Crossing The Line, Part One, Aug 17, 1998

Part One of Crossing The Line Merlin Theatre until August 20, 1998

 The Look by Alexa Wyatt 

The Floating Girl and the Man Who Whirled by Jack Feldstein 

 Review Aug 17, 1998

The lure of screenwriting for playwrights is well documented. There is no brain drain in the opposite direction because there is no money in theatre – and no jobs.

Crossing the Line is a momentary lapse, the exception to the rule. Under the umbrella of the Melbourne Writers' Festival, actor-writer-director, Gary Files has put together staged readings  of five plays by established screen writers.

These two media, stage and screen, demand very different techniques from writers. Naturalistic detail and dialogue is generally demanded on television whereas, on stage, styles range from realism to the abstract and physical.

Screen writers, so often constrained by the requirements of television executives, can be excused for forgetting the skill of the actor and the versatility of the stage.

The first program is two short plays: The Look by Alexa Wyatt (E Street, Heartbreak High, All Saints) and The Girl Who Floated and the Man Who Whirled by Jack Feldstein (Head Writer, Brilliant Digital Entertainment) Both are directed by John Wood, famous for his Blue Heelers role but also a seasoned theatre performer.

Ailsa Piper (Neighbours) alone on stage, apart from a Narrator (Tony Rickards) reading stage directions. Marilyn, a comic-tragic figure, is running a training session for Estelle cosmetics. Piper is poignant and funny as Marilyn's prepared lecture slowly disintegrates into a tortured and embarrassing rave

She was the first Estelle girl, the lover of Monsieur Dupont the owner. She is a shattered, disillusioned, dislocated woman who has no identity without her beauty or her make-up.

The piece is cleverly written but too long for its content. It is reminiscent of the women's theatre of the 80's which challenged role models and female stereotypes.

Feldstein's play is clearly written by a very capable screenwriter but it is not a theatre script because of its rapid cinematic scenes, very involved naturalistic stage directions, specific locations, costumes, props and numerous extras.

It is a tale of two inner-urban, self-indulgent, angst-ridden Jewish artists (David Tredinnick, Fiona Walsh) whose fraught relationship involves tormenting each other about their bisexuality, jealousy, intensity, neurosis and their Jewishness.

If this were staged in an abstract form it could be an interesting performance piece but, at present, it is still a short art-film script.

Other writers to come are John Wood's The Subterraneans, John Misto's Gossamer and Snoop by Patrick Edgeworth.

By Kate Herbert

Mechtron: Education from Womb to Tomb, Aug 6, 1998

Mechtron: Education from Womb to Tomb by Stefo Nantsou

A Brunswick Mechanics' Institute until August 23, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

 Review Aug 6

Our sense of Community is becoming a distant memory. We can bank by phone, shop on the Web, work from home. We change addresses, fear strangers, feel insecure in the workplace and are expected to be computer literate rather than simply literate.

Schools, at least, remained a community - until the State government hacked budgets, closed schools, sold sites, increased class sizes and reduced teachers. Free education is a thing of the past.

A thing of the very near future in 2004, postulates Stefo Nantsou in his community theatre play, Mechtron: Education from Womb to Tomb, is the nightmare of Educard. Educard is a hypothetical, computerised, centralised education system by which children, from birth, accrue points to pay for their future education. The poor suffer, the rich win.

Children work alone with a virtual reality program and a digitally recorded "Education Navigator": a teacher in old-speak. Learning is depersonalised. The only teacher who succeeds in Mechtron, is the cool, competent, detached Miss "T" (Nadja Kostich) who values technology more than human contact.

In the early time period of this story, '92-94, a primary school is threatened with closure, as were many schools in the 90's. (My local schools are now townhouses) Some teachers and families occupy the buildings and resist the authorities. Remember the violence at the occupation of Richmond High and the battle to keep Northland Tech. open to cater for the Koori population? People care about children's education.

Nantsou, with co-ordinator Steve Payne, developed this project with assistance from organisations including The Brotherhood of St. Laurence and The Victorian Council of School Organisations.. This team was responsible for The Essentials, the controversial play about a state politician/wife-beater.

Mechtron is a community effort. The cast has some professional actors including Kostich and Anne Phelan as the Headmistress but, in the tradition of the Community Theatre of the last two decades, most of the 26 performers are non-professionals. Nine or ten are children.

It may be didactic in its approach and message, but Mechtron is entertaining and challenging political theatre. We need more of it. When theatre stops questioning the status quo, it is dying. If artists continue to be militant and raise awareness, perhaps we can regain our sense of community and counter these impersonal modes of being.

By Kate Herbert

Some Mother's Son, Aug 5, 1998

Some Mother's Son by Jill O'Callaghan

At La Mama until August 23, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Review Aug 5, 1998

The attentive Gennazano Convent girls at Some Mother's Son, would be familiar with Irish Catholic references such as Christmas midnight mass and St. Patrick but it is unlikely they had any direct experience of mediaeval mummers play, Irish jigs and the IRA or Sinn Fein.

Written and directed by Jill O'Callaghan, the play, which is on the VCE Drama list, has a return season at La Mama that replicates the intimacy of a B and B in Ballymalone Ireland, complete with blazing fire.

But the warmth and cheer of the hearth is not echoed in its residents. Maura Kelly's (Libby Stone) husband, a member of Sinn Fein, was murdered in his armchair, in front of her son Diarmuid, (Joseph Clements) 27 years earlier. Diarmuid is now a member of the IRA.

