Angus Cerini's latest play is the third in a sequence of three plays that could be considered "rural gothic" - starting with 2016's "The Bleeding Tree", considering in 2020 with "Wannagatta" before concluding with this story of a rural couple at the end of a drought and the beginning of a flood season, as bad luck turns worse and crushes them casually through the passing of time. Cerini uses a simple poetry of expression in a series of short scenes that have a cumulative power. It's a play that is very much focussed on its two leads - Colin Friels as the reticent Ray and Kerry Armstrong as the warmer Floss - and the support they give one another even in the worst of times. Somehow the combination of Friels and Armstrong's performance, Paige Rattray's beautiful staging, the combination of David Fleischer's design, Nick Schlieper's lighting design and Clemence William's composition and sound design means that it never falls into being a glum monotony, but instead acquires a powerful beauty. There's a power to this accumulating simplicity that works well. The supporting cast don't have a lot to do, but Renee Lim provides strong support as two characters brought in to help our leads, ex-canberran James O'Connell plays three different roles with strong differentiation even as each brings further unwelcome news, and Bruce Spence is a welcome presence, morose yet hilarious in his grim certainties.
I hope this season isn't the end of the road for this play or this production - Friels, in particular, gets a chance to show vulnerabilities he's rarely shown previously, and the visual power of this production is something that's difficult to capture without seeing the whole thing live. And i hope more people do get a chance to see it.
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