Mr. Melancholy, Nov 29, 1996

Written by Matt Cameron

Chameleon Theatre

Beckett Theatre until Dec 14, 1997

Reviewed by Kate Herbert around Nov 30, 1996

A Hermitage a' Trois is one description of the characters in Mr. Melancholy by Matt Cameron and Chameleon Theatre. To be more precise, “three's company, four's a crowd" in this absurd comedy about love, loss and isolation.

It is essentially a long, very funny comedy sketch with a poignant ending. Three hermits suffering from varying degrees of sociability, live together in a lighthouse sans light. They all seem to have fallen out of society, or a passing ship, purposely or not we do not know. They struggle with their existential dilemma. Their routine is settled.

Ollie, (Wayne Hope) the light-housekeeper, no longer bothers to watch for ships. He collects flotsam luggage and steals a beachful of sand. Meanwhile the maudlin, hapless bride, Margot, (Maud Davey) steals it all back after burying another cold fish which has died in her care.

 Silly, naive, blathering Enzo, (Ernie Grey) the caretaker, bemoans his mute ventriloquist doll  and studies meaning in the dictionary. Shades of Samuel Beckett without the bleak existentialism.

The routine is settled; until Dolores, (Suzie Doherty) a clown escapee from the circus, arrives in a trunk and we all know that new blood unsettles the old. Everyone wants change and fears it except Dolores who will risk everything, transform herself for love.

Mr. Melancholy is entertainingly crammed with terrific groan-wrenching puns and gags but the first half feels unsatisfyingly insubstantial. The dialogue becomes glib and any flow or depth in characters or relationship is constantly undercut by one-liners. After interval the drama checks in, the emotional stakes are raised and the text comes closer to the examination of the human condition promised in the first half.

Performances are uniformly strong. Hope 's impeccable comic timing and Grey's quirky clown are excellent while Davey's acerbic gloom is an appropriate foil to Doherty's child-like peppiness. Anna Tregloan's design of enormous rickety piles of lost luggage and an encompassing ring of rocks/sandbags provides accentuates the isolation and containment for the characters. The evocative, dislocated circus calliope music, composed by Johna Doty and is effective while remaining unobtrusive.

Melancholy is the natural state. People stay too long in unhealthy relationships. Whichever way you slice it, all human activity is an exercise in futility.

KATE HERBERT

Mind's Eye, Nov 28, 2017

by Handspan & Back to Back

Lonsdale St Power Station until Dec 7, 1996

Reviewed by Kate Herbert around Nov 28, 1996

Theatrical collaborations can be a breeding ground for new and wonderful ideas in the land of the unpredictable or they may breed only conflict. Back to Back meeting Handspan Theatre is a successful example of the former.

Mind's Eye is weird in every sense of the word.  It is riddled with rich and disturbing Jungian imagery. One character's 'female parts' argue with her and represent her uncontrollable sexuality. It mews like a kitten and is attacked by a mangy mongrel which is in turn thrown ruthlessly into a furnace by the witch.

The character is played by Sonia Teuben, an experienced actor from Back to Back, a company for intellectually disabled actors.  Her provocative 'pussy' raises awareness about social repression of sexuality in disabled people.

The plot of Mind's Eye is simple. It is a fairy tale about a bored witch-mermaid who sends several messages in bottles inviting strangers to her birthday party on her island home.  Her invitation reads peremptorily, "Bring a present" and she is none too gracious if she does not like the gift. In fact, put a foot wrong and you're likely to be chained, burned or bewitched.

The company has a charming and disarming style. Mark Deans once again performs his inimitable natural clown and Rita Halabarec as the witch is both menacing and cute. Tom Lycos accompanies Back to back actors with a terrific physical presence naive clown.

Puppeteers (John Rogers, Liss Gabb, Megan Cameron) are, as is often the case in Handspan's black theatre, visible and active as characters who not only manipulate the puppets but who interact with them and with the actors. The mechanics of the theatrical form: lighting, musicians, movable sets, the creatures which droop before life is breathed into them, are all revealed in an almost Brechtian way. The process is demystified without destroying the magic of visual theatre.

Design by Cliff Dolliver includes a couple of mad cartoon-like critters: a huge " stupid jungle animal" and an animated drawing which scuttle about then go to sea together. ˆThe haunting live music is played by Helen Mountford and Hope Csutoros with recorded music by My Friend the Chocolate Cake. It provides an emotional layer for the piece.

There are messy bits, slow sections and some incomprehensible images but the whole is so entertaining it doesn't matter a jot. The crowd cheered and stamped at the curtain call – and Mark Deans did his cartwheels to steal the limelight.

KATE HERBERT  

Tristan and Yseult, Nov 27, 1996

Tristan & Yseult by Peter Jetnikoff & Stephen Joyce

 La Mama at Lonsdale St Power Station until Dec 12, 1996

In the end, Tristan and Yseult die the death they should have died in the beginning: suicide for lost love. Truth and passion don't rule the world but power, history and comfort.