To upset the apple cart, two Australian tourists arrive. Rene (Maureen Hartley) and her dead son Emmet's girlfriend, Therese (Kath Gordon) are on a bizarre quest to avenge Emmet's murder.

O'Callaghan's play raises issues about revenge as a solution to violence. When does the murdering stop? Can justice be achieved with the gun? Can we take the law into our own hands?

Maura's painful telling of her husband's murder is powerful. Another affecting moment is the midnight mass overflowing with victims: the baker's widow whose husband was roasted alive, two brothers, one's arm shot off, the other is knee-capped. It is a litany of crimes against humanity.

The pain of grief from violent death would make one mad and Therese's grief is near-deranged. The mellowness of Hartley is a good foil. Stone's Maura is somehow fragile while remaining earthy. Clements is a potent, brooding presence with an edge of danger and desperation.

Relationships become more complex as the protagonists become acquainted and one mother realises she cannot wreak further pain on another.

The dialogue is sometimes too informational, with unnecessary detail of landmarks, history and legends such as St. Patrick. It is also never made clear how and why the Australians decided on their target for vengeance.

The traditional Christmas mummers play about St. Patrick's defeat of Prince George is hilarious. The players improvise and romp wearing huge raffia condoms on their heads. A clever choice was to integrate the La Mama book raffle into this wacko scene.

By Kate Herbert

Shows opening August 1998

SHOWS OPENING in AUGUST 1998

Fri Aug 7 Steel City
Wed Aug 12  Bring on the Talent by Rosemary John Courthouse
Tuesday Aug 18 Third World Blues by David Williamson, STC at Alexander Theatre
Mon 17 -Thurs 20 Aug Crossing the Line Melbourne Writers' Festival Plays written by famous screen writers local.
Monday Aug 17  The Look and The Floating Girl and the Man who Whirled, both directed by John Wood
Tues Aug 18 Gossamer by John Misto, director Gary Files
Wed Aug 19 The Subterraneans by John Wood, director John Ellis
Thus Aug 20 Snoop by Patrick Edgeworth
Wed Aug 19 - Taking the Floor New  Short Works

Combo Fiasco, Aug 4, 1998

Combo Fiasco, at Capers Restaurant until August 22, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

REvie Aug 4 1998

"Hey! Let's do a show!" said three musical escapees from Phantom of the Opera. And so was born Combo Fiasco., a cabaret trio which has been wowing 'em in New York recently at the 88's Club.

If you like to hum along to a show tune, toe-tap to a Bacharach or Fats Waller medley or croon the odd Sinatra number, this is the perfect night out. It is a snazzy, colourful, low-budget music theatre show with good a la carte food.

Sharon Millerchip, who was a very fine Beauty in our Beauty and the Beast, teams with singer-pianist Shaun Murphy and musical director-accompanist to the stars, Tony McGill.

 The program is broad and lively. The harmonies are sweet and tight, the musical arrangements novel, satirical lyrics are clever, the choreography perky. The vocal arrangement on Rhythm of Life was spectacular.

All three have a warm presence and perform like show ponies.  They swap evening wear for lounge outfits after interval, lean over the baby grand as McGill tinkles the ivories and goof about with silly dance steps.

Millerchip's bright, versatile soprano is the vocal feature and is well supported by the two tenors. She is magnetic with has real star quality. If someone doesn't grab her for a major role when they return to New York for the Cabaret Convention, we'll be surprised.

Poignant ballads and bluesy numbers are peppered with funky show tunes and jokey songs. Bacharach's melodic Walk on By is teased into a choreographic satire. They relish the wickedness of Stephen Lutwich's song Beware of Soft-Spoken Men.

Phantom, which they all persevered in for two and a half years, takes a musical beating in their eight-minute parody. Millerchip is hilarious as a squeaky, tone-deaf version of ingenue, Christine from the hit show. Earlier, her rendition of I Wanna Be Rich, Famous and Powerful, was raucously funny..

The more serious songs include the tragic Games I Play (from Falsettos) and a cleverly combined version of Sondheim's salutary lesson for parents, Children Will Listen (from Into the Woods) and the 70's social commentary, One Tin Soldier.

This is a slick show with bright talented performers. Their patter is charming and effortless, their manner warm and natural with the audience and the segues between songs are smooth.

by Kate Herbert

Hotel Sorrento, Aug 2, 1998

Hotel Sorrento by Hannie Rayson

HIT Productions at Merlyn Theatre Malthouse until August 15, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Review Aug 2, 1998

Australian expatriates are an odd breed. When away, they may complain about their adopted culture and defend their homeland to the death. On returning home, all that patriotism vanishes and home becomes parochial and uncultured.

In Hannie Rayson's very popular play, Hotel Sorrento, expatriatism serves not only as an escape from Australian culture but as an avoidance of grim family secrets.

The play focuses on three sisters who reunite at their family home in Sorrento after a death. Hilary Moynihan (Janet Andrewartha) has remained in Sorrento with her son (Samuel Johnson OK) and father, (John Flaus) running a cafe and being everybody's support since her husband died in a car accident ten years earlier.

Pippa (Christine Harris), the youngest sister, has returned briefly from her advertising job in New York. Meg (Celia de Burgh) has lived in London for ten years and her latest novel, Melancholy, has been nominated for the Booker prize. The novel is the pivot of their mutual antagonism. Its narrative and characters are clearly autobiographical, despite Meg's refusal to acknowledge this.

