Too Human

12 Jul

This is remarkably silly fun, with a truly timely message.

Monty (Rhiaan Marquez) is in Year 8.

This is the second KXT production in a row that’s set in a junior high school (fortunately, for me, that educational experience is still a very recent memory.)

But Monty’s school is different from most: the students and staff are mythological creatures, of the half-human half-beast variety (so maybe it’s not that different from your average high school.)

Monty’s problem is that she is all human. From her minotaur dad (Mason Phoumirath) she got the human half, and from her mermaid mum (Luisa Galloway) she got … we’ll you guessed it.

But if she remains her uncool self, and therefore an inevitable victim of bullying, how will she ever get to pash Harry the Sphinx (Lachie Pringle)?

Michael McStay’s script is delightfully funny, full of terrific one liners and outrageous puns. Director Sammy Jing elicits from his entire cast performances that are big, bold and gloriously audacious.

Except for the sexual innuendos, it’s the sort of script that could be made into a sassy TV show aimed at an audience of the same age (if not genetic makeup) as the characters.

Except for its deceptive depth.

You could read Too Human as a play about high school bullying and the need to be yourself… but that seems a little too easy.

In our age of cancel culture, the pressure to cohere to the group has a wider relevance than the horrors of high school.

And, in contrast to the mythological beasts who are intersectional exemplars (clearly half this, obviously half that), humans are described throughout the play as complex, complicated and contradictory. It’s an insight that gets less airplay than it might. In our age of incessant sociological labelling, we can forget that what’s on the label ain’t necessarily what’s in the jar. And what’s in the jar today may be very different tomorrow. Humans (all of us!) are defined by biology – but we’re also fired by possibility. We’re not so much things as happenings. (There’s something beautifully Renaissance humanist about it all.)

It’s an inspiring, joyful, restorative vision.  

Paul Gilchrist

Too Human by Michael McStay

At KXT on Broadway until 20 July

kingsxtheatre.com

Image by Phil Erbacher

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Cut Chilli

12 Jul

Despite its serious theme, this has a sitcom structure and depth.

Jamie (Ariyan Sharma) was born in Sri Lanka and was adopted by a white Australian couple. Now, prompted by his girlfriend, he wonders whether he was stolen rather than saved.

The play works on some very clear dichotomies: young versus old; global majority versus white. However, there are unities: everyone’s comfortably middle class, and everyone’s subject to the same mercilessly shallow characterisation.

Writer Chenturan Aran has thrown the cast an extraordinary challenge – which they gleefully accept.

Let me consider two examples.

Noel Hodda plays Jeff, Jamie’s adopted uncle. Jeff’s the sort of jovial middle-aged man who is casually racist and who invariably bores or offends by riding hard his hobby horse that political correctness has gone too far. To find a watchable humanity in this character is quite an achievement.

Kelsey Jeanell plays Zahra, Jamie’s girlfriend. Zahra has a podcast called Decolonialise (?) and studies Critical Race Theory (CRT). She offers a wildly misleading definition of CRT – race is a social construct that deliberately perpetuates oppression. This assertion about the plague of racism is undeniably correct, but the form of CRT that Zahra acts out left me feeling it was, in fact, the disease it purports to diagnose. Zahra constantly tells everyone else that what they say and do is wrong. It’s breathtakingly self-righteous. (Perhaps I’m just pretending it’s parody – but it’s such a tragically impoverished vision of an ethical life that I can’t help myself.) It’s a feat to keep an audience onboard with a character like this and Jeanell is to be commended.

The play hinges on the question Who am I? It’s a question that currently predominates in our theatres. (I’m guessing the question What is to be done? has been made redundant by the superhuman apolitical certainty of characters like Zahra.)

In some ways, there’s an intriguing conservativism about the whole thing. It focuses on an origin story and it’s deeply conscious of the past. But, as Zahra reminds us, one reason we can’t be oblivious to the past is that trauma is handed down through the generations. And dismissals of history are appropriately given short shrift. Jamie’s adoption mother (played with a terrific unsettling ethereal facileness by Susie Lindeman) says You can’t change the past – and it’s a statement which impresses with both its obvious truth and its disturbing glibness. Similarly, her spiritual practice of radical presence (presentness?) is little more than an euphemism for moral irresponsibility.

