August: Osage County, Free-Rain Theatre Company, ACT Hub, 5-15 Sept

 

This production shares three cast members with the last time Free Rain ran this show, almost a decade ago (review here), all playing the same roles - but this is very far from a rote production. A modern epic American Family Drama, feeling like it summarises all the great American plays into one outsized epic, from the addiction issues of Eugene O'Neill to the weird regional activities of Sam Shepherd to the speechifying about the nature of America of Tony Kushner, this is a play that contains multitudes as three generations of an Oklahoma family gather in the wake of the disappearance of the patriarch - with three daughters returning to deal with their pill-addicted and happily-pasisng-on-the-genrational-trauma mother, the various husbands and partners, the local police, the aunt-uncle-and-cousin relations and a recently-hired live-in housekeeper. Beginning in 2007 at Chicago's famed Steppenwolf theatre, the original production transferred to Broadway and to London's national theatre and a tour hosted by the Sydney theatre Company, before the film was released (cut down to a more audience-friendly length) with a big name cast that never quite recaptured the theatrical energy of the play. 

It remains Letts' masterpiece - the plays he wrote before had a sharp incisive power (particularly "Killer Joe" and "Bug" but his later work doesn't quite have the urgency - Letts has shifted into an acting career largely made up of being senior patriarch figures in series like "Homeland" and movies like "Lady Bird", "The Post", "Little Women" and "Ford v Ferrari" - it's a very classically well made play, from the three act structure basically built into it by the uninterrupted roller coaster of act two, which takes this hothouse of a family and turns the boiler up until it explodes, with the third act remaining to pick up the pieces left behind. Cate Clelland gives the intimate Hub space an epic power, playing it longways and finding as many inches as possible of stage space to let the family sprawl all over the house. She maintains space and focus even as the various members of the Weston-Fordham-Aiken clans bicker and yell, often simultaneously across the space. There's a sense of control in among the chaos as we're always brought back to what matters, which is the emotions and tensions between family members, whether they be hostility, love, frustration or lust.

Karen Vickery as the matriarch is the mother from hell, and seizes the opportunity to ride a role that allows her to play everything from pathetic incoherence in the worst of her sedated-delusion to concentrated focussed venom as she reaches out to destroy family members one by one. Louise Bennet makes a return after a long time away from Canberra stages as the most prominent of the three daughters, dealing with her own parental frustrations, her own frayed marriage and her own ability to shoot venom at family members at the climax of the second act. Tracy Noble as Aunt Mattie Fae starts as a gossiping side figure before it becomes more apparent how great her own level of venom is, and what she's held in for years and is now finding an opportunity to release. Crystal Mahon is compelling as the somewhat crushed Ivy after long exposure to her mother, and brings hope as she finds a secret way to escape before a final brutal secret hits her like a brick. David Bennett handles Beverly's long opening monologue with aplomb, setting up the character and the nature of the family early. Bruce Hardie gives Bill a gentle generosity as he realises how deeply he's disengaged from his wife and how impossible it is to return. Michael Sparks similarly has a powerful humanity as the mostly-quiet-but-rebelllious when riled Charles. Richard Manning is suitably skin crawling as the awful Steve. Lachlan Rufffy is hapless, adorably labradorish and astonishingly vulnerable. Ella Buckley as the awkwardly prepubescent Jean draws attention as she tries and often fails to stand by her values in the face of the rest of her bullheaded family. Karina Hudson gives Karen a sense of a self that has decided to ignore as much as possible around her to avoid feeling damage, at the expense of parts of her humanity. Rob Drennan as Sheriff Deon is a warm honest presence who is clearly invested in parts of the families history they may not even remember, and Andrea Garcia's Johnna provides a strong observer figure, someone who absorbs all the tension around her without betraying too much judgment. 

This is an epic and powerful production, and well worth the three-hours-and-change of your time in the theatre - a high-tension family drama that takes us through all the darker sides of family history and leaves us wrung out at the other end happy we can leave these people behind and hoping some of them survive intact. 

