Review - The Children

Melbourne Theatre Company Presents

The Children

By Lucy Kirkwood

Directed by Sarah Goodes

Set and Costume Design – Elizabeth Gadsby

Lighting Designer – Paul Jackson

Composer and Sound Designer – Steve Francis

Cast:

Hazel – Pamela Rabe

Rose – Sarah Peirse

Robin – William Zappa

A challenging and rewarding work The Children unfolds naturalistically in real time. 

On a simple functional set of a rustic kitchen by Elizabeth Gadsby, that is superbly lit by Paul Jackson, three clever and influential sixty something nuclear physicists reunite.  The world as they know it has been turned upside down by a Fukushima like disaster.  Some of their pasts are divulged and we get to witness their flawed and often messy humanness.  And the apparently altruistic reason for the, often uncomfortable, ‘get together’ is revealed in the last minutes of the piece. 

Lucy Kirdwood’s text functions on a number of levels.  As an unfolding story it is full of surprises and maintains interest.  However as an observation of characters from the baby boomer generation it sometimes feels like an indictment.  The subject matter of our damage to our planet is deeply unsettling.  But there is another niggling ambiguous rift in this production.  Perhaps it is in the writing.  I am wondering if this is because Kirkwood is a much younger woman than the generation she is writing about.  Therefore what is presented is only partially from the lived perspective of the protagonists.   So at times the actors are bound by the way Kirkwood has written - to perform their characters from the perspective of an observer.

There is lots of humour and many laughs in this work.   However I get the impression there is a delicate balance, for director Sarah Goodes, between releasing the intrinsic sense of fun and play in the material from under the pall of the framing of a story of cataclysmic disaster.  I am wondering if the production itself tends more towards naturalism then the playwright intended.

Pamela Rabe’s Hazel is upfront and fascinated by, and unapologetic for, her own very human foibles.  At times she seems to be Hazel but every now and again she performs Hazel with self-deprecating humour.  Sarah Peirse brings to life the more independent and troubled Rose, a haunting presence who generally seems removed, somewhat toxic, and willfully unaffected by her friends.   William Zappa plays Robin, Hazel’s husband, the character with a greater sense of humour.  As with the other two his character expresses a very finely toned sense of his own self-importance.   

Throughout there are a number of rather clunky clichés and strangely simplistic statements.   All three characters are penned as clever privileged people exhibiting the appropriate blend of narcissism of those of their generation.  They have a disparate awkwardness about them as they relate to each other in an often-prickly manner.   The chemistry between the characters feels thin and fleeting but perhaps this will grow during the run.  Or perhaps one of the points of the work is that we are all alone together in this nest that we have soiled.

Sound by Steve Francis is minimal and extremely effective particularly in the last moments of the staging. 

My quibbles and questions aside I found The Children very engaging and rewarding, most particularly, for the argument it presents - I do heartily ‘recommend it.

Suzanne Sandow

(For Stage Whispers)

Review - The Glass Menagerie

The Glass Menagerie

By Tennessee Williams

Directed by Eamon Flack

Jim O’Connor – Harry Greenwood

Tom Wingfield – Luke Mullins

Amanda Wingfield – Pamela Rabe

Laura Wingfield – Rose Riley

Video Design Consultant – Sean Bacon

Lighting Designer – Damien Cooper

Composer and Sound Design – Stefan Gregory

Set Designer – Michael Hankin

Costume Designer – Mel Page

Merlyn Theatre – Malthouse

18 May to 5 June 2016

This Belvoir Street production of The Glass Menagerie is not for the faint hearted it is long and robust, contemporary and acutely perceptive.

As the quasi-autobiographical ‘Memory Play,’ of Tennessee Williams’s early adult life in a small apartment with his deluded mother and vulnerable fragile sister, with whom he felt a deep connection, is especially revealing. 

Although Tom, the Williams character, is able to walk away into another life it is an era when women had limited options.  So the only respectable way out of a dysfunctional family setting for daughter Laura is through marriage.   However due to social isolation and desperate shyness and a mild disability she has no mobility and is doomed to spinsterhood.   And yet there is a poignant glimmer of hope.

Interesting choices have been made around characterization.  Rose Riley plays Laura in a lovely open way - using a natural voice and unapologetic physical presence.  Riley’s Laura exhibits some startling, deeply disturbing and telling behavioral traits.

Harry Greenwood plays Jim O’Connor, the gentleman visitor, with sympathetic self-awareness.  He doesn’t overtly express any sense of repulsion that his character might be feeling towards Amanda and Laura and the smothering situation in which he finds himself.  This adds a rich dimension to the second act and the touching scene between Laura and the gentleman caller that is delightful staged and enhanced by marvelous lighting  (Damien Cooper).

As Tom Wingfield Luke Mullins shines.  He brings the audience in to his world with the seemingly effortless charm of Tennessee Williams.  He moves fluidly in and around the apartment through windows, doors and curtains, documenting all the while - particularly through the setting of cameras. 

Pamela Rabe’s characterization of the stifling, disturbed Mother Amanda is inescapably larger than life.  She is a grand puppet master – with invisible strings jerking at her children’s emotional well being.  There is an uncanny sense that the set (Michael Hankin) is a little smaller than a real life apartment and has something of a dolls house about it.   Rabe’s Amanda fills and dominates this space.  Sometimes what she mutters seems almost indistinguishable as though she is not fully expecting her children to be listening to her. 

Desperation and insecurity imbues this archetypal ‘Southern Bell’ who has been rejected and escaped by a philandering husband.   She is left with two very sensitive adult children with whom a dance of crippling codependency takes hold.  Ambivalence reigns and emotional blackmail abounds.  It has the potential to touch any raw nerve of familial dysfunction in the viewer.

As director Eamon Flack has elicited very strong choices from his cast and creatives that allows for a truly insightful production highlighting isolation, vulnerability and replacing some of the pathos usually emphasized with a contemporary sense of angst, even anger.   

One could be forgiven for thinking that Flack has imposed a contemporary post –modern sensibility on this staging through a use of multi media.  However nothing could be further from the truth as a great many of the stage directions and particularly the use of filmic projections are specified in the text.

Beautiful rich melodies transport the audience from scene to scene thanks to sound designer Stefan Gregory.

Mel Page’s costuming is great including having Amanda wear a man’s dressing gown and a dress that she has definitely grown out of  - with a zip on the back that doesn’t fully do up.

Tennessee Williams is truly honoured through this insightful production.

Suzanne Sandow
(For Stage Whispers)