The script could do with a trim. However, as an invitation to consider how we might build a better world, it’s wonderfully provocative.

Paul Gilchrist

Cut Chilli by Chenturan Aran

at Old Fitzroy until 27 July

oldfitztheatre.com.au

Image by Phil Erbacher

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Blue: The Songs of Joni Mitchell 

7 Jul

There’s talk Joni Mitchell should be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. She’s an extraordinary lyricist and writes beautiful melodies. Some people suggest – that when the time comes – Mitchell should be made the patron saint of melancholy.

However, I think her metier is simply honesty. Her songs are deeply personal – but not in the contemporary fashion of My story must be told – rather in the more generous-hearted sense of This is where it hurts for me; perhaps it’s the same for you?

This seems to be Queenie van de Zandt’s experience of Mitchell. And, just as Dante had Virgil to guide him through Hell and Purgatory, and Beatrice to escort him through Heaven, we’ve been blessed with the best of all guides in our journey through Mitchell’s utterly divine catalogue.

van de Zandt has the most exquisite voice and her interpretation of the songs is so clear and so genuine that it transcends mere performance and becomes a soul-expanding sharing.

Under the musical direction of Max Lambert, her band is utterly superb.

There are songs from the album Blue, but also some of Mitchell’s popular hits like Big Yellow Taxi, Woodstock and Both Sides Now. Written by van de Zandt and Lambert, the show places each song within a biographical context, either Mitchell’s or our guides’.

This splendid evening of cabaret is both the perfect introduction to Mitchell’s work and a priceless celebration for long-time fans.

Paul Gilchrist

Blue: The Songs of Joni Mitchell 

Starring Queenie van de Zandt

At Hayes Theatre until July 7

hayestheatre.com.au

Image by Maria Alzate

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Counting and Cracking

3 Jul

This is theatrically exciting and dramatically thrilling.

Written by S. Shakthidharan with Eamon Flack, and directed by Eamon Flack with S. Shakthidharan, it spans two continents and several generations. It’s grand storytelling at its best.

In the early 2000’s in Sydney, Siddhartha lives with his mother, Radha. (Siddhartha is played by Shiv Palekar with delicious charm. Nadie Kammallaweera as Radha is the backbone of the production, and she’s suitably spiky and magnificently strong.) Siddhartha was born here, but his mother fled Sri Lanka during its time of civil conflict. The play jumps between the past in Sri Lanka and the turn of the century both there and here.

Three ideas explored in this production make it extraordinarily vital.

The first of these ideas is encapsulated in a line delivered by Radha’s grandmother (played with engaging verve by Sukania Venugopal). She repeatedly asserts “Weddings are more important than politics!” We’re now so accustomed to the mantra that the personal is the political that we blur the difference between the two spheres of life, potentially to the detriment of both. Here’s a working definition: the political is what can only be done with others, and the personal is what can only be done alone (or, at least, in the intimacy of what we call personal relations.) A full life requires acknowledgement of the separate existence of both of these spheres. If you don’t, you run the risk of living a personal life that’s selfish and parochial or a political life that’s shallow and inhumane.

The second idea that makes the production so timely is this: Don’t court division. Apah (played superbly by Prakash Belawadi) is the only Tamil in a Sinhalese dominated cabinet. He believes in unity and equality, and he distrusts tribalism. When escalating violence challenges his convictions, his granddaughter, the young Radha (played wonderfully by Radhika Mudaliyar), urges him to keep his nerve – and it’s an electrifying scene. “There’ll never be another Gandhi ji!” he cries, and it’s the intensity that the dramatic form facilitates that turns this despairing lament into a direct challenge to us. Currently, our culture is tempted to conflate assertions of difference with the attainment of justice. It’s also being seduced into valorising anger and justifying violence. There are several reasons for these disturbing trends, but a key one is the sheer historical ignorance born of privilege. This production gives a frightening glimpse into the hell of civic disorder – and is a powerful cautionary tale. 

The third idea is implied in the play’s title, and gains clarification in the scene I’ve just referred to. What exactly does the political sphere consist of? Is it always either the counting of heads that is voting OR the cracking of skulls that is physical coercion? Does the political reduce solely to the various manifestations of brute power? Or are there other things at work? Perhaps too late, young Radha urges those fearful of the imminent violence to seek refuge with the people they can trust. A just and peaceful civic society is dependent on the building of relationships.