Yes, comfort. People choose the comfortable worn armchair. Even Yseult returns to her royal husband and abode after three years desperate exile and scrounging in the forest with her lover. Living hand to mouth with a loved one is not much fun as anyone on the dole can vouch.

This non-Wagnerian Tristan & Yseult, written by Peter Jetnikoff & Stephen Joyce is performed at the Lonsdale St Power Station. It is produced by La Mama which now has tentacles reaching right out into every available small theatre venue.

The disused warehouse contrasts the concrete industrial location with the delightfully classical style of the text. The poetic almost Elizabethan form of the dialogue and narration is coupled with stylised action and compelling performances by the entire ensemble.

The audience, after initially standing around uncomfortably, is seated around a manually revolving "Wooden 'O' " to witness the unfolding of the poignant tale of passion, besmirched honour and betrayal. One never tires of these such human frailties. The two are star-crossed, like Romeo and Juliet, coming from warring kingdoms of Cornwall and Ireland. As he escorts Yseult to marry King of Cornwall and end the conflict, Tristan (Luke Elliot) falls in love with his Queen-to-be (Vanessa O'Neill) and here begins their tale of doom and destiny.

The poetic, almost Elizabethan, form of the dialogue and narration is coupled with stylised action and compelling performances by the entire ensemble. There is a warmth and richness in the storytelling and a tautness in Bruce Naylor's direction which holds us for three hours. The recipe of tragedy with a tincture of irony which is inherent in the text, is heightened by Drew Tingwell's dwarf-narrator and Bruce Kerr's King. Alex Pinder provides the weight of experience and rationality in his Governal.

Luke Elliot's complex and driven Tristan is layered with the naivete and lust of youth and Vanessa O'Neill portrayal of Yseult is intelligent and detailed. The two create exciting and credible lovers. The whole piece is coloured and supported by subtle lighting and live music by Nick Papas and Caroline Lee.

The very opening fifteen minutes were slow with narration over dumb show but the piece flies for the remaining hours. This is really gripping myth-telling See it!.ˆ

KATE HERBERT

The Mysteries of Rufus Bummings, Nov 22, 1996

by Chris Dickins

 Spirit Theatre.

At Polyglot Theatre 14 -30 November, 1996

Reviewed by KH around 22 Nov 1996

'Ruffhouse Burminglsey Manufacturings. Drop a few dozen letters of the manufacturer written on his back and you are left with 'Rufus Bummings'.

Rufus, the title character of Chris Dickins' play the Mysteries of Rufus Bummings, is a wooden carnival soldier who hangs from a child's mobile. The child is the warm, vibrant but severely intellectually disabled Ruth.

This is her story told through the eyes of Rufus, her loyal soldier, friend and historian. Rufus awaits his fate in Ruth's parents' garage sale, along with his brothers Ricco, Ricco, Ricco and Keith.

Dickins candid, poetic and poignant writing is evident in this monodrama performed by Bradley Hulme and directed by Dickins himself. Hulme presents the story sympathetically with an engaging directness as he gambols about on stage, shifting between Rufus and Ruth, her parents and friends at her special school where she paints everything made of paper.

It is a bitter-sweet tragedy. Ruth is shocked to realise she is "a creature". Rufus is aware before she is that she is stared at and scares others. Her home is with the other special kids. "Last one in the bus is normal!"

She finally declares to her remote parents that she has ten wishes before she dies which include a new dress, going to the ballet ("I didn't think they could kick you out just for laughing.") and Scienceworks and putting Rufus's letters back on his coat.

The life-size carnival carousel dolls and horses, designed by Artery, are delightful amongst the garage detritus of Ruth's family's life. The fragmented structure is initially confusing but the second half clarifies much of the narrative. There are some awkward moments theatrically but the emotional tale eventually takes over and leads us gently to its conclusion.

KATE HERBERT

VCA Theatre Makers 1996 Nov 22, 1996

 Theatre Makers - Two plays

Victorian College of the Arts Drama School

The Great Divide by Tony Reck

 Old People by Alex Green

 VCA Drama School

The aged are often believed to live in their pasts in a non-sexual haze of heart drugs, tea and toast. The two oldies in Alex Green's short work, Old People, are no exception to this myth.

This black-comic masked piece is located in the rough, concrete back space of the Drama School building of VCA. The location provided the perfect setting for a cyclone wire enclosed rubbish dump. Do the old couple live on a tip? Is it a metaphor for their dislocated lives? Either way, the design serves the narrative.

These two, who appear to be Eastern European post-war immigrants who have not done to well financially in the land of milk and honey, pine for their pasts, their secrets, imagined or long-lost friends, their almost forgotten sexuality. They play games, taunt and dress up in giant teddy costumes. The past is a place of joy and sadness. Paraphrasing Shakespeare, "It's rosemary." "That's for remembrance." It seems to be all they have, apart from each other.

