Collected Stories, Chaika Theatre, Act Hub, 27 Oct-12 Nov

 This two hander is skilled at creating a small world with big implications- examining the push and pull between mentor and mentee as over the years a young writer and her tutor undergo changes as insecurities emerge and secrets are betrayed. Donald Marguiles script is very much of its era and it's location - the 1990s New York news bleeds off its every pore, and there's certainly some limitations in its slightly condescending writing of the younger woman (I'll be honest and say this is a fairly common trait of baby-boomer writers, shallow writing of anybody not in their generation). It also doesn't really examine the fundamental contradiction that it seems to suggest writers should not appropriate other people's stories as their own, except that Donald Marguiles is very much a male writer telling the stories of two women (and as such he tends to fall into traps like suggesting that most important experience of a woman's life would be her relationship with a man). 

However it's a great vehicle for Karen Vickery to have long monologues about literature, about love, about betrayal and about life. She siezes the chance that a wide-ranging role has to take the forefront of our sympathies, without ever obviously begging for them, as an opinionated, wise but surprisingly vulnerable mentor seeing her young protoge push away from her as the years go by, She also plays very well with Natasha Vickery as the protoge - while the role isn't quite as developed (and to a certain extent is hung out to dry - I'm never quite sure whether Marguiles believes she has any signifiant talent or not), she gives the character slightly more dimension as a young woman seeking to find her place in the world with a little bit of essential writerly ruthlessness about herself and others. 

The simple design, using the traverse style with the audience on two sides of the action makes the stage a laboratory interrogating these two people, drawing out every scripted nuance plus finding a couple that sit between the lines. Luke Rogers directs a tight production that finds both the laughs and the drama. Stephen Still's lighting design has some clever shifts in focus to bring the show together, 

In short this is a strong production of a play that isn't quite as strong, but is worth it primarily for a really great Karen Vickery performance. 

School of Rock, Dramatic Productions, Gunghalin College theatre, 7-22 Oct

 In signs that I'm getting older, it's now 19 years since Jack Black starred in Richard Linklater's film of Mike White's script, "School of Rock". A simple family friendly comedy and the perfect use of Jack Black's skills as a leading man, it turned out to be Andrew Lloyd Webber's return to writing popular musicals after about two decades in the wilderness (unless you're a huge fan of "Whistle Down the Wind", "Woman in White", "The Beautiful Game", "Love Never Dies" or "Steven Ward"), and his first largely Rock musical in roughly 45 years (since "Jesus Christ Superstar"). The combo of flat out comedy, showing off talented children in roles that require singing, dancing, acting AND playing instruments has proved broadly appealing to a fairly wide audience. If, yes, giving this American-set high school comedy to two members of the House of Lords (Lloyd-Webber and book writer, Julian "Downtown Abbey" Fellowes) does sound a little nuts, it seems partially like a product of the same insane logic that got Cyndi Lauper and Harvey Fierstein writing a Northampton-based industrial-shoe-manufacturing musical, and that decision worked out pretty well. 

In all honesty, the success of the material owes far more to the stuff transferred from the film than it does to any of the embelishments by the two noblemen and the not-a-noble lyricist Glenn Slater - Lloyd Webber's tunes rarely stretch beyond the familiar (occaisonally borrowing, acknowleged from Mozart's "Queen of the Night" aria from "The Magic Flute", unacknowledged from the bit in "If Only You Would Listen" that sounds like "Someone Else's Story" from "Chess"). The performers give it guts and energy in ensemble numbers like "Stick it to the Man", "When I climb to the top of Mount Rock" and the title song, but the deeper delvings into the teen-and-pre-teen angst here are never really given anything more than the most cursory of treatment. You can kind of smell the old-straight-white-man-ness off the show too from the treatment of women and homosexuals in the show who are both broad-brush caricatures (the two gay parents dash on and off stage screaming, the young gay kid is into Vogue and Barbra Streisand and wants to be a stylist, the women are either shrewish (Dewey's nemesis Patti) or mother figures (principal Rosalie)). 

Fortunately, Marty King's directed one hell of sttrong, constantly-flowing show, with clever use of an adaptable set - well built under the supervision of John Nicholls to adapt from rock stage to apartment to classhroom to dive bar, flowing back and forth easily and standing up to some fairly vigorous performer interraction. Katrina Tang gets great sounds out of the 7-piece band plus the onstage cast, including five musician-actors. Nathan Rutrups also gets great simple rock choreography which adds spectacle when it's needed without ever feeling like dancing-for-the-sake-of-dancing.

There's strength too in the cast - Max Gambale would seem the most obvious casting ever for the role (having previously played a great Jack Black role in "High Fidelity", plus having demonstrated his rock vocal credentials in everything from "War of the Worlds" to "Jesus Christ Superstar") but here is another chance to show off just how skilled he is in a role that has him centrestage pretty much continuously, constantly energetic as the somewhat-selfish-but-still-somehow-loveable Dewey. Taylor Paliaga as principal Rosalie is given some of the bigger singing burden, carrying both the aforementioned Mozart Aria and the sentimental "Where Did The Rock Go", as well as being a somewhat sensible straightwoman to Dewey's antics. The rest of the adult and kid cast have great energy dashing around as parents, rock musicians, bar patrons and faculty or as members of the class, with special mention to Edith Baggeley's officiousness as Summer and Hester McDonald's fine rock voice as Tomika.  

In short this is a surprisingly fun show, built on thinnish material but making great use of it to show off an entertaingly stacked cast. It's a straightforward crowdpleaser that did its job of pleasing a crowd well.

