My Favourite Local Writers 2012-2018

In the last of my retrospectives covering the years 2012 to 2018 I wanted to highlight those people perhaps closest to my creative heart, that being local playwrights and collaborators. The people who have created wonderful plays, musicals and cabaret acts that, at their very best, can compete with any new work anywhere else in the country.

There have been outstanding individual works - Stephen Lee's Madame Piaf immediately springs to mind - but this list is made up of those writers where I have seen more than one example of their creative output.

Thank you for the drama, the laughs, the entertainment, the discovery of new worlds and characters, of reflection and debate.

Tyler Jacob Jones & Robert Woods

A duo that is synonymous with award winning one act comedy musicals. Jones is the showman with dazzling lyrics and inventive books that skewer everything from reality television to the movie industry to our obsession with celebrities. Woods is the more stoic of the two when it comes to being onstage but his music is just as inspired. Together they are a perfect creative match. They also have a shared love of movies and movie making that is abundantly clear in how they approach their material. It's perhaps why their work resonates so deeply with me. Above all, they create smart, witty, laugh out loud funny musicals that are a joy to watch. They are also prolific as a Holiday Special and recent Retrospective amply demonstrates.

Highlights: Point & Shoot: A New Musical; Dr. Felicity Rickshaw's Celebrity Sex Party; Gravity the Musical

Tyler Jacob Jones is a fine dramatist in his own right with F**k Decaf and Becky Peterson Will Punch You In The Face notable examples. He also contributed to the excellent Skin Deep which lambasted the cosmetic industry with typical flair.

Jeffrey Jay Fowler & Chris Isaacs

Members of independent powerhouse The Last Great Hunt, Fowler and Isaacs combined their considerable writing talents to create two wonderful pieces of theatre featuring the same characters (that they also played) - FAG/STAG and Bali. There is a compelling honesty to their writing that comes from sharp observation and pointed social commentary. They can have an audience roaring with laughter in one moment then deathly silent the next. Consummate storytellers, they have an innate grasp of storytelling rhythms honed, I suspect, over many performances together.

Each has individually written notable plays with Isaacs' The Great Ridolphi an engrossing one man tour de force and Fowler impressing with perhaps his most mature work, The One.

Scott McArdle

McArdle was like a supernova at Murdoch University when I first came across him - from writing original works to acting, directing, lighting design, pretty much everything. Such indefatigable multi-tasking has continued since he graduated, adding publicist amongst other functions and being a popular fixture on the independent theatre scene. The scope and ambition of McArdle's writing has been a feature - contemplative dramas; a full superhero themed musical; bringing science fiction front and centre to the stage; and adapting Mary Shelley's Frankenstein as a passion project of considerable skill.

Highlights: Bye. Gone; Coincidences at the End of Time; Frankenstein; Between Solar Systems

Will O'Mahony

Perhaps the finest local exponent of dialogue writing I have witnessed over the last seven years. I adore his rapid paced rat-tat-tat exchanges between characters and the density of the information he has them impart. He builds in verbal motifs and repetition that has my Aaron Sorkin loving heart swooning. There is a somewhat off-kilter approach to his storytelling that I enjoy as it allows for such theatrical treats as a talking panda. But he doesn't shy away from emotionally wrenching drama as the final moments of The Mars Project and his contribution to the Loaded double bill attest.

Highlights: The Mars Project (WAAPA version); Tonsils + Tweezers; Coma Land

Hellie Turner 

Always in demand as a dramaturg and mentor, Turner seems to have specialised of late in bringing true life stories to the stage. Notably in uniquely Australian tales set during World War I and a searing reportage-based production tackling rape culture. There is often a lyrical quality to Turner's writing that suits the historical dramas even with their sense of doom and glimpses of impending horror. Project Xan, however, grabbed you by the throat and demanded you bear witness.

Highlights: The Dreaming Hill; The Lighthouse Girl; Project Xan

Tiffany Barton

The aspect I respect most about Barton's writing is the no holds barred, in your face approach. She illuminates extreme characters and behaviours with a forthrightness and honesty that you simply can't look away from. There is no guile or ego here. It may be blunt, it may shock, but it makes for riveting drama.

Highlights: Metalhead; Diva 

Noel O'Neill

To say O'Neill is prolific would be an understatement. He seems to have at least two to three of his plays being performed every year and is a fixture in the community theatre scene. His comedies are so popular he has even turned two of them into franchises. But it's his dramas that most impress.

Highlights: Under Any Old Gum Tree; Holly & Ivy; It's All Greek To Me

Izaak Lim & Nick Maclaine

Specialists in a certain type of cabaret show - take a musical theatre icon from the past and weave a tale about their life story while incorporating their most memorable songs. It's a winning formula that has seen entertaining explorations of Cole Porter and, I confess, someone I did not know much about beforehand, Dorothy Fields.

