REVIEW: Comfort - Singing Through Painful Memories

©️Comfort, Poster designer: Giannine Tan

Comfort tells the story of the “comfort women”, survivors of one of history’s darkest times. Through the eyes of one survivor, the play revisits the Second World War, when the Japanese Imperial Army forced more than twenty thousand women into sexual slavery. The production confronts these horrors with courage, bringing a painful history to local audiences with an unusual lightness of tone.

Giannine Tan opens the performance as a gentle elderly woman, speaking softly to the audience while recounting an unbearably painful past. As folk music weaves through the narrative, time shifts fluidly: the elder returns to childhood, the sound of warplanes slices overhead, and the audience is carried back to the Second World War.

The show uses uniforms hanging on stage to represent the Japanese army. One of the most striking moments comes when these clothes swirl and wrap around the girl, depicting the women’s suffering in a subtle yet heart-wrenching way. The girl shivers and screams, and when the clothes finally settle around her, her eyes are hollow, and the silence on stage is deafening.

The play navigates these traumatic events with a delicate balance of tenderness and gravity. Music and song carry the emotional weight where words alone might falter, allowing pain and resilience to resonate directly with the audience. This is a performance that remembers the past without overwhelming viewers with graphic depictions.

Overall, Comfort is a quietly powerful work, a respectful and moving tribute to survivors, and a reminder of the human stories behind historical atrocities. It succeeds in keeping memory alive, offering both reflection and empathy in a measured, sensitive performance.

★★★★

https://camdenfringe.com/events/comfort/

Credits

Writer: Giannine Tan
Director: Elisabeth Tu
Set and prop designer: Izzy Cresswell
Poster designer: Giannine Tan

Cast:
Hilum & Maria: Giannine Tan
Ensemble & Guitar: Janna May
Ensemble & Guitar: Mary Suarez