pain from a stomach ulcer and well into his forty years plus prison sentence of isolation. These days he focuses on his newspapers and feeding the birds, drawing parallels with his love of flight and aviation.

The show certainly does its job in covering difficult themes and unpalatable beliefs whilst portraying the remnants of a man, with some form of grief in his eyes, explaining himself and his actions. It is gripping and diligently constructed.

The character is mainly strong in conviction but the complexity comes in when he shows signs of weakness, exposes some sorrow for events now ‘too late’ and makes astute declarations such as ‘a man can’t give up the dream he once had if he is given nothing in its place’.  

The simplest of sets and the dimming of lights surround the real drama that comes from the spoken words. HESS is the type of show you almost have to pause at times and think. It is particularly relevant in today’s climate of rising extreme ideology, hate and division. It is a masterpiece of human psychology, written fifty years ago but sadly all too relevant now. 

HESS
Gilded Balloon Teviot
13:00
22 – 31 Aug