Tony Reck's play script was workshopped at the Playwrights' conference this year but it required a full production to realise its predominantly visual and physical emphasis. David Symons, himself a VCA graduate, has scattered the sparse dialogue amidst multi-media imagery provided by multiple slide screens, film projector, soundscape and recorded voice. It is primarily a conceptual piece of theatre, influenced by the abstraction of performance art.

The juxtaposition of imagery is effective at times but most often it remains bewildering or overstated. The hour long piece takes off fifteen minutes in when the actual narrative about a family is clarified to some degree. To suggest that there is a coherent narrative thread is to undermine the style and concept of Reck's work and Symon's direction.

The characters are representative of the family of parents and two sons. The jump-cut physical movement style fragments moments of their lives and the shifts in relationships. The dislocation of people in suburbia is accented and the dysfunction of families in the modern world is heightened by the abstraction.

The work of the VCA Theatremakers (writers, directors and animateurs) is showcased this week in various college venues.

KATE HERBERT

Thumbul, Nov 16, 1996

By Tom E Lewis & Mac Gudgeon

At Gasworks until Dec 1996

Reviewed by KH around Nov 15, 1996

There's no denying it. Tom E. Lewis is charming. His autobiographical show, Thumbul, is a perfect vehicle for his entertaining and often poignant solo journey through his 40-odd years on this planet as a bicultural Australian.

Lewis straddles the twin worlds of remote Arnhem Land and urban /urbane St. Kilda. More precisely, he has spent his years tumbling backwards and forwards from his tribal home in the far north and the strange, artsy-fartsy world of film and theatre.

The pivotal point both theatrically and in his personal Road Well Travelled was the moment, at age seventeen, he was discovered at an airport by Fred Schepsi and tossed headlong into playing the title role in The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith Lewis, in a darker moment, muses that he may have been Jimmy reincarnated. As he re-enacts Jimmy's gruesome slaughter of the white women, he seems to be purging all his childhood abuse at the hands of the white church, schools, red-necks and the Welsh father who abandoned him.

John Bolton's direction is brisk and often physical representation of Tom's story. Lewis speaks directly to us. We are part of his trip. He engages us with his quips, anecdotes and songs and his warm, amiable, vigorous and, above all, totally natural persona. It is a joy to be with him.

The text, developed with writer Mac Gudgeon, is light and funny and is coloured by Lewis's constant improvising as he stumbles over a word, hears a digital watch in the audience or plays with toy farm animals in the red sand covered floor. His comic timing is impeccable and the audience roared at his jokes and stood to cheer at his curtain call.

It is the sheer simplicity of the piece and its delivery which is its greatest asset. In combination with Lewis's natural charm and the dark underbelly of his story of cultural dichotomy, this makes a compelling 90 minutes in the theatre.

KATE HERBERT

Snorkel, Nov 14, 1996

by Richard Bladel

At La Mama until December 1, 1996

Reviewed by KH around Nov 13, 1996

Incest, patricide, fratricide ­– not a very cheery piece is Richard Bladel's Snorkel. However it is briskly directed by Ariette Taylor and stylishly performed by Belinda McClory and David Pidd.

The small space at La Mama becomes dangerous and the emotional and physical violations perpetrated by the two characters re intimidatingly close to us. McClory and Pidd's portrayal of adult siblings, Snorkel and Sis, shifts in a complex emotional dance from child-like to adult, lovers to loathers.

During what begins as an eerie wake for their murdered father, they taunt, tease, attack, withhold and terrify each other with threats of abandonment, revelation and escape. They fear aloneness but Sis fears Snorkel, drunk on metho and milk, will turn into her abusive father. Their chequered past is slowly revealed.

McClory gives a magnetic, fluid and often beautifully realised performance of the fraught and terrified Sis. Pidd's Snorkel is perilously close to the edge of insanity as he literally climbs the walls and leaps across tables. They work hard and fast, providing the text with layers of subtext with a glance, a pause, a tear.

The mutton bird, on which they are about to dine, is a pivotal metaphor. "These plain little grey birds returns to the same burrow every year." Sis is a mutton bird. She has never been able to escape father or brother. Perhaps tonight.

Director and actors have given a flawed script a new and successful fourth dimension. Adrienne Chisholm's set design of totally bleached grey removes any touch of naturalism in combination with the abstract, heightened performance style.

The script wanders a little, is unclear in style, repeats itself and reveals too much too early, reducing its dramatic tension.  There is a flat patch in the middle but the actors kick it up into top gear for a swift and furious finale.

KATE HERBERT

Monash Schools Drama Competition, Nov 12, 1006

At Monash Performing Arts Theatre

November 12-16, 1996

Reviewed by Kate Herbert on Nov 12, 1996

Perhaps it's time to hand over the theatre industry to the teenagers when one of the most compelling pieces of theatre I’ve seen recently was written, directed and performed by 15-16 year olds.

The Schools Drama Festival sponsored by Monash University Arts Precinct and adjudicated by professionals in the theatre field, was a week long series of heats with sixteen participating schools, both private and government.