Highlights: You've Got That Thing!; Exactly Like You: The Magic of Dorothy Fields

Thomas Owen, Cal Silberstein & Jackson Griggs

Emerging from the UWA theatre scene this trio has been tackling that most difficult of beasts, the fully fledged musical with Owen and Silberstein on book and lyrics; Griggs composing the music. The first effort I saw was promising though perhaps trying a little too hard to impress while the followup was one of my favourites from 2016's Fringe World.

Highlights: How We Ruined MacArthur's Markers; Viva La Restoration

Gita Bezard

Another member of The Last Great Hunt, Bezard's writing has a lighter comic touch, oftentimes playing with farce and the exaggerations/preoccupations of youth. Even her most provocative play featured four female teenagers that are literally in a playpen.

Highlights: In A Bony Embrace; Girl Shut Your Mouth; The Talk

Petits Fours - WAAPA (19 June 2017)

An eclectic quartet of bite-sized theatrical treats ranging from political satire (The Election) to an exploration of film set dynamics (Remarkable), amusing canine empowerment (The Emancipation of Alice Paws) and lastly, arthouse portrait of a hedonistic artist (Self Portrait, Masturbating).

All written by local playwrights, in order, Finn O'Branagain, Gita Bezard, Chris Isaacs, and Hellie Turner and directed by Julia Jarel, Nicole Stinton, Trudy Dunn, and Susie Conte respectively.

My pick was Remarkable which started off as a pisstake of the egos one might find on a film set (of a hilariously poorly written script) but turned into a most interesting commentary on the depiction of sex, nudity and violence and, critically, the ways male filmmakers pressure actresses into doing their bidding for less than altruistic motives. A fascinating angle emerged around who was portrayed as complicit in this. Unsettling and perceptive.

Performances were uniformly strong throughout all four plays but my picks from each - Lily Stewart as the kinetic emcee of The Election; William Bartolo as the writer-director in Remarkable whose character initially seemed innocuous/pompous enough until darker motivations emerged; Shannon Ryan in a fine physical performance as the mouthy pooch in The Emancipation of Alice Paws; and Thomas Jackson as the outraged and conflicted Oskar in Self Portrait, Masturbating.

Good to see so many of the 3rd year MT students in the audience on their night off from 42nd Street supporting their acting colleagues. 

*originally published at facebook.com/perththeatrereviews

The Lighthouse Girl - Black Swan State Theatre Company (4 May 2017)

Playwright Hellie Turner revisits familiar territory after 2015's WAYTCo commissioned production of The Dreaming Hill for the 100 year anniversary of the Gallipoli landings.

Daisy Coyle played a nurse in that production and has since appeared as the lead in another of Turner's plays, last year's explosive Project Xan and now as Fay Howe in The Lighthouse Girl.

She is terrific here in a dual coming of age story - that of the eponymous character and of Australia itself as innocence gives way to the 'baptism of fire' on the shores of Gallipoli and the harsh realities of war writ both large and personal.

Just as in Project Xan, Coyle projects a radiant innocence and decency that is compelling. Clearly, writer and actor have gelled creatively and it will be interesting to see what may come in future endeavours.

Coyle is joined by a crack cast of newcomers and stage veterans. The play itself feels very much a throwback to old-fashioned storytelling with its own guileless charms. We know what awaits the troops steaming off to war and portents of doom are therefore flickering beats instead of heavy-handed assaults.

The characters represent aspects of the Australia of its day. Coyle and Murray Dowsett (as the gammy legged Joe Taylor) are innocence personified, the latter with a good willed Ocker sense of humour but with a touch of wisdom as befits the older pre-war generation.

Giuseppe Rotondella and Will McNeill are the larrikin spirit of the young country; two outback tearaways off to see the world and chase adventure as they sign up for war. Their chemistry is excellent, forged over the last three years together at WAAPA.

Then there's Benj D'Addario as the widowed father of Fay and Alex Malone, the older sister of McNeill's Jim Finch. They serve important functions as the voices of concern and reason (in the former's case from hard won experience) which grounds the other two strands.

The ending is well executed as 'growing pains' turn to inevitable tragedy but mostly this is a gentle and good-natured tale driven by an immensely likable central performance.

The Dreaming Hill - Western Australian Youth Theatre Company & Southern Edge Arts (15 April 2015)

One hundred years ago our youth were asked to fight a terrible war far beyond our shores at immeasurable cost - soldiers as young as 14 died on the Gallipoli Peninsula and later on the fields of France and Belgium. In this centenary year, a year that will see many commemorations to honour the deeds of those men and women who served both at home and abroad, it is particularly fitting that the Western Australian Youth Theatre Company (WAYTCo) in partnership with Southern Edge Arts commissioned this original play. Written by Hellie Turner, The Dreaming Hill explores the day before that fateful landing on 25 April 1915.

