Review - The Bleeding Tree

The Bleeding Tree

Written by

Angus Cerini

Director - Lee Lewis

Composer - Steve Toulmin

Designer - Renée Mulder

Lighting Designer - Verity Hampson

Cast

Paula Arundell, Brenna Harding, Sophie Ross

Fairfax Studio

15 – 19 May 2018

At the heart of The Bleeding Tree is the question of why, as neighbours and friends, do we turn a blind eye to the perpetration of domestic violence.  It is an extraordinary work of ‘high art,’ with rich integrity.  Superb craftsmanship is skillfully fused together by Director Lee Lewis.

The Bleeding Tree commences with an abrupt change of atmosphere, brutally, bringing the audience into the pitiless world of a desperate story.

I’m not giving away any secrets by quoting the press release:  “The only issue now is disposing of the body.”  This tells us there has been a death, but what happens next is pretty wild, wacky and unexpected.  The production is darkly imbued with an Australian Gothic sensibility. 

Three women portray, a Mother (Paula Arundell), and, her two daughters (Brenna Harding and Sophie Ross) who live on a desolate and fairly isolated country property.  We witness a grim and gruesome incident perpetrated by the Mother.   Subsequently as events unfold we better understand the cause and the overall situation.   We are perhaps not inclined to judge, as there seems to be, little room, or need, for remorse or regret.

The story is told partly through the stilted personal language of the three women and partly through the voices of visiting neighbours.   The girl’s responses to, and sharp asides about, these intrusions, are very telling.

Writer Angus Cerini’s poetic language, that at times even rhymes, does much to create atmosphere and convey the intimacy of the relationship between the three.  When just talking amongst themselves they use a kind of stilted abbreviated language.   This also suggests isolation.   Indeed, these three women have been isolated by a powerful, controlling man.

The acting is superb and all three actors are deeply convincing as they represent the essence of what it is to be relentlessly tormented and afraid of ferocious violence. 

Each also takes on personas of visiting men to startling effect.  Paula Arundell most particularly displays extraordinary vocal versatility in speaking as a rough but caring bloke.  It is easy to she why she is a Helpmann recipient for this performance.  She shines but so do Harding and Ross as they very convincingly embody young girls.

Cerini’s words paint strikingly vivid and memorable visual imagery.

Lighting (Verity Hampson) at times bright and at others shadowy endows the story with added dimension.

Designer Renee Mulder has stripped everything back.   The three actors work on a bare stage, which is partially raised in tiers and painted with a floral carpet like design.  The costuming feels timeless and is perhaps indicative of the 1950s or 60s or 80s.   The two young girls have that grubby look of neglected or indeed abused children.

Sound (Steve Toulmin), at first deeply disturbing and insidious white noise, is later used in various ways to assist in creating assorted atmospheres and imagery.

As I watched I was continually referring to my memories of Cerini’s work Animals, Directed by Susie Dee and presented in November 2016 at Theatre Works.  Both are extraordinary pieces of Theatre that very bravely explore issues around the social problem of domestic abuse.

An extraordinary work for six voices - or three voices, six characters that are richly embodied in this marvelous production. 

Strong and timely.

Suzanne Sandow

(For Stage Whispers)

Review - Animal

Animal

Created by Susie Dee, Kate Sherman and Nicci Wilks

Director - Susie Dee

Performers – Kate Sherman and Nicci Wilks

Composer – Kelly Ryall

Designer – Marg Horwell

Lighting Designer – Andy Turner

Projected Text and Dramaturgy – Angus Cerini

Producer – Adam Fawcett

Theatre Works – St Kilda

17 to 27 November 2016

Susie Dee, Kate Sherman and Nicci Wilks, with the assistance of Angus Cerini, have had the courage to delve into the murky depths, and usually hidden experience, of the insidious damage of abuse.  Marvelously they have extracted a poignant poetic essence.  And with the help of an exemplary production team are sublimely communicating this to audiences.  

Designer Marg Howell has created what looks like a found space and made Theatre Works feel cavernous.  It is fitted out, like a huge shed, with metal encased water tanks.  There is a sense of being in the country feathers are littered and float about and a kind of angel bell is ringing.  Two young barely clad women are perched near the rafters like featherless birds with clipped wings who are unable to escape and destined to an existence of ‘acting out’.  Imagery abounds and so do semiotics.

Composed sound (Kelly Ryall) is often effectively loud at times, and at some points appropriately disturbingly overwhelming.

Animal interprets the tragic effects of the internalized response to abuse.   It is not the experience of being violated we witness.  It is the resulting carnage that is expressed through the exceptional work of performers/co-creators Kate Sherman and Nicci Wilks.  The ordeal is relived again and again.   A huge energetic expression of trauma is exhibited through their strong vigorous physical performances.

Wilks is extraordinary in her capacity to morph into an innocent child.  Evidently the abuse, this work is most particularly looking at, is the sexual abuse of young girls.  This aspect of victimization is depicted as children dancing in a ‘sexy’ way for someone.  There is a weary desperation in this dance, a sense of fretful apprehension.  It is evident that their aim to please is marked with a deep fear and a kind of defeated resignation.

The perpetrator is absent, but his presence is palpable.  He is rendered an absent shadowy figure – a larger than life specter that will always haunt.  His victims may have murdered him, however if this is the case, it is to no or very little avail.  His dark presence looms larger than life.

All roads seem to lead to a bottomless pit of psychological pain.  This devastation is expressed with amazing clarity in a kind of helpless, hapless stillness.

The abstracted roles these two women play interchange between victim and bystander, inferring an unavoidable situation.   They take on dresses – guises.  There are two distinctly different costumes one indicates more kudos the other outright victim status.  Although throughout there is a shared victimhood and a strong sense of sisterhood even when they attack each other.   They express an extraordinary intimacy through shared experience.

One discussion I had in the foyer likened the work to The Boys (the film adaptation by Stephen Sewell).  However it is not so much the horrifying edge of threat we witness, as audience, but the overwhelmingly demoralizing results of violation.  It is not frightening but enlightening.

Also in the foyer while I was half listening in to someone telling me it didn’t make them feel anything, I was observing a woman struggle with her tears.  Responses will by mixed.

This is such a gutsy challenging work – so worth catching – we will be talking about it for years.

Suzanne Sandow

(For Stage Whispers)