Students were required to develop their own work with only supervision by teachers. They were judged on their creative conception, use of the theatre space and facilities and the quality of their final production on the night.

Drama teachers, in spite of cuts to arts education programs in recent years, are providing kids with sound skills to express opinions by making their own theatre. Issues arising in the five finalists' shows ranged from social and parental control and expectations,  identity, peer pressure and fashion (particularly amongst the girls), sport and competition (for the boys!) and the struggle with change.

One Day at a Time by year ten boys from St. Bede's, was streets ahead in its level of skill, perception is a moving 25 minute sustained naturalistic play with twin narrative threads. Rob (Daniel Robinson) discovers, at sixteen, that he is adopted. His mate, Johnno, (Brayden Haynes) is faced with his girlfriend being pregnant.

These adolescent fears are not simplistically handled but tackled with emotional and philosophical maturity and sophisticated dramatic form. Major and minor characters are credible, three-dimensional and totally inhabited by the actors. The artistic voice behind this play is Daniel Robinson who has a formidable talent and energy. His script was "80-90%" of the project and others wrote additional scenes. He is a talent to watch in the future.

BeaconHills Christian College took second place with a series of vignettes relating to social control. Methodist Ladies' College created a choreographic piece about the tyranny of fashion. Sandringham Secondary College investigated, in short scenes, changing relationships, sudden life-changing situations and our ability to cope.

Haileybury devised a slick, seamlessly directed collage of images about boys, men and sport. It was a knockout and would have been my choice for second place. This was a night worth visiting.

KATE HERBERT

Sanctus by Chris Dickins, Nov 6, 1996

At Merlyn Theatre
Performed by Ballarat University

Until November 9, 1996

Reviewed by KH round Nov 5, 1996

Chris Dickins is a gem of a playwright whose plays continue to appear in productions from country Victoria. Sanctus is the latest and has arrived as the graduate production for Performing Arts students from Ballarat University.

The core narrative of Sanctus is the convergence of two stories based in a church on the Murray River. One begins in 1900 when the church was constructed, the other in 1996 when it is to be demolished. They collide during the war in 1940.

Dickins has always been interested in challenging dramatic structure and Sanctus does so with a cocked eye. It is a brain teaser to follow the story both backward and forward through discrete episodes, but Dickins' writing has such a lively lyrical quality and his characters are so quirky and colourful that it a joy to watch and listen to his ramblings. A priest's nightly "midnight moan", a swaggie's broad Aussie lingo, a novice's existential dilemma, a madwoman's dislocated ravings: all fill the broad stage at the Merlyn.

Director, Peter Tulloch's production showcases students' acquired skills in an entertaining and coherent piece which has a fluid choreographic style. Although actors shifting character was at times difficult to follow, the story rolled on like the Murray alongside which it resided. Tulloch has developed a delightful, live vocal soundscape with actors out of scenes but visible evoking creatures, elements and Gregorian chants.

The students must be commended for have found funding, designed, produced and mounted the production, in line with much of the fringe theatre industry in Victoria.

Although, for some of the actors, the emotional layering of Dickins writing is out of reach, there are several strong performances within the ensemble: Kylie Lockwood's cameo as the madwoman, John Bolger's Father Brendan and Renee Willner as the 60's hippy, "Jesus H Christ'.

However, for this audient, Damien Muller's exceptional design was the star of this production with its extraordinary flexibility and swift scene changes creating evocative spaces.

KATE HERBERT

The Mourning After, Oct 26,1996

The Mourning After by Verity Laughton

Playbox Beckett Theatre until Nov, 1996

Reviewed by Kate Herbert around Oct 25, 1996

If you have never experienced the death of someone close, it is impossible to explain the very odd actions and reactions which grief may cause. For example, why would a woman whose husband has died the night before, spend Christmas Eve picnicking alone on a beach?

Well, she does not feel alone. Former singer and radio star, Belle Doyle, (Nancy Hayes) dines with the phantoms of her absent children and dead husband on the familiar beach by Aunt Luce's holiday home.

As she lays out the turkey and scoffs a bottle and a half of wine, she ambles about in her past, leading us gently through births and marriages, comings-out, conflicts, joys and pains. Mainly, she tries to fathom whether she killed hubbie, Harry by proposing to accept, against his wishes, the lead role in a new musical. Harry has controlled her world for too many years it seems.

The basic idea for the play is a good one. We listen to the unfolding of Belle's history, her fraught relationships with Harry, lesbian daughter Yvette and smug, pretty son "Magnus the Magnificent". The problem is that there is little dramatic tension in the text. The narrative and emotional journeys of the character are simplistic, lacking the layering which is essential for a solo piece. 

It relies on the stage being peopled with characters by one actor and this is not effectively realised. The other characters are not sufficiently significant and are left incomplete. There is too much explication in the dialogue which could be left to the action. The major conflict for Belle is whether she is betraying Harry by taking the role of Ned Kelly's mother but her final decision is so swiftly achieved, that the drama of the problem is obliterated.