The cast of predominantly teenagers from both companies - including a 14 and 15 year old – was a powerful reminder that in another age these were the very people who served our country as soldiers and nurses in the chaos of ‘the war to end all wars’. The tragedy of what followed was captured eloquently in a line delivered by a Greek fisherman to a young Australian serviceman – “only dead men see an end to war.” The fact that we still put young men and women in harm’s way to this very day illustrates the point. The clear message was to us as an audience, as a community and as a country to never forget the cost exacted to protect our freedoms. 

The play follows five Australian diggers and four nurses with their Matron as they spend a last day on the Greek island of Lemnos before the amphibious assault. They encounter various locals including the aforementioned fisherman, Spyros (Luke Binetti); a good-natured shyster, Ascesto (Lachlan McGregor), who promises girls, grog and garlic while protecting the honour of his beautiful sister Phoebe (Liannah Prior); with a haughty ‘witch’ (Zali Stipanicev) thrown in for good measure. There are portents of impending doom from the flock of crows that fly overhead to a speech by Spyros about chaos. For the lads though there is a mix of excitement, apprehension, and naivety which is beautifully counterpointed by the nurses who know (and have trained for) the deadly ramifications of what is about to come. The hospital ship that they will shortly return to is another potent symbol by its very presence offshore.

The script by Turner is lyrical and poetic with one of the soldiers, Leo (Campbell Greenock) himself a ‘philosopher-warrior’ quoting Shakespeare, reciting his own attempts at poetry, and having conversations with Spyros about Homer’s The Illiad. The beauty of the island and its people is nicely conveyed as is all the exuberance and impetuousness of youth. But the script never loses sight of what is to come with references to Death, Chaos and symbolism like The Ferryman intruding. In the most powerful sequence, the fragile romance and tenderness on display at the end of the party is torn apart by a flash forward to only a few hours hence with sickening detail. It is wonderful piece of theatre as we have come to identify and even care about these characters only to have their possible futures blown apart before our eyes. Equally impressive is the company intoning each of their character’s fate on the day and beyond in a chilling postscript.

The acting is very strong across the board – from the innocent flirtatiousness of the nurses played by Daisy Coyle, Mikayla Merks and Tahlia Norrish to the over-exaggerated accent of the New Zealand nurse (Michaela Barker) used for comic relief. Tess McKenna reins in their antics as the stern Matron and is decisive and calm as the glimpse of battle shows us the grim reality of war.

Greenock opens the play by walking onto the impressive outdoor set as a modern day teenager before stripping down and changing into his uniform. It was a potent message – what would it be like to step into their shoes given all we now know. He gave a well measured performance that grounded the more poetic elements within the context of the horror to come. He has a particularly fine moment with a rallying speech towards the end of the play exhorting the men to “go forth” as the time of battle draws ever nearer. The only slight drawback was the string of lights in front of him that had lowered for part of the party sequence that cast shadows over and partly obscured his face from my vantage point. 

Liam Longley’s and Thomas Blowffwitch’s characters both try their luck with romance, Longley to sweet effect; Blowffwitch’s to amusing reversal. Andrew Phillips was a stout physical presence as Frank which made sense on reading the program notes to see he has served with the Australian Army – his bearing and demeanour was perfect for the character. While not as accomplished, Austen Faulkner’s Harry was the decent kid from Fremantle out of his depth in both war and love but had some nice moments all the same.

 

The standouts for me were Binetti and McGregor, the former working well with Greenock as they discussed Aristotle and Homer and the nature of war and chaos. Binetti has that intangible quality that makes him eminently watchable even when prowling on the outskirts of the set. McGregor, on crutches no less after breaking his ankle a fortnight ago, was sly and mischievous, providing a lot of humour to lighten the stark knowledge of these people’s likely fate.

Director Renato Fabretti makes full use of the set as his actors clamber over sandbag emplacements and literally feel the soil under their feet. There was a tendency in the party sequence, however, as soldiers and nurses paired off, for the actors not in whatever featured duo was talking, to be impassively waiting for ‘their turn’. Live music is provided for atmosphere to one side of what really is a thrust arrangement with the audience enclosing two sides of the courtyard at the Museum. External street noise was minimal and not too invasive, even from the movie playing on the big screen in the cultural centre.

Overall this was a wonderfully acted, evocatively written, and well directed play that looked at a brief moment of joy and discovery before being wrenched into the horrible reality of war. That it was performed by actors the very age of the men and women being portrayed gives it special significance and it is a thoughtful and powerful addition to the ANZAC canon.

Directed by Renato Fabretti, Written by Hellie Turner and starring Michaela Barker, Luke Binetti, Thomas Blowffwitch, Daisy Coyle, Austen Faulkner, Campbell Greenock, Liam Longley, Lachlan McGregor, Tess McKenna, Mikayla Merks, Tahlia Norrish, Andrew Phillips, Liannah Prior, Sam Reeves and Zali Stipanicev, The Dreaming Hill runs until 18 April in the WA Museum courtyard before moving to the Albany Museum 23-26 April.