I began by suggesting the production was theatrically exciting. This is thanks to Belvoir’s trade mark rough magic house-style. Actors become a clothes line. A beach is represented in the most delightfully nostalgic way. Scene changes are fast, fluid and gloriously energetic. Perhaps a quarter of the text is in languages other than English and this is translated “live”, with a gleeful awareness of translation’s tricksy nature. All this adds up to a production that constantly reminds us that it is telling a story – this story.  Not too long ago, this particular story was unlikely to appear on our main stages, and we’re being cordially invited to celebrate that change.

I also suggested the play is dramatically thrilling. It makes the most of the multi-voiced nature of the artform. I don’t mean there’s explicit tension between characters (that’s just the bread and butter of drama). What I mean is that there’s also grand unspoken tensions, the ones that explain why Life’s big problems are so notoriously difficult to solve.

Take this as an example: In the Sri Lanka of last century, we’re presented characters who warn of the dangers of tribalism. Meanwhile, in 21st century Australia, Siddhartha and his girlfriend Lily (played with an enchanting stage presence by Abbie-lee Lewis) are embracing their tribal identity. We assume it’s the right thing for these generous-hearted young people to do. But when does the positive form of tribalism start to become the other, more hazardous, form? The play doesn’t explicitly offer an answer; it doesn’t even explicitly acknowledge the possible danger. It simply places the two forms side by side with beautiful honesty.

Paul Gilchrist

Counting and Cracking by S. Shakthidharan with Eamon Flack

a Belvoir production at Carriageworks until 21 July

belvoir.com.au

Image by Pia Johnson

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[Your Name]

24 Jun

It’s tempting to think of fan fiction as some kooky, contemporary phenomenon.

Driven by obsessions with pop culture, celebrity and the net, we tell stories based on other people’s stories. We happily steal the universe created by some well-known story teller, people it with their characters, and then slip in some of our own – often ourselves.

It might all seem rather bizarre, but it’s actually what most of us do all the time. We make sense of our lives by viewing them through a narrative we didn’t invent. We do this whenever we call ourselves a feminist or a socialist or a Christian, or any other label that marks our participation in a grand narrative not of our own making. And we’re doing it even when we don’t label ourselves. Few moments are lived free of the phenomenon; narrative abhors a vacuum.

In [Your Name] by Kate Bubalo, three fourteen year old girls write fan fiction inspired by those famous children’s stories of a decade or two ago, the ones about the school for wizards. Being teenagers, it’s not long before these stories take on a distinctly sexual nature, and are shared with the wrong people.

Bubalo’s script is very funny. It’s constructed from the juxtaposition of two experiences: the fraught navigation of teen friendships and the wild fantasies of the fan fiction.

Director Lily Hayman understands exactly what she’s working with and pitches the production beautifully between honesty and audacity. The cast deliver wonderfully high-energy comic performances. Evelina Singh as Petra offers a marvellous portrait of a passionate, no-nonsense advocate for Truth, one who’s beginning to realise that advocacy is not as clear cut as she imagined. Georgia McGinness is terrific as Nadine, the young woman who’s already begun to wonder whether Truth is just a type of tale, and that human connections are more important. Lola Bond as Kris – brittle, fearful and full of uncertain affections – induces both laughter and deep pathos. Andrew Fraser, doubling as both the girls’ PDHPE teacher and Larry the young wizard of the fantasies, is superb. His total commitment to the physical humour is a delight. (On a dramaturgical note, some of the teacher’s decisions are ones no sensible professional would make, yet the script only glances briefly at this behaviour. Of course, this creative choice ensures the girls are the real focus, and since few groups have been more thoroughly erased in our culture than teenage girls – either entirely objectified or utterly dismissed – this is hardly a fatal flaw.)

Tyler Fitzpatrick’s design creates a stage world where magical transformations are possible.

And what transformations do we witness?

Bubalo’s joyous play illuminates one of the most important spiritual opportunities Life offers. If we live through borrowed narratives, then maturity is when we become conscious of that fact. Only then are we able to choose our tales deliberately, or dare to ask if the comfort of story can be cast aside entirely.

