Performative Encounters: Memory Violence in Sleep Deprivation Chamber

In their biographical play Sleep Deprivation Chamber (1996), Adrienne Kennedy and her son Adam P. retrace family memories to describe the aftermath of police brutality in 1990s America. They narrate brutal beating a middle-class, young Black man named Teddy events taking place later at trial. The playwrights make use “memory violence” (Olick 2018) elicit spectators’ emotional response construct performative encounter which figures perpetrator, survivor bystander are questioned redefined. Through this violence remembering, they manage insert unrecorded moments abuse our collective imaginary, moving from staged nightmares, distant courtrooms individual sleep deprivation chambers into figurative shared space where lives do matter.