Comeback Special by Greg Wohead

 

Jam sessions, patter with a Southern drawl, big dance numbers, and a bit of sweat: this is a re-enactment of Elvis Presley’s 1968 Comeback Special. But not how you might expect.

What happens if the Comeback comes back? Like a half-remembered dream or two mirrors facing each other or repeating a word so much it loses its meaning. Comeback Special is a double negative. It’s not the original, but it’s not not.

Greg creates an echo of the original event coloured by reverberations of contemporary masculinity, visibility and desire; a peculiar kind of séance.

 

“Although Presley is the ghostly heart of it, it’s neither an act of homage nor a simple nostalgia trip…by blurring the line between performers and their public, as well as the past and the present, Wohead creates a special bond”

Donald Hutera, The Times