Rayson addresses not only expatriatism and cultural cringe, but also issues of love, loss and nostalgia. The ethics of plundering the lives of one's family for literature are questioned, as are those of intrusive journalism.

The writing is smart and the play well crafted with full characters and rich comic dialogue. My only quibble is that the revelation of the 'secret' is too rapid, rushing the play to a sudden end.

The performances are strong. Andrewartha is warm and poignant as the stay-at-home Hilary and de Burgh is suitably maddening as the hot headed over-achiever, Meg.

As her husband Edwin, Brian Lipson is the perfect meld of loving partner, intellectual snob and awkward Brit. The two non-family members, played by Jan Friedl and Ken Radley, provide us with outsiders' commentary on the family which is nonetheless biased by their own obsessions.

This production is directed by David Latham who was, ironically, responsible for Chekhov's Three Sisters last year. It starts slowly but gathers momentum after interval when the real conflict escalates and characters communicate more directly in the one location. The split stage of the first half leaves the narrative feeling disconnected.

Judith Cobb's design provides multiple locations with its old wooden pier and platforms. Real water on stage reminds us constantly of the sea that eventually takes one of this fraught family.

By Kate Herbert

The Drover's Boy, July 30, 1998

The Drover's Boy by Ray Mooney

at Athenaeum 2 from July 29, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Reviewed July 1998

The wrongs done our aboriginal population by the English are myriad. We know about stolen land and children, murdered tribes and disease. Many other abuses go uncatalogued. Ray Mooney's play, The Drover's Boy, deals with one.

Last century, drovers travelled with flocks over vast tracts of the outback. It was illegal for black women to 'fraternise' with white men, so drovers who were attached to an aboriginal woman took her on the track dressed as a 'drover's boy'. Was this abuse or genuine attachment?

Mooney's play began in 1985 as a one-acter which director Peter Oyston combined with others by Jack Davis and Jennifer Playnter. Its characters appeared in Black Rabbit (Playbox 1988) but it has taken 13 years for The Drover's Boy to be staged.

Archie, the seasoned drover, (Jim Daly) travels with his flock accompanied by callow youth, Stanley (Wilde Mooney) and Jackey, an aboriginal 'boy' (Pauline Whyman) They cook, yarn and tease. Archie teaches Stanley about the wild and tells him stories of the tribes.

They listen to the wild life, stop mid-sentence to watch an owl, listen to a dingo, stare at a snake. Time is elastic. The night seems endless. The space is enormous, the light is startling and the land is dry and ominous.

Their quiet world changes radically when Macca, (John Brumpton) the racist violent drover hunting for a sheep thief, invades.

The Drover's Boy is a worthy work. The script, like a Bertholt Brecht play, is didactic, educating us without involving us in the victims' emotional torment. Mooney peppers the play with poetic language, snatches of drover's songs, rhymes and old Aussie slang.

My reservations are that the narrative leaves us craving more information about the 'boy' and there is a too sudden dramatic leap towards the end, although this does lift the level of dramatic tension.

Daly plays Archie with an edge of lunacy and as Jackey, Whyman is engaging. Brumpton brings a whiff of danger and Wilde Mooney, the writer's teenage son, makes a fine debut as the ingenuous Stanley.

Director, Greg Carroll, takes risks, sometimes unsuccessfully. The style is inconsistent with some awkward moments but the sense of the wildness of the environment is strong, enhanced by Joe Dolce's soundscape and the splashing of real rain through the old roof of the Athenaeum.

Theatre Summit,l June 26 & 27, 1998

Theatre Summit

At North Melbourne Town Hall June 26 & 27, 1998

by Kate Herbert

"We want theatre to have a sexy future not just a noble past." Liz Jones, Artistic Director of Melbourne's precious theatre institution, La Mama in Carlton, voiced the desire of theatre workers who devoted two days to devising a five year plan for the Victorian theatre industry.

One resolution proposed that we be called a "theatre community" not "industry" :a term used to legitimise artists in a world committed to 'product', financial outcomes and economic rationalism.

The sense of isolation experienced by theatre artists is merely a microcosm of our society. People feel undervalued and insecure in workplaces, face redundancies, unreasonable hours, short contracts and alienating work environments. The wider community is experiencing the insecure lifestyle which artists have endured their entire working lives but to go any further into insecurity would be the death of the arts.

With the new philistinism that seems to be creeping into our politics, theatre workers are having to defend themselves against those calling, "Why give you money? What use is theatre?"

A country is defined by its social and cultural policy. The latter predetermines who is subsidised. With the shrinking arts funding pie we have lost our best middle-level theatre companies. Actors are out there hunting for waiter jobs - probably competing with their administrators.

State and federal funds still go to state theatre companies via the Australia Council's Major Organisations Fund and Arts Victoria. Individual projects are still funded. However, the middle ground has been eroded and companies that provided work for theatre artists and an exciting alternative to major companies, are in hibernation.

Theatre has its own eco-system. Its parts are interdependent. Mainstream companies are worried that this may diminish the development of new audiences for their own work: a trickle-up negative effect.

A huge marketing push is needed to inform the general population that theatre is not just for the elite. Yes. It is a risk. New plays, unlike movies, do not have the advantage of runs all over the world and $20 million budgets. But the beauty of the theatre is its immediacy. You can see and hear the actors. In some cases you are so close you could touch them, hear them breath, see them sweat.

Every night is different and you, as audience, are part of the equation. Unlike film, without you, the show does not exist. It can transport you in a way nothing else can. Remember, theatre stems from mystical, ritualistic and religious canons.