Paul Gilchrist

[Your Name] by Kate Bubalo

at KXT until 29 June

kingsxcrosstheatre.com

Image by Georgia Brogan

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Masterclass

20 Jun

It’s a tradition for the less inventive of my reviewing colleagues to play with the title of a show when they write it up.

A show called, say, Simply the Best will be responded to with the highly inventive quip this show is simply the best. Or admiration for a production of Twelfth Night might be expressed in the gushing creativity of I can’t wait for Thirteenth Night!

Formulaic wit is how mediocrity shields itself from the dangerous provocation of genius.

If I actually read theatre reviews, I’d be tallying how many times the reviewers fall into the formulaic with this production.

Terrence McNally’s Masterclass gives Lucia Mastrantone the opportunity to show what an extraordinary performer she is. (And so you can probably guess what the formulaic quip will be.)

Opera icon Maria Callas is offering instruction to young singers. Apart from the occasional psychological flashback to Callas’ troubled past (which I’m not sure are necessary), the play operates as a vignette, a character portrait of a legend.

Callas is presented as a diva. She is fussy, self-obsessed, inconsiderate and deeply, deeply serious about the art.

It’s hilarious and wonderfully stimulating.

Mastrantone is utterly brilliant. She catches the glorious humour in every nuance of the script. In even the simplest of pauses, in the stare that’s a fraction of a second too long, in the smile that flits across her face, she projects a woman of intense vivacity. It’s a performance of phenomenal attention to detail. But equally impressive is its remarkable openness to possibility: the fourth wall is firmly down, and Mastrantone as Callas responds with exhilarating ease to the wild unpredictability of the audience.

Director Liesel Badorrek gives her a terrific support cast. Callas famously lost her voice in later years, so Mastrantone is not called upon to sing, but the rest of the cast gives us a delicious taste of the operatic art form. Bridget Patterson is very funny as the nervous student whose lesson establishes just how challenging working with Callas will be – and later Patterson reveals an outstanding voice. Elisa Colla is hysterical as the student attempting to follow instructions beyond her understanding, but both her voice and her final response to the master are truly beautiful. Matthew Reardon as a cocky young tenor is enormous fun, a joy to both watch and hear. Maria Alfonsine’s work as piano accompanist (and musical director) is marvellous and she induces many a giggle as she deals with Callas’ obtusity. Damian de Boos-Smith is magnificent on the cello, and as the surly stage attendant not at all cowed by the diva.

The play ultimately poses some provocative questions. What makes an artist? What is art? What is it worth? What does it cost? Perhaps you shy away from such questions.

But priceless is an evening in the company of a woman whose genius provokes them.

It’s a masterclass in acting.

Paul Gilchrist

Masterclass by Terrence McNally

At Ensemble until 20 July

ensemble.com.au

Image by Prudence Upton

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Death in the Pantheon

19 Jun

This is an odd one.

Written and directed by James Hartley, it’s a whodunnit comedy featuring the ancient Greek gods.

Someone has murdered Hephaestus, the god of artisans. All the other gods of the pantheon, excepting Hermes the messenger, are suspects. Athena, the god of wisdom, must identify the killer before more immortal lives are lost. (Don’t worry, that seeming inconsistency is cleverly overcome.)

The Agatha Christie style set-up means no-one can leave until the crime is solved. So the suspects mope around and bicker amongst each other (which is sort of what we moderns think the Greek gods did – that’s if we think of them at all.)

It’s the rather bizarre dramatis personae that’s one of the main reasons I call this piece an oddity. After all, the Greek gods are hardly household names in Australia, and no-one, anywhere, has taken them seriously as objects of devotion for millennia. However, the script ensures even a classical novice can navigate this foreign world.

Natasha Cheng is absolutely outstanding as Athena. Her presence and poise are divine. Brenton Aimes as Hermes delivers one-liners with perfect comic timing. Cam Ralph uses his beautiful bass voice to superb effect in creating an amusingly self-important Poseidon. Daniel Moxham as Dionysius induces giggles with a portrait of a deity who has simply partied too hard, a god who offers not life-affirming ego-destroying joy, but rather falls into pathetic little tricks to hide a substance-abuse problem.  