Nancy Hayes was well received by the mainly older female audience at the Saturday matinee but her musical skills were wasted in this piece in which she sings only a single finale. Her performance and direction by another musical identity, Tony Sheldon, did not provide the dynamic range which might have invested this piece with some emotional texture.

The Mourning After is quite watchable but it does not even scratch the surface of the issue of grief and its associated guilt and nostalgia.

KATE HERBERT

Aive At Williamstown Pier, Oct 24, 1996

Alive at Williamstown Pier Neil Cole

La Mama until November 11, 1996

Reviewed by Kate Herbert around Oct 23, 1996

The combination of politician and mental illness is evidently a sure-fire entertainment drawcard. 

La Mama was stuffed to the rafters even on the second night, notoriously quiet night of Alive at Williamstown Pier written by Neil Cole (MLA Melbourne). One wonders whether Jeff Kennett's appearance on IMT had something to do with a psychotic episode.

As a playwright, Cole is a better politician. This is not to suggest that Williamstown does not have its merits. It boasts some sharp political satire, numerous snappy gags and a singular, interesting, well-shaped character in Mick, the manic-depressive.

The deficiencies reside in the fragmented structure of the script, its mixture of styles and in the clumsiness of the actual production. The script is at its best when it focuses on the relationship between Dave, the manic-depressive politician who is Cole's alter ego and his institutionalised pal, Mick. The naturalistic warmth and wit of their dialogue is a great strength.

The text would be enhanced by concentrating on this instead of the rather awkward stylised Vox Pop-come-cabaret interludes and unnecessary readings from a "Premier's award-winning" novel.

Cole, as playwright, has drawn on his own experience with bi-polar disorder, otherwise known as manic-depression, to create this narrative. The character's battle with the public airing of his dirty psychological linen is directly related to his own newsworthy illness. Not only is the play a courageous "outing" but it gives mental illness a high profile and a human face which can only be a positive move.

The direction is unwieldy and the production suffers from clunky scene changes, painfully slow pacing, a cluttered although interesting set design and unimaginative staging. The problems with performance arise from expecting stand-up comics to carry a play. At times, the lead actor was inaudible in the tiny venue and the emotional landscape of his character remained unexplored. Richard Heath, however, had some high points as the lively and tragic Mick.

Death in this play is somehow life affirming. Those who survive their illness carry on after losing friends to their psychic demons. It is chastening to remember that the wolf, psychosis, is never too far from the door.

Kate Herbert

The North, William Yang, Oct 22, 1996

The North William Yang 

George Ballroom St KIlda Until Nov 2, 1996

Reviewed by KH around Oct 22, 1996

There is something harmonic in the tone of William Yang's The North which is not only due to its eccentric musical accompaniment. Yang's voice is not resonant but its unaffected un-actorly quality is refreshingly naive.

As he did in the deeply evocative and moving Sadness, Yang stands in a spotlight at the side of the stage in front of huge projections of his own photographs. The images are of his childhood home in Dimbula, North Queensland, his Chinese-Australian relatives and his visit to mainland China. Like Sadness, this is no mere holiday slide show. Although it lacks the anguish and pain of Sadness, Yang's attachment to people  and place is simply but intensely felt.

Through his monologue, we meet people from his family and his past, we encounter the arid North country, tobacco plantations and small town anecdotes. We travel to his parents' "home" in China and watch him discover Daoism and his deep-buried Chinese-ness.

The lyrical quality is enhanced by an exceptional live soundscape by Collin Offord who plays his invention, the Great Island Mouthbow which conjures sounds akin to a Chinese violin, wind through tunnels and a whole string section.

Yang explores the nature of cultural identity in a very personal way. the moment he stepped into the obviously topical and political, namely the Pauline Hanson racism debate, he lost his focus. His very circuitousness and dreamy delivery allows us to be surprised when ideas are suddenly woven together and we have an ' ah-ha" experience.

"Home is many places,” he says "-and one". Denying one's cultural heritage is a way of absorbing racism to the point where it becomes self-loathing.

The path is warm and easy for we, the audience, but it is evident that Yang's own path to self-awareness and acceptance has been more of a struggle. As he says, "It is easy to hate and blame but hard to understand another and change oneself."

Kate Herbert

Corrugaton Road, Oct 18, 1996

Corrugation Road by Jimmy Chi

Black Swan Theatre. Fairfax Studio until October 26, 1996

Reviewed by Kate Herbert around Oct 17, 1996

Sheer anarchy was loosed upon an unsuspecting audience on opening night of Corrugation Road. Writer, Jimmy Chi, who also wrote Bran Nue Dae, flies in the face of musical theatre convention, breaking every rule, avoiding narrative thread like the plague and dodging form. It left one gaping at the sheer gall of its being in the midst of the toffy old Melbourne Festival.

Chi writes peppy songs in a thousand divergent styles ranging from Gilbert and Sullivan rhyming silliness to Country and Western. The piece is more like a cabaret, a string of singable, completely unconnected tunes with quirky lyrics, than a piece of musical theatre. It is begging for a coherent storyline but, simultaneously, its very chaotic nature makes it entertainingly bizarre.