English, Melbourne Theatre company, Playhouse, Canberra Theatre Centre, 5-7 Sept

 

Sanaz Toossi's play was the winner of last year's Pulitzer Prize for drama - a tight comedy-drama about four students in an English-Second-Language class in Tehran, it uses a device where when characters are speaking English they use strong Iranian accents, and when not, they use the performer's natural accent. It's, as the concept suggests, a show looking at language, and how it affects how people express themselves beyond the immediately obvious - and about how the character's relationship to another culture affects them. It's a rich array of characters - all four students are learning for different reasons, and Toossi's script gives them plenty of room to breathe and explore themselves as it plays out moment by moment.

Director Tasmin Hossein gives this a naturalistic sheen as the various exercises present different challenges to the student. The set by Kat Chan is a simple small classroom with whiteboards, clicks and institutional chairs, a simple learning environment for the performers to play out their challenges, and the direction finds the meaning in small moments of tension and release.

Of the five cast members, Maia Abbas emerges strongly as the character most challenged by the English language, Elham - not because of her proficiency so much as a profound cultural identity crisis within her. Abbas gives the character wit, energy, and vigour as her challenges come more and more to the fore. Elsewhere, Osamah Sami as the english-proficient Omid has a lot of charm and handles his own counter-acting cultural issues intriguingly, and Salme Garensar as the instructor, Marjan, has a polite demeanor that proves steely when challenged, leading to a professional crisis and confession of her own issues. Delaram Ahmadi has a gentle charm to her as the hardworking student Goli who tries to stay out of the identiy issues but struggles, and Marjan Meshabi is quietly heartbreaking as the mother trying to catch up to her son who has moved to Canada but unaware how much he has already left her behind. 

This is a strong, powerful play that got a little lost in the crush of multiple productions last weekend - I saw it too late in the season for my review to do it any good, hence the delay, but it's the kind of thing I hope we see more tours of. 

Ordinary Days, Q the Locals, The Q, 5-7 September

Adam Gwon's song-cycle is inevitably going to be described as Sondheimesque by many - it's full of fast paced songs sung by four New Yorkers in various degrees of neurosis - a young couple who've just moved in together and are finding accommodating one another difficult, a grad student freaking out about his thesis and an art-enthusiast seeking for a better purpose to his life - and every song tells a mini-story all in itself, often using a device where the title takes on different meanings as it's repeated (though Sondheim doesn't have a monopoly on neurotic New Yorkers - back when Betty Comden and Adolph Green were writing them, they were considered quirky). It's a small scale story but with big feelings within it - of that point in your mid-thirties when finding the big picture of your life conflicts with just trying to live day-to-day.

Chris Zuber's production emphasises the music, fitting the action around musical director Matthew Webster at the grand piano, with the cast in constant motion on a set largely made up of milk crates (including a spectacular back wall of upside-down-skyscrapers), beautifully lit by Zac Harvey. It's an energetic production that earns its moments of still reflection in the middle of the chaos. 

The cast is made up of great musical theatre performers who, for various reasons, haven't been onstage in musicals in a while - I must admit I mentally associate Joel Horwood with plays (though they were a great lead in Urinetown only two years ago, and were in the Canberra cast of "The Hello Girls" which I missed due to being overseas) but as Warren they're a strong, open, sweet natured presence. Vanessa Valois has been away from Canberra stages for 7 years due to, presumably, the normal life things that mean people don't do stage shows, but her return is greatly appreciated as the twitchy, uptight grad-student Deb - nobody does an onstage rant like Valois. Grant Pegg and Kelly Roberts have both been on the other side of the footlights for the last few years, co-directing such productions as "Assassins", "Heathers", "Dogfight" and "Spring Awakening - their return as young couple Jason and Claire is sweet, funny and relatable as they negotiate everything from where to put his shoes to what to do on the weekend. 

It's a beautiful show full of standout moments for each of the cast members, and the energy of the production fills the big stage at the Q with delight and charm. And it's a pleaure to remake the musical acquaintance of its cast in a piece that seems sculpted on them - everybody is so suited to their roles that it's a joy to behold. The season is short, so if you blink you'll miss this and regret it, so get in fast! 