Few other industries need to constantly justify themselves as does theatre. It is exhausting. We need a catch cry "Theatre is sexy!" or "Go to a Show!" Playwright, John Romeril, suggests a "Go to a Show Week".

Melbourne needs to relish and promote its extraordinary theatre scene. It is unlike any other city in the country. Huge musicals are not the key to our identity. The diversity of our theatres, the proliferation of small companies, unusual shows , street theatre, festivals and quirky venues is what makes Melbourne's theatre scene idiosyncratic.

It is the fact that, in any one week, there are 6-8 new Australian productions opening unlike any other city in the country, in fact, the world. It is not the blockbuster musical which, as Kennett suggested, will make Melbourne the third "theatre city" after London and New York.

The five year plan includes resolutions such as developing a Theatre Centre which provides not only master training for actors as does the Actors' Centre in Sydney, but a whole administrative infrastructure for smaller companies an individual artists and houses a Peak Body to argue for the survival of the industry.

Theatre needs to reach more people so touring must be further fostered. Cheaper ticket prices for industry members and students would help keeps theatres alive and attract new young audiences.

The forging of relationships with local governments will provide a new source of funding and venues and enable theatre to go back into specific communities. This is reminiscent of the heyday of Community Theatre but in a new modern form.

Diversity is what makes Melbourne special. Why not sell this to the tourists? "See ten shows in five days. Visit the Playhouse, La Mama, a garage in Footscray, a cupboard in Fitzroy - and see great theatre."

KATE HERBERT

Behind Closed Doors, July 26,1998

Behind Closed Doors adapted writings of Robert Walser

at La Mama until August 2, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Tucked into La Mama's snugness is a literary and theatrical gem.

Howard Stanley's solo show, Behind Closed Doors, is a truly delightful, 'must-see' performance of adapted writings of Robert Walser (1878-1956).

"We don't need to see anything out of the ordinary. We already see so much," demonstrates the simplicity of Walser's poetic vision. Stanley is the perfect representation of the humble, peculiar and hilarious voice of the writer.

Disconnected writings join seamlessly in this adaptation by Stanley in conjunction with Wayne Macauley and director, Adrian Guthrie who has returned after a 20 year absence. His work in the 70's with Stanley and others at Claremont Theatre was part of Melbourne's early experimental theatre.

The performance is stripped bare and so is Stanley. When the piece begins, he is crouching cramped in a tin tub in an almost Munch-like silent scream. His mad grin and odd physical antics punctuate Walser's naive and poignant words. His timing is impeccable and his quirky delivery adds an ironic note to the lilting music of the text.

There is a sweet sadness in Stanley's simple fool who is reminiscent of Geoffrey Rush's character in Diary of a Madman. Stanley has always been Melbourne's answer to Sydney's Oscar-winning Rush but has remained inexplicably undiscovered.

He is the perfect charming clown - and I do not mean fuzzy orange wig and white face. His past work has always been exceptional, unpredictable and on the cutting edge. In one show, he scampered about naked then let loose a dozen stray dogs amongst the audience. In a gallery show, he required people to pay with a cheque that bounced. He was known on the comedy circuit as "The Comedian's Comedian" for his character Howard Slowly.

The man in the bath-tub pre-empts a later reference to a writer who lived in a woman's bathroom. He attends a job interview - naked - from his tub. He searches for a room, seeks romance with a potential land-lady, marvels at women's legs, their desire to wear trousers and to vote: "Voting so boring!"

He jitters about his ageing and his nervousness. He acknowledges his weirdness. He dresses coyly, behind a striped sheet, adding silk shirt, vest and jacket in his journey from tub to poetic visionary. Walser's words reflect his warmth, his childlike joy, his love of the landscape and, tragically, his own later madness.

This is a must-see show.

By kate Herbert

CLOSER , MTC, July 24, 1998

CLOSER by Patrick Marber MTC

At Fairfax Studio until August 22, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

"Liar, liar. Pants on fire!" Everybody lies in English playwright, Patrick Marber's Closer. Like his chronic gamblers in Dealer's Choice, they are all out of control but in Closer the lack of control relates to love..

Dan (Marco Chiappi), a needy, aspiring novelist who writes obituaries, meets Alice, (Asher Keddie) a brazen 20 year-old stripper, when she walks into London traffic without looking. This is how she lives her life.

Anna, (Jane Menelaus) a stylish photographer, meets Dan when she takes his publicity shot for his soon-to-fail novel. Larry, (Robert Menzies), a dermatologist and social primitive, encounters Anna, by Dan's contrivance, in an aquarium. They all fall in love: serial monogamy. Ah, the nineties!

The characters are not likeable but the actors are. Menelaus is subtle and magnetic as Anna, Chiappi plays Dan as the hopeless romantic, Keddie is a perky Alice and Menzies is a suitably unpleasant and vulgar Larry.

The secrecy of guilty sex is attractive. These modern people are easily bored or disillusioned. They crave their fantasies made real.

Designer, Judith Cobb's romantic blue moon looms over the space that is piled with furniture echoing the temporary state of all four relationships.

But Marber's people, despite several split ups and lots of tears, never manage to gain our sympathy or elicit our compassion. They remain shallow and lack warmth. The actors rattle around in the cavernous space as if it is too huge to allow them to be intimate.

The problem is not in performances nor in Bruce Myles sleek direction, but in the writing. The dialogue is often funny but never penetrates the surface. They speak in glib phrases that alienate us. The narrative is entertaining but thin. Marber places all dramatic moments off stage.

