Tell Me ★★★★

Tell Me — ★★★★

There are circus shows that use spectacle to impress, and then there are those that use extraordinary physical skill to say something. Tell Me firmly belongs in the latter.

From Sadiq Ali Company, Tell Me is a bold fusion of circus, dance and physical theatre exploring HIV across two very different generations. Grace receives an HIV diagnosis in the present day and finds herself connected with Michael, a gay man navigating a profoundly different reality during the AIDS crisis of the 1980s. Past and present collide, allowing fear, stigma, progress and hope to exist alongside one another.

Remarkably, the story unfolds without a single word being spoken by the performers.

Instead, Chinese pole, aerial artistry, dance and acrobatics become the language. The physical skill level is exceptional, borderline perfection, with a trio of performers joined by a rigger whose presence increasingly becomes part of the theatrical world itself.

At the centre is an extraordinary multidimensional cube apparatus. Geometric yet fluid, shapes exist within shapes as the performers climb, suspend, balance and move through the structure with remarkable finesse. The visual symbolism is everywhere: confinement and freedom, darkness and light, illness and survival, past and future.

The lighting design is insane, transforming the apparatus and bodies within it, while an outstanding musical score carries much of the emotional weight. Together they create images that can be interpreted in countless ways. With no dialogue dictating what an audience should feel, Tell Me leaves space for individual interpretation.

Most importantly, its queer perspective on HIV/AIDS is handled with enormous care and grace. It honours those lost during the epidemic while refusing to leave HIV trapped in the past. Instead, the production looks forward, considering how treatment, attitudes and queer communities have changed while acknowledging that stigma has not disappeared.

There is one significant staging problem. Too much important action happens at floor level. From the second row backwards, sightlines can make portions difficult or impossible to see, and when such a substantial amount of the storytelling happens there, it becomes frustrating. Raising, reblocking or tightening those sequences would make an enormous difference.

That issue aside, this is extraordinarily accomplished contemporary circus: clever, technically fearless, visually beautiful and emotionally intelligent.

I’ve never seen queer circus quite like Tell Me. Iron out the floor work and this has everything required to become a five-star, sell-out production on stages around the world.

★★★★