Uncle Vanya, Ensemble Theatre, 26 Jul-31 Aug

 Why does Chekov keep on coming back? It might be a combo of some dense, rich roles for actors to get their teeth into, the themes of a society on the verge of breaking down, of frustrated lives and failed interactions, of a lost generation at a turning point in history, all combine to maintain interest about 120 years after his plays were first performed. 

This small scale production at the Ensemble uses one simple set and a smaller-than-usual cast (with Vanessa Downing doubling in two small roles) to pour the drama directly onto our laps, as a long summer on a remote russian estate begins to boil over as Vanya begins to act out his frustrations, simmering romantic tensions build between his niece Sonya, the local doctor Astrov and the owner of the estate's wife, and the professor cannot help himself from boring everyone. Joanna Murray-Smith's translation occasionally gets a little too excitable about leaning towards the contemporary in the language (Yelena at one point calls Vanya a little bitch, which... is not inaccurate but it's a little out of 1890s Russian vocab), but otherwise mostly slips onto serving Chekov's original text, keeping things tight and moving. 

It's a strong cast - Yalin Ozucelik as Vanya is the centre of our attention, frustrating, needy, broken and oh so sympathetic when he finally breaks and unreels his frustrations. Tim Walter as the doctor is a little too flat in aspect - the production kind of suggests the reason two different women are drawn to him is more due to him being the best prospect in the region rather than anything particularly magnetic about him. Chantelle Jamesion as Yelena drags us into her dilemma - having obviously made a wrong choice when young she's determined not to make it worse but is drawn towards other options.  Abbey Morgan is a young and bright Sonya with a yearing heart. David Lynch as Serebrykov sells the self-important mediocrity of the man, and John Gaden as Telyehgin gives his character a few strong moments of focus. Vanessa Downing's double casting unfortunately plays a little as a stunt - she distinguishes the roles well but it's always clear that it's the same actress playing both for no real benefit. 

This is a bit of a mixed bag of a production but for those who like to wallow in their Chekhov it's a nice chance to wallow again. 

The Turn of the Screw, Craig Baldwin in association with Hayes Theatre Co, Hayes Theatre, 16 Aug-15 Sep

 

Benjamin Britten's 1954 chamber opera takes Henry James' 1898 ghost story and tells it intimately, with a cast of six telling the story of a governess, entrusted with two children who seem caught up in something strange and ominous. Given James' era, the exact nature of the ominous doings are kept at the implication level rather than blatantly spelled out and Mfanwy Piper's libretto doesn't really try to make things very much clearer, and Britten's atonal score means it's not exactly a comfortable listen, but there is a spooky power that builds up within it.

Craig Baldwin's staging strips the Hayes back to its essentials, with the walls peeling and with minimal set pieces, and the two children played by adult performers carrying puppets, lending a suitably eerie aspects to the children. It also reduces the score to a pianist and a keyboardist and lets the cast's voices reverberate off the walls of the tiny theatre. Emma Vine's simple setpieces have occasional powerful moments (as a frame turns the governess's chair into a coach) but occaisonally spend too long getting moved around the stage to convey different locations that could as easily be conveyed with a lighting change. Addy Robertson and Sandy Leung as the two children are nicely unnerving, as it becomes increasingly clear Miles has fallen deeply under the influence of one of the ghosts while Flora denies any knowledge of what's going on. Sophie Salesveeni as the governess has a clear singing voice and a modest demeanor which is stressed more and more as time passes. Benjamin Rasheed as the sinister Quint is compellingly offputting, as is Georgia Cooper as his accomplice/victim Jessell. Margaret Trubiano as the observant housekeeper, Mrs Grose, is suitably offputting too.

This is not the easiest show to take - Britten's pacing is a tad slow, his atonal music unconfortable and even though the cast is singing in English it can be difficult to make out lyrics sung at high varying pitches of intensity. This felt like a strong staging of material I was never really going to love, though there are moments in the setpieces which have distinct power. It falls into the space of something I admire rather than love. 

