Is This a Room? from New York’s Half Straddle theatre is an example of what has become known as “postdramatic theatre,” based on the use of elliptical yet realistic texts for which no stage directions exist, and hence are performed in odd, self-conscious and dissonant ways.

As with David Hare’s Stuff Happens (2004) or Version 1.0’s Wages of Spin (2006), the text consists of real-life transcripts which have political significance: in this case, the interrogation of US national security translator Reality Winner by three FBI agents regarding the (soon proven) accusation of providing classified notes on Russian interference in the 2016 election to a journalistic website.

Half Straddle Theatre’s Is This a Room. Photo © Tristan McKenzie

The cast’s uniforms and casual clothing are plausible, but little else is. The interrogation is performed on a carpeted strip parallel to the front row, with a rise at either end, but multiple spaces are traversed and alluded to in the performance. “Is this a room?” one agent asks twice. We never know.

As the interrogation heats up, the two main agents corral Winner and tower over her, making up a tight, on stage...