Let the Right One in, Darlinghurst Theatre, 12 Oct-20 Nov 2022

 John Ajveide's novel has been around the adaptation route a few times - filmed, adapted to a US context, currently a TV series and this stage adaptation originally written in 2013. It's a simple story of a child meeting something strange but protective, about a bond formed in harsh conditions, about alienation and acceptance. It's also, in this production, tense and terrifying. 

On a simple industrial looking set (designed by Isabel Hudson), we get the slowly warming relationship between bullied Oskar and the unusually confident Eli, interspersed with scenes of Oskar being bullied at school, dealing with his distant parents, and the background of a series of mysterious deaths being enacted by Eli's guardian. The revelation of Eli's true nature comes slowly but surprisingly, with a few intriguing departures from popular lore, and the true horror turns out to be social rather than an individual monster. 

There are a few inconsistencies in the production - in particular, the choice to use Swedish accents throghout does distance the production more than is strictly necessary - and at least one early murder feels a little under-bloody. But in the core, as it tells the blossoming relationship between Will McDonald's freshfaced Oskar and Sebrina Thorton-Walker's disconcertingly calm Eli, it blooms as a very unconventional love story of enforced co-dependence.

Alexander Berlage's production is full of sudden blackouts and large industrian rock noises throughout transitions,throwing us off-centre and building audience tension to explode when necessary. I do feel it meanders a little when the attention is off Oskar and Eli, but part of that is the nature of the material - the story is intent on isolating them as much as possible to strengthen their bond, and anything that moves away from them does feel like a distraction. But all in all this is a successful, intriguing thriller. 

The lifespan of a Fact, Sydney Theatre company, Ros Packer Theatre, 20 Sept-22 Oct 2022

 

Having one of Sydney's larger auditoriums may feel like a blessing for the Sydney Theatre Company, but occsionally what they really want to do in that venue is an intimate three person philosophical comedy looking at the gap between facts and truth, dealing with a real-life exchange between a magazine essayist and the intern assigned to fact check his essay. And while Paige Rattray's production pulls out all the bells and whistles (plus a clarinetist), in the end I'm not sure that smaller wasn't the better way to go for this story. 

Admittedly, there are compensations here. Marg Howell's stage-filling sets and Cameron Smith's AV choices make the stage pop and moves us efficiently from Manhattan to Vegas, creating strong visual pictures. And the three performers, Charles Wu, Gareth Davies and Sigrid Thornton, also give performances that are scaled up to the venue - the increasing passions betwen Wu and Davies as they argue through the finer points of detail are hysterical and yet emotionally engaing, with Thornton as the editor mdediating between the two of them. The three archetypes - Wu's entusiastic intern, Davies' prickly writer and Thornton's efortlessly powerful boss - are well deliniated and given space to have arias of pesonal expression.

The fourth performer on stage, musician/composer Maria Alfonsine, is where things get a little trickier. She provides a live jazzy soundtrack, pushing the show towards the 30s/40s newswroom comedies that this superficially sligtly resembles (though the finer points of journalistic ethics are somewhat more evolved than that model). The intention, aparent in program notes, to have her represent the person the essay is actually about never really seems fully thoght out - it's a concept that never really becomes staged in any real sense. Yes, she's there throughout, but there's never really a sense that her prescence has been thought out or makes any real sense beyond a directorial intention that isn't quite realised. The music itself is fine - it's the idea that it's meant to represent anything other than just mood and decoration that kinda falls apart.

This is still a fairly engrossing story, and the three performers are fine skilled performers. But I feel like the depths and nuances may have been better suited to a smaller more intimate venue, rather than being drawn to the flash and spectacle which the Ros Packer slightly demands. 

Looking for Alibrandi, Belvoir Street theatre co-production with Malthouse theatre, 1 Oct - 6 Nov 22

 

An adaptation of a classic novel that's had a hit movie adaptation and has remained on school reading lists for the better part of three decades, this is a good old populist hit. Some interesting choices make this more than just a simple regurgitation of all the classic bits, though - starting with the casting of Chanella Macri as Josie - the Italian girl coming of age in the 1990s, third of a series of three women whose emergence into sexuality and adulthood has disrupted their lives and those around them. Macri is not your standard wish-fulfillment teen - she's a very realistically sarcastic, moody, and tough in a way we don't normally see. Vidya Rajan's adaptation feels funnier than I remember the 2000 film being, letting Josie narrate her story and be at the centre at all times. It does mean some elements get sidelined - the story of John Barton, the rich white boy who Josie loves from afar whose personal issues end tragically no longer feels as centred, possibly partially because it's difficult these days to have much sypathies for the rich white boys no matter how much personal angst they might be carrying. 

The two males of the cast play single roles - Ashley Lyons as the returning Michael, rediscovering his daughter and the woman he left behind and realising how far they've both moved beyond him, and John Marc Desagno as the goofily working class Jacob Coote, giving surprising wisdom in the second half of the show. All the other women double-or-triple - Hannah Monson embodying Anglo Privilege both as Barton and as his female equivalent, bitchy Ivy; Lucia Mastrione giving great supportive mum as Christina and enjoying the chance to steal large amounts of scenes as Josie's ebullient friend Sera; and Jennifer Vuletic playing both imposing Nonna and the stern-but-compassionate Sister Bernadette.

Stephan Nicalozzo directs on a simple staging that combines transitioning the scenes with letting the characters make passata - flashing around the various locations and keeping Josie's experience central (including on-stage costume changes). It's a very audience-pleasing production that only in the second half really starts to engage in the darker undercurrents of the material but it does the job of engaging the audience with an emotionally rich story of identity, humanity, and growing up.