Ground zero, part 2

This is the second half of Kate Maltby’s essay on the representation of September 11th in art. You can read the first here.

Decade
succeeds in humanizing moral failings: fear, shame, doubt. In the simplest and most intimate scene, we hear a blokish, British New Yorker talk through the guilt of swapping his day off for 9/11, his creeping frustrations with the official investigation, his confusion at finding his public criticisms picked up by conspiracy theorists.

It’s a devastating performance by Tobias Menzies, pared down, humble. And Menzies isn’t the only talented performer here: Kevin Harvey is fierce and firm as the Marine ordered to shoot Bin Laden, as well as pulling off a neat Barack Obama impression.

The ever-reliable Emma Fielding is solid as a professional 9/11 widow, monumentalized in grief, even if her accent wanders. Snaking through all these stories, Scott Ambler’s choreography is revelatory – dances hint at the ritual of everyday life, our interdependence, combat, humility, at infinite possible relationships formed in the rubble.