For the character of Bob Two Bob (Stephen "Baamba" Albert), Chi draws on his own schizophrenia, his prolonged institutionalisation and being drugged to the eyeballs. Bob's funeral begins the piece but what follows is a chequered journey through his dislocated, ambling mind. We visit his past, his friends and his psychotic episodes.

It becomes difficult to discern which are memories and which delusions. A few wild and goofy images leave one gob-smacked, the most memorable being a giant pink rooster shakin' its tail feather and the mental hospital is run by siamese-twin psychiatrists (Michael Turkic, Richard Mellick) and their slinky nurse (Becky Brown).

The story, what there is of it, is an anti-hero's journey from darkness into light. Bob's delusions allow him to revisit his past, come to some understanding of it and then to travel forward to the place he left long ago: sanity and Broome.

It is the joyful, energetic performances which carry this show, particularly Ningali Lawford who brings a freshness and magnetism to the role of Fiona. It brings aboriginal culture crashing into western musical form and the result is astonishing. In the end, it lacks an edge and is screaming for some moving moments.

 It slides over the surface of Bob's painful world and satirises his delusional state so that it has little emotional impact. It lacks polish and has some clunky direction, mediocre singing and predictable choreography but it remains engaging, warm and silly.

KATE HERBERT

Cor Blimey It's Matt King, Oct 6, 1996

Cor Blimey It's Matt King

At Star & Garter Hotel Nelson & Dorcas Sts. Sth Melbourne, Wed-Sat until October 18, 1996

 Reviewed by KH around Oct 5, 1996

It's been a while since I was at a pub comedy gig. Aah! My misspent youth! The publican greeted me; "Are you the judge?"  Was I missing a wet T-shirt comp in the bar? I trailed upstairs, followed by the perfume of stale beer, to a windowless room with a kids' wacky alphabet doona cover/backdrop on a tiny stage.  Comedy still works on a low budget.

Matt King ambles onstage with a bad Geography-class map of England. He is a warm, mild-mannered, sweet-tempered stand-up with a Hertfordshire accent - or is it f...ing Essex? He started slowly but by the end this audient was laugh-weeping at frighteningly true, gruesome childhood stories about his militaristic dad's obsession with order and adventure holidays. King engenders a heap of sympathetic "Ohs!" and "poor sod" responses.

The word- gag picture of little Mattie painted by big Mattie is of a skinny, unsporty kid with attitude. He alienates his nightmare German exchange family, evades death by kayak in a France and finally escapes England for good for Oz, land of his favourite scary, lethal critters.

King is a great yarn-spinner and the longer the story the better. He re-incorporates snippets, appeals to our sympathies and our prejudices about the English, the Germans, the French, the military, the cub scouts - everything. The more excruciating the story, the funnier he is.

We squirm at his adoption story: " They did a bit of shopping on the way home and picked up a baby too." His father's homemade snake costume is every kid's embarrassing nightmare. The whole routine travels a path to dad getting his just deserts for being a total shit.

KATE HERBERT

Jump! by Crying in Public Places, Oct 5, 1996

Jump! by Crying in Public Places

Beckett Theatre, Malthouse, until October 12, 1996

Reviewed by Kate Herbert around Oct 5, 1996

When my mouth falls open I know I've seen a good show and I gaped all through Jump! Again!  Crying in Public Places grab you by the heart, lungs and soul from the top and don't let go.

This is a reprise of 1995's successful show but nothing is lost of the bright, joyful, fulsome core of the original season. There are a few new songs but the four (Anni Davey, Maud Davey, Karen Hadfield, Jane Bayly) still work with the conversational-naturalistic, a' cappella singing, quirky movement and a consistently wry view of the world, themselves and their foibles.

The personal snatches are fascinating and as their re-incorporation is assiduously handled to tantalise us with snippets of an unfolding story. "What is the worst thing that could happen?" gives us a sniff of Anni's danger to come. "I'm pregnant," develops into grabs of Jane's painful birthing. "Where the fuck is my future?" signposts Maud's chequered life as she keeps leaving behind the girl that she was and we root for Karen to overcome her "Don't rock the boat" pattern.

Jumping is represented literally but so is falling down, tripping up, on life's little problems or, sometimes, its big doozies. We take chances or avoid risks. We leap into the unknown, dive into new experiences or, perhaps, turn aside just at the crucial moment. We fall in love and can never get back to where we jumped. Its all a game of dice and if you never jump you'll never know what might have been in store for you: the good, bad or ugly.

The joy and near ecstasy of this group as it croons and chants, whimpers, howls and grooves its original songs is infectious. I grinned and gaped, basking in their warm glow, wanting to rush up and hug them. Again. I fell in love with them all. Again.  I can't wait for the next show so I can drop my jaw, let go and love them all over again.

