The River Project, Aug 27, 2000

By John Britton & Hilary Elliott

 La Mama, Carlton until  September 3, 2000

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

The River Project is the second show this week about a life's journey performed by a solo male actor in a virtually empty space. He tells the story of Jake, an Australian farmer born in 1901 who turned beatnik, hippy and, finally, gypsy.

Britton narrates Jake's life in both first and third person using poetic narrative and wry observation. He adds to the mix a subtle and simple movement vocabulary and a single musician, Dan Witton on double bass, who improvises throughout the show. Each night a different musician plays with Britton. Each night the show is changed.

There is nothing on stage with the actor apart form a series of grotesque white masks dangling like dead men from the ceiling. The actor and the character are constantly surrounded by death masks somehow representing the rambling path of Jake's life scattered with people lost in his past.

Britton is a relaxed and warm presence in the tiny La Mama space. When his CD of ambient river sounds malfunctioned, he continued without it with a gentle quip to the audience. The silence worked. Who knows how the river would add to the atmosphere.

Of course, the show is called The River Project so we can only assume that the river soundscape creates a sense of Jake's long and circuitous journey from 1901 away from the Murray River where he grew up.

Britton conceived and devised the project with Hilary Elliott. It peers into the life of an ordinary man whose life went unnoticed for 90 years as he wandered from his farm life to the city, from war in the Pacific to underground Melbourne in 1956, from Berkeley in 1967 to Byron Bay in the 90s where he meets the ocean and his death.

He conjures with small gestures, the titanic stature of Jake,  a muscular man of six foot four. His characterisations are not detailed but mere suggestions of persons unknown. He accompanies the story-telling with repetitive movement that echoes or pre-empts the action. At times it is mesmerising.

Jake's life is like a meandering river. From its gushing forth at its source, it rushes and slows, bends and finally finds its oceanic end. Such is life.

By Kate Herbert