The history of authoritarian-sanctioned torture goes back to the Roman magistrates who used it on the first Christians. Then the Christians systematically tortured thousands of so-called heretics during the long period of the Inquisition. They were followed in later years by the sadists of Nazi Germany, Stalinist Russia...and the United States of America.
Now, a gutsy playwright, Michael Franco, has dramatized that last sad fact in The Interview, currently in its world premiere at the 2013 Hollywood Fringe Festival. Michael Dunn plays an unnamed American prisoner being grilled by two government agents (Joe Hulser and Dylan Maddalena). The former, like so many inquisitors, takes pleasure from torture; the latter, who has a shred of conscience, questions his partner's use of force to extract information. Evil wins out over good here, and the torture session goes on, with beatings giving way to water-boarding.
In the background, three soldiers, one of them a woman, gleefully take part in the proceedings, battering the prisoner with fists and bats every chance they can. Adding even more terror to the "extraordinary rendition" are such mega-theatrical touches as ear-splitting music, blinding light and ominous sound effects. The result is a hellish setting (complete with a leering Devil) in which barbarity and bestiality are the norm. Shame on America -- and on all of us -- for condoning the use of torture as an instrument of state policy.