The humour of the piece would gain from an increased pace and further development of the physical comedy. (Since you can’t present the truth of fictional characters, you may as well have theatrical fun with their hyperbolic nature.)

Ironically, English speaking theatre was given an energising boost when early puritanism curbed the representation of divine characters on stage. Responding to Christian morality plays, featuring God the Father and Jesus, the fifteenth century Treatise of Miraclis Pleyinge has a deity assert “Do not play with me. Go play with your peers.” And so the generations that followed, geniuses of the likes of Marlowe and Shakespeare, portrayed instead the human experience, in all its messy glory.

But though Hartley gives us gods, he provokingly leaves us pondering our relationship with them. Not the irrelevant ones of Olympus, but rather all those authority figures, all those grand narratives, that we project into the firmament – in the unspoken hope that this will somehow secure them from earthly Life’s frightening untidiness.

Paul Gilchrist

Death in the Pantheon by James Hartley

at Flight Path Theatre until June 22

flightpaththeatre.org

Image by Tobias Moore

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King James

17 Jun

This is a wonderful production of a wonderful play.

It’s also one of the funniest, most joyous, serious plays I’ve seen.

I mean this: though grounded in realism, the territory explored by Rajiv Joseph’s King James is exuberance.

Two men become friends through a shared enthusiasm for the Cleveland Cavaliers and its star player LeBron James. These men need each other, but no relationship remains static or fixed.

It’s sometimes suggested that male friendships are shallow because they consist of two men looking in a similar direction rather than at each other. But there’s something to be said for not staring too closely at the other person. After all, there is no essential truth to see. The assertion I know you completely is not love; it’s control. All of us change, and any attempt to definitively sum up or categorise an individual is misguided. Each of us is more a happening than a thing. The essential you is just a careless, or convenient, construct.

The scene in which Joseph has the issue of race raise its ugly head is a masterclass in this type of richness in dramatic writing. To witness these two extremely likable characters tear at each other is heart-rending. In any play, the conflict can represent a wider cultural tension, but if we don’t feel it in all its irreducible messiness in the actual characters, if we read it solely as a critique of society, what’s the real takeaway? That individuals are of little value. The glory of theatre is that it’s fundamentally existential; it knows that Life is what happens to you while you’re otherwise occupied maintaining some grand narrative. (There was a logical consistency in the Puritan dislike of theatre. They understood what it had in common with the Prince of Darkness; like the Devil, Life is in the details.)

Directed by Bali Padda, the performances by Aaron Glenane and Tinashe Mangwana are brilliant. They portray beautifully characters who are gorgeously vulnerable, the desire for an ongoing relationship carefully and doggedly navigating friendship’s envies, awkwardnesses and sensitivities. This wary gentleness is brought into glorious relief by tremendous bursts of jubilant energy (including one extraordinarily fun scene change.) Designer Ian Kanik does a terrific job creating the play’s two settings in the Old Fitz space (and filling them with some oddly specific, but absolutely, crucial props.)

Joseph’s dialogue is superb. The affectionate raillery between the two men is pitch perfect. Who is the G.O.A.T? Michael Jordan or LeBron James? And equally delightful are the hyperbolic expressions of fanatic admiration. The claim that James is capable of teleportation nails the glee with which sports fans manage to find glimmers in a world where others see only triggers.

But, no, don’t worry. You don’t need to know anything about basketball. You don’t even need to like sport.

The joy of this show is utterly infectious.  

Paul Gilchrist

King James by Rajiv Joseph

at The Old Fitz until Jun 29

oldfitztheatre.com.au

Image by Daniel Asher Smith

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No Love Songs For Lady Basses

15 Jun

This is a beautiful show.

It’s an autobiographical sharing. We’re currently seeing a lot of this form on our stages. I’ve previously expressed curiosity that this major shift in our theatrical language seems to be going unnoticed. I don’t mean these sort of pieces aren’t getting positive responses. (Usually they do, and usually they should.) What I mean is that the common perspective on what’s happening in our theatres is partly erroneous. The popular position could be summed up like this: Until recently, only certain privileged groups have been permitted to tell their stories on our stages; other groups have not, and now it’s their turn. This is a perfectly valid historical statement, but it slips in, unnoticed as it were, the assumption that theatre is traditionally autobiographical.  