His history in stand-up comedy writing may keep Marber distant from the personal. He is one of the international wave of young men who have been too quickly promoted onto the mainstage.

His women.speak like men, almost as the mouthpiece for male fantasies. The two men engage in a funny, grotesque internet sex chat, Dan pretending to be a woman to tease his unwitting victim. The internet chat is sexual in a pornographic, adolescent way. These days, we are unshockable.

Men's attitude to pornography is still the main lapse in understanding between genders. Women speak a different language. Larry should have guessed it was a man on the other end of his cyber fantasy. We hope all men are not trapped in this phallo-centric stage.

By Kate Herbert

Speaking in Tongues, Playbox, July 21, 1998

Speaking in Tongues by Andrew Bovell

Playbox at Beckett Theatre until August 15, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Reviewed around July 20.

People's lives bleed into one another's, not necessarily by design, often by accident. They may actually meet, intersect, even run parallel or simply reverberate, resemble or echo each other. Six degrees of separation: we are all only six acquaintances away from each other.

In Andrew Bovell's play, Speaking in Tongues, nine characters played by four actors, share lives and even unwittingly share partners. They plunge headlong or dip blithely into each other's world's only to damage or abandon, perhaps to advise, reconcile or empathise. Whatever their relationships, they speak different emotional languages, hence the title.

Bovell's writing is always crisp, stylish and witty. His signature is the fracturing of time, space and dialogue. He splices several scenes and locations, creating intersecting voices, echoes in one scene of another, twanging ironic chords and reminding us that there are so few stories in this little human world. We all suffer the same pains and joys.

In creating this text, he has cleverly merged two earlier plays: Distant Lights from Dark Places and Like Whiskey on the Breath of a Drunk You Love. Additional narrative, for those familiar with these or the monologues from Confidentially Yours provides a further compelling back-story for familiar characters. It is not simple storytelling. There are diversions and detours at every turn.

Four consummate actors (Heather Bolton, Robert Meldrum, Merfyn Owen, Margaret Mills) double roles and are directed skilfully and unobtrusively by Ros Horin who directed the 1996 production at the Griffin Theatre, Sydney. Sleek design, (Liane Wilcher) adaptation (Nicola McIntosh), evocative lighting (Nigel Levings) and subtle music (Sarah de Jong) complete the piece.

Mills' Jane, a frightened fawn seeking change, is counter-pointed by Bolton's tough Sonia. Owen's forceful copper, Leon, balances not only his timid wife but his casual lover's sensitive, betrayed husband. Power and weakness, betrayal and loyalty, deception and reconciliation pull these characters together like magnets.

Bovell's dialogue plays with the fragmentation of everyday communication and the actors balance superbly the vocal dynamic, interplay of voices and roles, the canon effect of the dialogue and the cryptic emotional landscape.

Strangers' life stories can be catalysts for change or clarity. These characters are deeply affected by chance crossed paths. Leon cannot forget the man whose lover never returned from Europe. Neil obsesses about a stranger whose wife was stranded on a country road and disappeared.

There are some hiccups in this piece that may be due to the collision of styles but it is a resonant and challenging peep into nine lives.

KATE HERBERT

Faith Healer, July 13, 1998

Faith Healer by Brian Friel

Presented by The Old Van

 At The Shed VCA Dodds St. Sth Melbourne until August 2, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Reviewed around July 13, 1998

Who needs a design with everything that opens and shuts, elaborate lighting, digital sound and a ridiculous budget when you can see an impeccably written play performed by three remarkable local actors in a shed?

Fiona Blair's interpretation of Faith Healer by Brian Friel is such a production. The "shed" is a surprisingly warm and comfortable portable classroom in the grounds of the VCA. Even if it were not, this play would warrant enduring some discomfort.

Faith Healer uses the same narrative device as Friel's recent play, Molly Sweeney that had a stellar season for the MTC. Three characters speak in monologues. As their shared history unfolds, we become complicit in each one's version of the facts. Events and their relationships are coloured by their selective memories.

Irishman, Frank Hardy (Kurt Geyer), is a talented faith healer with a chequered record. He travels Scotland and Wales with his ex-lawyer wife, Grace (Jane Nolan) and his manager, the lovable ingenuous cockney, Teddy (Richard Bligh).

The trio bump about the drizzly countryside in a rattle-trap of a van fitted with a smelly primus stove, visiting remote villages and presenting healing as an almost vaudevillian revue to rival Teddy's previous client, Rob-Roy, the bag-piping whippet.

Several incidents are significant to all three. It takes two and a half riveting hours of intimate contact with Frank, Grace and Teddy for us to glean the truth about that village in the far north of Scotland where a baby is buried, that Fred Astaire number they used for openers and that fateful night in the pub in Ballybeg, Ireland

The marriage is fraught. Both Frank and Grace have abandoned their families only to attempt belated reconciliations. Frank lives in a fantasy world. Grace only wants devotion. Teddy stays twenty years on the road with them because he loves both too much. They are victims of themselves and each other. Artists should never marry. Says, Teddy. His whippet is proof positive.

Blair has focused on the text and the actor, which is the key to Friel's work. All three actors bring a detailed and intelligent eye to the script, bringing alive the sub-text. Geyer is charming as the charismatic, whiskey-soused Frank. Bligh is sweet and endearing as the poor doormat, Teddy. Jane Nolan is heart-rending as the shattered Grace measuring her progress by the hours she sleeps and the cigarettes she smokes.