KATE HERBERT

Kaspar, Oct 3, 1996

by Theatr eTarquin

At Vaut Theatre, Banana Alley until late October 1996

Reviewed buy Kate Herbert around Oct 3, 1996

A "civilised" culture has always had a fascination with the barbaric and this romance with the "savage" has often manifested in his gross mistreatment. This may apply to whole racial groups and individuals.

Films, novels, poetry and theatre have all found such stories to transform into art. The Wild Boy of Aveyron, the Elephant Man and Kaspar Hauser who is the central character of Kasparˇ, by Theatre Tarquin

 Kaspar, directed by Nick Harrington, uses the narrative of Hauser's life as a springboard for a stark, stylised text and movement based performance with four actors and a live pianist. Kaspar's early undocumented life, incarcerated in a cellar, fed only bread and water, has left him unsocialised but, unlike the Wild Boy, not uneducable.

The process of his civilisation and his indoctrination in language and logic, social mores and religion is represented in bleak tableaux, faux-Berlin cabaret song and raw black and white lighting. The location is a disused railway vault on Banana Alley which provides a deep, narrow performance space and plenty of disturbingly thunderous overhead train noise to accompany Monique di Mattina's original acoustic piano composition which punctuates the action.

The process of his civilisation and his indocrination in language and logic, social mores and religion is represented in bleak tableaux, faux-Berlin cabaret song and raw black and white lighting. The location is a disused, railway vault on Banana Alley which provides a deep, narrow, claustrophobic performance space and plenty of disturbingly thunderous overhead train noise to accompany Monique di Mattina's original acoustic piano composition which punctuates the action.

The production employs the house style of Tarquin. The narrative is fragmented, the design based in grunge, and characters are non-representational. There are moments of intelligence and sharp irony and some strong theatrical images but others do not quite make the grade.

There was a dull patch in the middle of the hour. The circus freak show was predictable, and some long speeches were unnecessarily expository but Kaspar's ingenuous pleas were moving and the final death scene was a powerful and memorable tableau.

 It seems that these stories have been done so often that Tarquin needed to find something new, which it did not. I wanted to be touched in some way but came away surprisingly unmoved.

KATE HERBERT

The Rape of Lucrecia, Oct 3, 1996

by William Shakespeare

Complete Works Theatre Company La Mama until October 20, 1996

Reviewed by Kate Herbert around 3 Oct, 1996

Pouring a play into the confines of La Mama Theatre in Carlton is no mean feat at the best of times but when it is a Shakespeare it is nigh on miraculous. Of course, performing a mythic poem by Will rather than, say, the Scottish play, is another matter.

The Rape of Lucrece is an epic verse about the violation of the chaste bride of Roman commander, Collatine by his friend, the lusting, saturnine Etruscan Prince Tarquin. With two others, (Wade Beed, Caroline Lee) actor-director, David Wicks has created a suitable companion piece for his previous superb solo, Venus and Adonis.

 Lucrece concentrates on Shakespeare's sweet, scented language and abandons the rampant physicality and dexterity of the earlier Venus. The delicate stillness of the portrayals with the simplicity and starkness of the production, heighten the fragility of the language. Wicks allows the words to speak for themselves and finds the dynamic range within them.

The horror of the rape is not lost in such underplaying. In fact it could be too intense or melodramatic to overstate it in such an intimate space. Being so close to the almost tableau effect of images, we might be swamped. Such intimacy in the playing highlights the focus of the text on the psychological minutiae of the characters and their detailed observations.

We crawl inside their heads and wander about in the rhythm of their thoughts and sensations. There were, however, moments when  I was craving an emotional outburst, a clutch at the heart or to be sent into tilt - but this is not the style of this piece.

This exceptional trio interpolate six dulcet and unaccompanied Renaissance songs to great effect. Wicks, as narrator, shifts skilfully in and out of focus, engaging us and colouring the canvas. Beed's Tarquin is sinister and salacious and his rich baritone a treat while Lee's frail, pale English-rose quality is perfect for the violated Lucrece.

This is a fine theatrical interpretation of a beautifully crafted text.

KATE HERBERT

Because You Are Mine, Sept 29, 1996

Because You are Mine by Daniel Keene

Melbourne University Student Theatre until October 1996

Reviewed by Kate Herbert around Sept 20, 1996

Invariably, before a war, there is a period of time during which there is the possibility, the hope that there will be no war. 

Before the horror and despair there is uncertainty, an atmosphere of unrest, political upheaval, military activity, societal confusion and a hint of impending inhumanity. People cannot comprehend the fact that they could become the ones to suffer. Catastrophe happens to others.

In Because You are  Mine, people whisper incredulously, "They say there is going to be a war." The extraordinary happens to these ordinary people: war. It is their pain which makes them exceptional.

Daniel Keene's play is an episodic representation of the Bosnian experience. It takes fragments of lives, snatches of conversations, voyeuristic glimpses through windows or into dark corners and secret places. Intercutting these with the monologues of the dead, the raped, the abused, he weaves these formerly disconnected lives into a bloody tapestry. We witness the war opportunists, the rapists and the raped, the physically unscathed and the permanently scarred as they creep helplessly and in ignorance across the landscape.