Written and performed by Sheanna Parker Russon, No Love Songs For Lady Basses tells of her journey to accept she is a woman and how that has been received in the show business industry. Because that industry sees its role as storytelling, this show becomes, among other things, her story about her story. It’s this explicit awareness that makes the show insightful, wise and very funny.

Her conversations with a straight, middle-aged, cis male director are a comic delight – and only partly because he’s reduced to a sock puppet.

The songs are superb. Written by Lillian M. Hearne, they’re replete with gorgeous melodies. The lyrics by Parker Russon are both hilarious and moving. Accompanied by Hearne and Aisling Bermingham, Parker Russon’s performance of them is magical.

Director Cassie Hamilton helps Parker Russon navigate the whole fourth-wall-down-meta-theatricality of the thing in a way that allows humour and honesty to co-exist, and to nourish each other.

When Parker Russon speaks of the challenges facing the trans community you’d have to have a hard heart to feel we shouldn’t do better. But there’s a mindful paucity of rage. She gently jokes that her supposedly non-woke approach makes her more appealing to conservatives and the politically timid, but she’s right. Just as we’ve unconsciously come to assume theatre is autobiographical, we’ve come to assume anger equates with a commitment to change. It doesn’t. Anger is a perfectly understandable response to injustice, but it’s not the perfect tool for ending it.   

The inner voice that tells Parker Russon she is a woman also tells her to be nice to herself. It’s indicative of the spirit that infuses this piece, a glorious generous-heartedness.

Paul Gilchrist

No Love Songs For Lady Basses by Sheanna Parker Russon

At Old Fitz, as a Late Show, until 16 June

oldfitztheatre.com.au

Image by Jamie James

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Ink

10 Jun

With a title like this, I was expecting the story of a giant squid. I was expecting a hideous creature from the murky depths, a cold blooded monster from that mysterious world down under, a frightening phenomenon with a disturbing multiplicity of arms, arms that grab at everything we hold dear, at every civilised thing, at that fragile ship we call society, and drag it all down, down, down.

So, you can imagine my surprise when I found this show was about Rupert Murdoch.

Written by James Graham and first produced in the UK in 2018, Ink tells the story of the first year of Murdoch’s ownership of the newspaper The Sun and the impact on the Fleet Street scene.

In some ways it’s ancient history; despite Murdoch still being with us, the play is set over 50 years ago. Whatever was the impact then, you might wonder whether it’s worth crying now over spilt ink. I grew up in a world in which the damage was already done.

It’s a grand piece of storytelling, with a huge dramatis personae and 2 hours 30 minutes stage time (and an interval.) Director Louise Fischer marshals a fine cast.

Despite this grandeur, the piece has a curiously small focus. This is a result of three of the playwright’s creative decisions.

Firstly, The Sun’s editor, the now deceased Larry Lamb, gets far more stage time than Murdoch, and the media mogul is presented as almost reluctant to accept some of his editor’s more trashy strategies. (Lamb is played wonderfully by Nick Curnow, in a performance that drives the production.)

Secondly, we’re shown only Fleet Street, so the point of debate – whether The Sun’s tawdriness actually affected society or merely reflected it – is reduced to competing assertions from characters within the parochial world of the press.

And finally, the complaint many people have had about Murdoch over the years is his political impact, his alleged pushing of the working class towards the Right. However, in the year represented in the play, that tentacle is yet to surface. The Sun’s sin is that it’s low brow, not that it’s fascist.

Not that the play is oblivious to the possibility of political influence; in the final moments there’s an ominous swirl in the inky waters.

And it will no doubt be a discussion starter.

I’ll get the ball rolling. The role of the media in civic society is always ambiguous. The media can help and it can hinder. Democracy may die in the dark, but neither does it cope well with noise.

And we’re often tempted to ignore the role of the media’s audience. It’s easy for us to assume that the audience are passive consumers who unthinkingly accept whatever they’re told. (Fortunately, this is an error we ourselves never, ever commit.)

In a capitalist society – in any society – can we be surprised when the media chases an audience?

How are both civic society and culture created?

Where does responsibility, and power, lie?

Paul Gilchrist

Ink by James Graham

at New Theatre until June 29

newtheatre.org.au

Image by Chris Lundie

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