British director, Peter Brook praises "Poor Theatre" This is.a prime example.

KATE HERBERT

Cakes Men Like July 7, 1998

Cakes Men Like, by Sat on the Hat

Athenaeum II, July 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Reviewed around July 6 1998

If you are looking for a cheap and novel lunch activity to interrupt your working or shopping day in the city centre, look no further than the Athenaeum Theatre II on Collins Street. While you watch a half-hour show, you can sup on soup provided by Heinz and yummy bread donated by Pott's Bakery. All this for only $5.

Soup Kitchen Theatre began this terrific little earner eight years ago and it has now been commandeered by another small company, Sat on the Hat. The first show of this winter season is Cakes Men Like that will be followed by Trudy Hellier's Trapped opening on August 4.

Cakes is a simple cautionary tale about housewifery in the 50's. This, of course, lends itself to satirical observations, songs from the period and some slightly patronising commentary from our high-horse 90's.

Director Greg Dyson works with three women, Charlie Laidlaw, Rosina Gannon and Amanda Armstrong, who portray three diverse characters who are trapped in the never-ending cycle of pleasing the men in their lives with their kitchen creativity.

The men invent appliances to make the lives of the women easier but, in fact, they end up literally incarcerated in their fridges singing Doris Day tunes, posing by the Frigidaire and telling their favourite cake recipes. It is like a fractured 50's Women's Weekly advertisement.

The catch is that, occasionally, the women go completely bonkers - inside their own heads. The pressure of being nice, providing for hubbie and kids, and keeping up appearances, is all too much.

The three are performers and devisers of this light, entertaining, if sometimes didactic piece. Laidlaw and Gannon are members of the very clever clown ensemble, Four on the Floor who are known for very physical comedy with sweet, wacky characters.

There is some of this style in Cakes but the pace is slower and the comedy less punchy. It could benefit from a bit more action and a lot less static talk. It is a dated style reminiscent of 70's feminist street theatre that damned the housefraus and their over-bearing husbands.

The comparisons of men to the kind of cakes they like were very funny. One tubby chap likes dumplings. Another eats meringue, " Crusty on the outside, sweet and sticky inside." But their dream man is a fruitcake. Rich, fruity and you can put him a way for a long time and he's even better when he comes out.

By Kate Herbert

Tell Her that I Love Her, June 25, 1998

Tell Her that I Love Her by Somebody's Daughter Theatre
Beckett Theatre until July 11, 1998
Sacred Promise opens July 8, 1998
Reviewer: Kate Herbert 
Reviewed round June 25

A child's voice in the audience whispered, "What's dope?" You can bet that the characters and some of the actors in Tell Her That I Love Her wish they had never found out the answer to that question themselves.

Somebody's Daughter Theatre has remounted its 1991 production which was developed, under the direction of Maud Clark, in workshops with women in Fairlea prison. The play incorporates the painfully real stories of those women, some of whom are still in the cast.

Within a loose narrative built around Jessie's (Tracey Forward) release from prison, we hear disturbing stories of childhood sexual abuse, abandonment, adoption, foster homes and drug-fazed mothers.

Live music by Greg Sneddon on upright piano underlines dramatic moments but is essentially used for songs which pepper the scenes. John Beckett's beautiful design is evocative of St.Kilda pier with crisp white sails and rough wooden decking embedded in sand.

The structure may be predictable, the gestural language awkward, the writing sometimes melodramatic and the acting limited, but the intention of this community theatre company is not to compete with a Melbourne Theatre Company production.

Rather, it is to give these women a voice, a channel of communication by which they can shout the stories of their lives from the ramparts. The truth of what they tell us and their commitment to their stories carries the play and gives it a resonance not found in fictional piece.

We see a series of scenes begining with Jessie's first day out and her meeting with her old friends, (Maud Clark, Helen Barnacle, Nicol Morrow) some of whom have have kicked their habits and are struggling to survive, another has overdosed and a third, Tuesday, (Kharen Harper) Jessie's lover, is unable to stop using.

The tragedy is in the relentlessness of Tuesday's decline, the insidiousness of the lure of the drug for Jessie and the ease with which the addict can acquire it on the streets in an underworld which few of us encounter.

The play reaches a poignant and tear-wrenching ending which is heightened by the women tossing roses onto the sand-covered ground as they call the names of their dead friends. The list is distressingly long.

KATE HERBERT

Amy's View, MTC, June 21, 1998

Amy's View by David Hare

MTC at Playhouse until July 18, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Reviewed around 20 June 1998

Since the late 60's, British playwright David Hare has written full and layered roles for women. Hare’s roles on stage and screen have been played by Vanessa Redgrave, Judi Dench and Meryl Streep.

The central role in Amy's View, directed by Simon Phillips, is, ironically, not Amy but her bohemian actress mother, Esme Allen, She is played with dignity and empathy by the virtuoso Robin Nevin who demonstrates what Hare describes as the great gift of actors to not only do the line but play the interior thought with layered detail.

There are fine cameos from seasoned performers, Patricia Kennedy and Donald Macdonald.

This naturalistic, quite conservative play is staged on a realistic set by Dale Ferguson. In four acts, it maps the life of Esme from 1979 to 1995, beginning in her comfortable middle-class Berkshire living room and ending in the dressing room of a scruffy West End alternative theatre.

The play, astonishingly for an originally political writer such as Hare, makes no overt reference to Thatcher's economic rationalism although it shows Esme as a victim of the financial collapse of the late 80's and the unlimited liability of the wealthy "names" who underwrote Lloyd's of London.

