Playing the Petrocene: Toxicity and Intoxication in Leigh Fondakowski’s Spill and Ella Hickson’s Oil

Abstract

Ella Hickson’s Oil (2016) and Leigh Fondakowski’s Spill (2014) make palpable to their audiences what I call the Petrocene: the age in which human existence has become impossible to conceive without oil. Each play illuminates the pervasive presence of petroleum infrastructures in its own way: while Spill focuses on the specific and sensational crisis of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, Oil presents a series of scenes which focus on two women (mother and daughter) who struggle to carve out their existence in various time periods and in the context of different fossil-energy regimes. Both plays succeed in unveiling not only the toxicity of extractive regimes necessary to fuel the Petrocene, but also the toxicity of the narratives that uphold extractive regimes and their attendant injustices. Moreover, both plays convey the intoxicating effects of oil, which appears as a near-magical substance that promises unfettered progress and access to the good life. Examining these plays in conjunction not only highlights the increasing presence of ecological concerns in dramatic pieces, but also illustrates the ways in which dramatic performance can distill enormous oil infrastructures into apprehensible worlds and thus create vital spaces for pondering the Petrocene.