Kim Hanna has directed this student production with simplicity and compassion. He allows the emotion, the truth and power of the text to speak for themselves. Kathryn Sproul's design with huge sliding, crashing steel doors, provides an icily sterile environment for the atrocities.

At times, the emotional complexity is beyond some of these young actors but their level of commitment and compassion speaks volumes. There are several good performances but it is the actor playing the street-dwelling woman (name unknown), who brings an exceptional clarity of vision and delivery to her role. Her presence is magnetic. Hers is a lovely, idiosyncratic, warm and detailed performance which makes the poetic images of Keene's language live for us.

One character, trying to understand this senseless war, variously cites economics, politics, religion and history as the causes. Perhaps it is far simpler: power and hate rule.

KATE HERBERT

Not Dead Yet: The Romantic Story of Margaret Catchpole, Sept 25, 1996

By Sarah Vincent and Vanessa Pigram

At La Mama at The Courthouse until October 12, 1996

Reviewed by Kate Herbert around Sept 25 1996

Lottie Lyell may not have had a movie house named after her as has her hubbie Raymond Longford but, according to Sarah Vincent and Vanessa Pigram, she's Not Dead Yet.

Vincent and Pigram have teamed up with Lottie to re-vamp her 1911 film, ˇThe Romantic Story of Margaret Catchpole. Only fragments of the Lyell-Longford original footage are extant so Vincent has created, in theatrical form, the missing story.

The style of the production is pure Victorian melodrama, complete with a villain’s, romance, danger, Sarah Bernhardt histrionics and wind machine sound effects.  Margaret's one true love is the smuggler, Will Long, alias Cut-throat Willy, for whom she rejects her other suitor, the law-abiding coastguard, Edward Barry. Both men come to no good as a result of their love for Margaret and Margaret in turn , resorts to crime and the poor wretch is transported to, you guessed it, Australia where, for her sins,  she cares for orphans.

The production, part of the Fringe Festival, is stylishly directed by Pigram and is light and funny with delightful performances from the cast of five. They prance about, mug at the camera, double-take, tear at their clothes and generally over-act in the best possible satire of the silent movie genre.

The black and white theme is echoed superbly in the costumes and set by Anna Tregloan and the style is supported by predominantly original music by Mark Pollard.

There are, however, moments when the narrative becomes confusing and difficult to follow particularly when it concentrates on short grabby scenes. Spoken dialogue interspersed with silent miming of text is amusing and clever but extremely taxing on the audience's concentration and the constant setting and re-setting of location and characters is exhausting.

All that said, it is a hoot and one of the most inventive concepts I have seen in some time.

KATE HERBERT 

Schnorky the Wave Puncher, Sept 22, 1996

Adapted by Sue-Anne Post from book by Jeff Raglus

Arena Theatre. Napier Street Theatre until October 5, 1996

Reviewed b y KH around Oct 22, 1996

There's no denying it. Kids' theatre can be great entertainment for adults too and Schnorky the Wave Puncher at Arena Theatre is a good example. The laughs rippled up from the shoreline of children seated on the mats and rose to a wave of hoots from the adults in privileged place on chairs.

Of course the laughs generally came in different places. The children, aged 4-10 years, giggled at the slapstick, acrobatics and cartoon-like characters. The grown-ups howled at the wry portrayals of conservative suburban values, the inverse mother-daughter relationship between "Bert" (Maria Theodorakis) and her husky mum, Audrey (Katrina Stowe) and mature love between single parent, Audrey and the crusty old sea captain (Bruce Gladwin).

When she's not chasing a wave, Bert organises her mother's life and health, governing her smoking habit and burgeoning sex life in a manner reminiscent of Saffie and Edina in ˇAbsolutely Fabulous.

The protagonist of this story, adapted by Sue-Anne Post from the popular book by Jeff Raglus, is Schnorky, the surfie boy (Katrina Stowe) who has become a legend in his own esky. He lives on the beach with his dog ("He's my friend not my owner"), watching the surf, riding the waves, testing the wind, fossicking, bartering and planting native trees, all to the chagrin of the neighbourhood puritans, the Tweets (Gladwin & Noel Jordan).  He speaks to nobody and, inevitably, Bert falls headlong in love with him.

Rosemary Myers has directed the piece in a roustabout, physical style with much poppy music, oodles of tumbling and balancing, and a kooky cast of broad caricatures, cartoon set design by Raglus and some clever, cute costuming by  Graham Long. The four actors pour energy onto the stage, singing, cavorting and generally have a great time.

Songs by Frank Wood support the whole lively populist form as does the garbled, bastardised surf lingo. There are some rough moments where the action needs clarification for both kids and adults but the show relies on the abstract representation of objects, mime and quick costume changes. My kiddie companions were particularly taken with Bruce Gladwin's Irish-Scottish- Lancashire captain and his silly Mrs. Tweet.

KATE HERBERT