The third and fourth acts are more dramatic and dynamic with the focus on Esme. The first half concentrates on Amy (Vivienne Walshe), Esme's dull, decisive, albeit successful daughter and her deceptively positive relationship with her widowed mother. Esme secretly does not approve of Amy's new partner, Dominic, (Simon Bossell) an angry and rising TV arts critic. In these two acts, the younger actors look uncomfortable and Walshe's acting is often mannered.

At this stage the play is about the backlash of youth against conservative art and the irrelevance of the theatre in a culture obsessed with rapid screen imagery Dominic and Esme stand at opposite ends of the battle field, Esme fighting with her refined and tasteful aloofness and Dominic with his vitriolic and resentful tongue.

After interval the dramatic tension increases and the stakes are raised. It is now about the declining fortunes of a well-heeled and successful actress, the irresponsible actions of major financial organisations and the refusal of the English upper-class to accept that its fortunes have altered irrevocably.

Finally, there is some sense of resolution for Esme and her family after all the betrayal and loss and misunderstanding and love. It is the personal lives of the characters that are important. In the end, the rest is just theatre, not life and death.

KATE HERBERT

Chicago Chicago System 98, NYID, June 20, 1998

Chicago Chicago System 98 by Not Yet It's Difficult

 Athenaeum II until July 4, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Reviewed around 19 June 1998

Making an 'old' play relevant is a popular pastime. John Bell dragged Henry IV into soccer-mad England. The Club recently translated easily to our 90's corporate sport era. Such productions generally adhere to original text; not so David Pledger's adaptation of John Romeril's Chicago Chicago with contemporary performance company, NYID.

Not Yet It's Difficult creates challenging, physical theatre that incorporates new media and deconstructs text, attacks social norms, and political systems. Chicago Chicago System 98 is no exception.

The original Romeril play was much longer with 20 scenes. NYID has nipped, tucked and reconstructed the old dame, scaling it down to 75 minutes. The audience, seated initially on rough benches on two sides of an almost empty space was subsequently moved twice more..

Video footage by Paul Hosking is projected onto a scruffy wall. It uses a complex collage of wry imagery filched from television journalism, game shows and CD Rom. Characters are under constant surveillance by hidden cameras. The space remains 'live', unpredictable and constantly questions the relationship of audience to actor and character to state. Romeril wrote "a protest against the American way of life" which is now also an indictment of contemporary Australia.

There is a narrative about a man "who will later be known as 'The Victim' (Greg Stone) who appears to be a politician on the campaign trail. Two mock audience members (Carole Patullo & Tom Considine) voice our own confusion as it is revealed that George may be undergoing rehab and is suffering delusions.

NYID's ironic take on theatre is never far from the surface. Considine's character grapples valiantly with the sub-text of the play. His wife is distracted by worries about their front light being left on. Pledger appears on screen as a pretentious American critic commenting on Romeril, with a portrait of the artist as backdrop.

 Any whiff of self-indulgence is undercut by such cynical representation. There is no program to assist us, which is a relief. Too much contemporary performance relies on notes to make itself comprehensible.

The chorus of performers (Paul Bongiovanni, Danielle Long, Kha Tran Viet, Tamara Saulwick) wear suits and sunglasses and employ the NYID's signature style of crisp, abstracted gesture and choral vocalisation.

The piece requires enormous concentration, as this is no simple narrative with pretty costumes. Although not as cohesive, stylish or expensive as NYID's 1997 Austral-Asian Post Cartoon Sports Edition, it challenges one's view of the theatre space, action, audience and narrative.. That can only be a good thing.

KATE HERBERT

Double Disillusion, June 13, 1998

Double Disillusion By Rod Quantock
Trades Hall from  June 10, 1998
Reviewer: Kate HerbertReviewed around 12 June, 1998
 
Yet again we must declare our bias. Rod Quantock is this reviewer's local god of comedy. He is not, he declares, a political satirist but a "political vitriolist" and the Kennett and Howard governments take a beating - which is how we keep 'em honest, isn't it?

The new show incorporates material from his successful Comedy Festival show, Crown of Thorns but, after interval ("It's a proper show. We have an interval.") Quantock moves on to newer, more recently topical subjects such as tax reform and the GST with asides about One Nation.

Quantock shatters theatrical illusion and conventions in his "mono-media" production. Instead of funky computer graphics, slides, light show or soundscape, he uses blackboard and chalk to illustrate his political points and statistics. He relies on his charismatic, idiosyncratic personality and ironic delivery to captivate an audience.

He ushers, tears tickets, greets audience members by name then feigns a grand entrance after flicking off the fluoros. The stage is a rough platform lit by a couple of coloured lights which he kindly redirected away from the eyes of the front row. "You wouldn't get this in an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical."

Quantock's wry, intelligent style and venomous attack on government are balanced with his warmth, generosity and genuine care about the community. he says it gets depressing talking about unemployment, poverty, company tax dodges, lying politicians, labour reform, advertising, foreign ownership, privatisation and the media dynasties of Murdoch and Packer. In short, he analyses "Power": "moral, political and economic.

He pines for the 'good old days" and postulates that for younger listeners, these days will be their good old days. Isn't that depressing? "Our history is written in our biscuits.". Teddy Bears are different since Campbell's took over Arnott's  Their legs no longer fall off when dunked. Economic rationalism has even affected our bikkies.

