"The Dismissal: The Musical" has been a fair while in development - getting a workshop in 2019, and a further development in 2021 prior to a planned premiere run as part of the Sydney Theatre company's 2021 season with an accompanying planned run at Canberra theatre centre - both were subsequently pulled due to continued COVID restrictions. I'm listed as a Grassroots Producer in the program due to dropping Squabbalogic a donation at the end of the 2022 financial year, but rest assured, I'm not expecting any return on this investment.
Catching it late in its run, I must admit I found that, despite several years of development, it's still a show that suffers from some occasionally messy storytelling - despite the success of "Hamilton" internationally and "Keating" locally, political history doesn't always suit the stage without careful reshaping and editing, and some of the material appears not fully rethought for best dramatic effect - in particular, the material relating to the Khemlani loans affair drags alarmingly, and the script keeps on pushing the central trio of Whitlam, Fraser and Kerr offstage for long patches (in fact, Fraser doesn't really enter the narrative until late in act one). The use of Norman Gunston as narrator and odd-role player it should be a constant delight but apart from the opening number of act two, we never really get a chance for Matthew Whittet's Gunston to go hogwild and dominate the stage the way he should. And there's a lack of care in selecting between what's dramatically important narrative (much of the internal ructions in the labor party remain very much untold) and what's petty gossip (the snideness of a lot of the writing about Lady Anne Kerr has a distinctly bitchy tone). In general the show feels a little too long - the political stalemate that led to the dismissal starts at the beginning of act two, meaning we're waiting while very little is actually happening for most of an act. Laura Murphy's score has some great moments in it (in particular the Liberal Party anthem "Private Schoolboys" and the metaphoric montage "Rain down under") but it never quite lets Gough get a full grand moment - he's more seen in quips and quotes than fully musicalised.
It's still an impressive physical production, from the pre-show of 1970's TV commercials mixed with more modern house-of-reps activity to the well-drilled cast, from Justin Smith's stenorian Whitlam, Andrew Cutcliffe's smooth Fraser, Octavia Barron Martin's overwhelmed Kerr, Peter Carroll's panto-villain Barwick, Monique Salle's triple of Khemlani, Snedden and QEII, There's some fine moments of physical production too, but it never quite conquers the over-written material and gives it simplicity and clarity. It's a pity a show this anticipated doesn't quite fly like it should.
No comments:
Post a Comment