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Belvoir Street Theatre, 17 Aug-22 Sep

 Simon Stephen's adaptation of Mark Haddon's book "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" was an instant hit when it hit the london stage in 2012 - Marianne Elliot's production using all the bells and whistles of the Royal National theatre, including high-tech lighting, sound and lighting. But Stephen's adaptation is a relatively simple piece using its ensemble to assist in telling the story of Christopher, our neurodivergent protagonist who attempts to solve a mystery in his backyard only to find one inside his own household. Belvoir's production, directed by resident directer Hannah Goodwin, strips back a lot of the bells and whistles, using a simple set with a clock and a lot of chalk to tell the same story, keeping the ensemble focus. She also includes a short warning section at the beginning for the neurodivergent concerning bright lights and loud noises, and adds a continuing device to maintain these warnings. 

There's still the same amount of spectacle, with the journey at the beginning of act two being a particular highlight, but the human focus keeps us inside the story and engrossed in it - while it's a long-ish night at two hours 40, the time races by as the plot twists and the relationship dynamics emerge in a way that reaches across the stage. Even when the driving mysteries of the first act are resolved before intermission, the personal challenges that have been revealed by the solutions drive the second act quite remarkably. 

There's not a dud performance in the cast - Daniel R Nixon as Christopher is the centre, slightly snobbish and intellectually self-possessed but aware of his own limitations, brave and powerful and yet desperately in need of comfort. Bridgit Zengeni as his supportive teacher Siobhan is a warm presence at the heart of the play, interrogating Christoper to get a better sense of his story and to find the things that he's not able to tell. Brandon McClelland as his dad manages the tricky path of a character who tells very little directly but clearly feels a lot. Matilda Ridgeway's appearance is one of the surprises of the story, but she's a warming presence as soon as she arrives. Tracey Mann is one of those actresses who is always welcome and here she's delightful in a range of roles, most specially as neighbor Mrs Alexander. Ariadne Sgouros is also a pleasure to see both as the grim Mrs Shears and the gleeful Mrs Gasgoyne. Nicholas Brown gets to play warm and rough in his various roles, while Roy Joseph has a nice line in confusion and frustrated authority. 

There's skilful use of movement throughout by Nigel Poulton, Tim Dashwood and Elle Evangelista, and Kelsey Lee's lighting is tight and direct and plays significant roles in the storytelling. 

In short this is a powerful telling of a classic show, which goes beyond being a replica of the much-seen National Theater version (rerun several times by NT Live)  to find its own ways of telling the story with skill and passion. 

Every Brilliant Thing, ACT Hub, 20-25 Aug

 Duncan McMillan built his play "Every Brilliant Thing" with the performer Johnny Donohoe. It's basically a monologue with extended audience assistance - the story of the show is of how a young person deals with their parent's depression by trying to find all the good things in life and making a list of them, and the show gives audience members numbered sheets which they're asked to read aloud at the point when their particular thing shows up on the list ... among other requirements which it would be a shame to spoil. But the show becomes a true collaboration between audience and performer, a rapport and comfort between us. In Australia, it's been performed by some skilled actors  - Kate Mulvaney did half the original Belvour Street season before being called away by international filming duties for an Amazon TV series, with Steve Rodgers taking over the second half, and in Adelaide it was picked up by Jimi Bani for a run at the State Theater Company of South Australia. It's a very open text that requires the actor to age from around 7 to around 40 in front of us and to drive the evening with little more than their personality, a couple of pieces of cardboard and the audience's assistance.

Jarrad West is more than up to the challenge. One of the downsides of him being a directorial powerhouse is that he doesn't get on stage as frequently as we'd like - but between definitive performances in "The Normal Heart", "Company" and "The Boy From Oz", and some great supporting work including his recent run in "Mary Stuart", he's always a welcome presence, but this show requires a lot of him in terms of energy, warmth, compassion and emotional tension. And he delivers in bucketloads, warm, sly, playful, charming, daggy, endearing, vulnerable and transcendentally joyous. It's a performance fully worthy of any number of positive adjectives and these are the ones I've come up with this morning - there are thousands more to throw at this and they would all be richly deserved. 

This is a very short run and deserves the full and undivided attention of every serious theatregoer in town (plus all the people who don't know they want to be serious theatregoers yet, but who should become one). It's a thoughtful heart-filling show that you would be foolish to miss.