We are blessed with a local hero such as Quantock who never allows us to become complacent about our social and political environment. Jokes arise from significant (albeit scribbled) statistics about wealth and the GST or from laconic references to the irony of the naming of Bayswater or the silliness of selling electricity from supermarkets.

Quantock is the darling of the press at present, since he declared again that he would stand against Kennett in the seat of Burwood. He promises he won't win. But if the Witch from Ipswich can get a seat, you never know.

Kate Herbert

Henry IV, by Bell Shakespeare, June 11, 1998

Henry IV by William Shakespeare by Bell Shakespeare Company

 at The Merlin Theatre Malthouse until June 27, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Reviewed around June 10, 1998

Shakespeare's Henry IV is a study of the quest for power. It reveals the corruption of rulers, the folly of princes, the vanity of power-seekers and the myriad weaknesses of humankind. To paraphrase Falstaff, honour is for the dead.

In the Bell Shakespeare Company production, director, John Bell pares Parts 1 and 2 down to a rollicking 3 hours that happily and anachronistically skip in style from merry mediaeval England to contemporary Bovva-Boy troubled UK.

Henry IV (Richard Piper) replaces his deposed cousin, Richard II, only to be hounded by the ungrateful and hotheaded Hotspur, (Darren Gilshenan) who joins Wales and Scotland in rebellion. Henry's son, Prince Hal (Joel Edgerton) is engaged in revels with his bawdy acquaintance, Falstaff (John Gaden) until Part 2 when he inherits the crown and must give up childish things, which evidently include his 'friends'.

Part One travels at a cracking pace with battles and jokes coming thick and fast. Bell contrasts the pomp of the court with the raucous ribaldry of the inn where Falstaff rules as the clown prince. Clear parallels are drawn between crimes wrought by Henry and the petty thieving of the inn-fellows. Shakespeare did not present a pretty picture of the ruling house for his Queen Elizabeth.

Part Two is slower and theatrically less interesting because all the action has already taken place. Essentially we wait for Henry to die and Hal to discard Falstaff like a used rag.

With fight director, Steve Douglas-Craig , Bell has created colourful battle scenes reminiscent of marauding soccer hooligans. They chant "Harry Percy" and sing choruses of Liverpool's theme song, "You'll Never Walk Alone".

Gaden demonstrates his incomparably stylish delivery as Falstaff, the lovable rogue and the versatile Gilshenan is superbly overwrought as Hotspur and over-sexed as Pistol. Edgerton is capable as Prince Hal but seems more comfortable in the lighter first part.

Bell's fine ensemble, all of whom play multiple roles, revel in the blokiness of the play - even the two women (Carole Skinner, Rebecca Massey) Highlights were Tony Llewellyn-Jones' Welsh rebel, Glendower , Edwin Hodgeman as the raffish old legal eagle, Justice Shallow and cameos from Tony Taylor and the inimitable Duncan Wass.

The production is better-served by the Merlin after years at the cramped Athenaeum. Justin Kurzel's design is reminiscent of a nightclub alley. Its steeply raked stage is surrounded by cyclone wire, scrap metal and rock-and-roll detritus Alan John has created a thumping musical score which underscores dramatic tension.

This is an exciting and innovative production with broad appeal to a modern audience.

Kate Herbert

Keene /Taylor Theatre Project 3, June 2, 1998

By Daniel Keene & Ariette Taylor

Brotherhood of St Laurence Warehouse 97 Brunswick St Fitzroy 

until June 21, 1998

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

In this third series of the Keene/Taylor Theatre Project, the three short plays rely not on technology, but fine performances and dialogue to affect us.

 We are drawn closer to the plight of our underclass that has been created by our social and moral vacuum and loss of community.

Director, Ariette Taylor, uses four actors, a dancer and18 extras. Performances are all versatile and detailed. Once again, the pieces are set in the raw and real environment of the Brotherhood of St. Laurence furniture warehouse and staged simply by Taylor with very few theatrical devices. The design uses the actual welfare furniture and Paul Jackson's lighting is simple with bare globes and plastic light fittings

Daniel Keene's playwriting falls into two distinctly different styles: social realism and a more elusive poetic form In this series, both styles are represented.

To Whom It May Concern is a poignant, intimate tale of an ageing and ill father's struggle  (Malcolm Robertson) to solve the future of his 40 year old intellectually disabled son, Leo, (Phil Sumner) after father is gone. It is sweet and tragic with dad trying to be practical and Leo remaining frightened and uncomprehending. These are the disenfranchised of our inner city. Information is power and this father and son have none so they wander alone in the urban wilderness.

Custody is a grittier slice of life about a police cover-up of a death in custody. The young buck cop (Dan Spielman) is responsible but his volatile senior officer (Phil Sumner) engages in an elaborate deception to avoid discovery. It is violent and terrifying in its emotional brutality, overt racism and the characters complete lack of accountability for their actions. It is an indictment of the justice system.

Keene's poetic form appears in What Remains of Dying that is a moving, fraught monologue by Paul English as an unnamed, unspecified man, distressed and despairing when his wife and son disappear. Rows of silent people sit as if in a waiting room. Intermittently, a woman (Meredith Blackburn) who may represent his wife or his fate, dances through the space..

 He speaks directly to us, reading from what could be a police statement. Is it a confession? A breakdown? Is his family alive or dead? This piece the most difficult and remains a little too obscure. But it deals with irrational or unresolved fears and the desperate needs of humanity when it hits rock bottom.

By Kate Herbert