The Ghost Writer by Ross Mueller
Melbourne Theatre Company
Fairfax Studio, Victorian Arts Centre, March 7 to April 21, 2007
Reviewer: Kate Herbert
In Ross Mueller’s The Ghost Writer, we are confronted by near death experiences, nightmares, the palpable presence of a ghost, a vision of Jesus and the mysterious death of a child.
The atmosphere reeks of impending doom and past tragedy while the persistent, haunting sound scape (Darrin Verhagen) and dramatic lighting (Paul Jackson) maintain our sense of anticipation.
Brihanna’s (Margaret Harvey) story and that of Megan, her lost four-year old, is shrouded in mystery. Publisher, Robert (John Wood), engages his daughter, Claudia (Belinda McClory), to ghost write Brihanna’s tale of despair. Meanwhile Claudia, whose own life is clouded by secrets and lies, must confront her own demons. Her secretive affair with an attractive, anonymous man (Raj Sidhu) becomes startlingly interwoven with the child’s murder case.
Claudia is obsessed with finding the truth about Megan, her father is preoccupied with profit, the illiterate, volatile Brihanna is determined to “write” a bestseller and West (Sidhu), a Crown Prosecutor, is haunted by the victims he failed.
Mueller’s script is more conservative and less abstract than his previous work but it retains his capable crafting of a story and slow revelation of the underlying truth of the characters. His dialogue is intelligent, well observed and often very funny. Although the truth of both Brihanna and Claudia’s stories is evident very early, we are happy to go along for the ghost train ride.
McClory, playing the ailing, “emaciated” Claudia looks positively skeletal under stark lighting in Stephen Curtis’s cold grey set. She gives Claudia a vibrating intensity and fragility that allows us to sympathise with such a cool character.
Wood is hearty and entertaining as the acquisitive Robert. Harvey relishes Brihanna’s vocabulary of expletives and gives a tough and comical edge to this uneducated mum from a small country town. Sidhu is charming and languid as West, revealing his depth later in the play. Alaeyah Blaufuhs is magnetic as the ghostly child.
Director, Julian Meyrick, allows the comedy of Mueller’s script full rein without losing its eerie atmosphere and supernatural elements. Mueller’s play resonates with his themes of justice, human tragedy and intimacy. It has the texture of both a ghost story and a murder mystery – incorporating a few good laughs.
By Kate Herbert
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