SHORT AND SWEET 2019. A festival
of ten minute plays. Artistic Director Trevar Alan Chilver. The Courtyard Studio.
Canberra Theatre Centre. April 22 – May 4
2019
Reviewed by Peter Wilkins
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TrevarAlan Chilver. Artistic Director of Short and Sweet 2019
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Just one look at Short and Sweet
Festival director, bespectacled Trevar Alan Chilver with his long blonde shoulder length
hair over shoulders sporting a Sixties style Sports jacket reaching to a tartan
kilt and long white knee-length socks
stretching from laced up orange sneakers tells you that you are in for a quirky
night at the theatre.
It is ten years since the ten
minute play festival made its debut in Canberra, and since then aspiring
playwrights, directors and crew and performers have vied to win the prestigious
Best Production prize. Short and Sweet has become synonymous with community
spirit, laying out a banquet of surprises and delectable theatrical treats,
both sweet and sour. Comedy is the usual fare, most easily digested in the
short time to tickle the dramatic taste-buds.
I have come to the Gala Final,
for which nine short plays have been selected by judges to be performed in the
Canberra Theatre Centre’s Courtyard Studio. The foyer is packed with excited
supporters, and inside a full house peruses their voting slips before Chilver
introduces a night of variety and fun.
There is no time to waste. The
scene is quickly set, the characters rapidly established and embarked upon
their short journey and the climax is reached in a final moment of absolute
surprise. The writing may be variable. So too the stories. And the quality of
the acting can depend on the experience and talent of the performer under the
director’s guidance. What is constant, however, is the commitment and the
enthusiasm. And, as Chilver said, “If you don’t like the piece, you only have
eight minutes to wait before the next one. True. The night can never get
boring.
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Brendan Kelly and Jess Waterhouse in
Fallout by Greg
Gould
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The tenth anniversary Final had
enough corkscrew twists and turns to keep you guessing. Fallout, written and directed by Greg Gould with excellent
performances from Jess Waterhouse, Brendan Kelly, Kirsty Budding and Dec
Hastings set the bar high, but the Armageddon Bunker survival setting for the
play let cliché invade a tightly written and well-acted script. Maybe that is
why the play skipped the judge’s favour.
Interestingly enough, local
plays, Gould’s Fallout, Judith
Peterson’s The Invisible Hitman with
Peterson and Nigel Palfreman, and Lyn Peterson’ s interactive role play as
Maude, Why Would You Bury Your Underwear,
supported by Short and Sweet veteran Helen Way were the only locally written
works in the Final. The final six plays were written by English and American
writers. Perhaps, without appearing parochial, this is a matter for debate?
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Ryan Erlindsen, Helen Way and Heath Keighran
in Joe Bergin’s Once
Upon A Time
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Competition will always imply
winners and losers. I am no fan of competition where the playing field does not
appear level, and perhaps Short and Sweet Canberra, recognizably a highly
popular and successful community theatre festival is more to be lauded for its
inclusion than for its awards
The best was saved for last. The
People’s Choice was awarded to a very clever
variation on the Jack and Jill and Simple Simon Nursery rhymes. Once Upon A Time by Irish writer, Joe
Bergin, lurched the nursery rhyme characters into a real world off stage reality.
Directed by Adam Skillicorn, this was a piece that caught the imaginations of
an audience willing to be surprised and amused by a quirky twist to an old
tale. Skillicorn was helped by three fine performances by Ryan Erlandsen, Helen
Way and Heath Keighran.
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Amy Crawford and Mali Haddell in
Vicki Connerty’s The
Snow Angel of Antarctica
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But it was Number 9 and the final
play of the night that rightfully raked in the awards for British writer, Vicki
Connerty, director, Lyn Petersen and actors Marli Haddeill and Amy Crawford with
The Snow Angel of Antarctica, voted Best
Production of Short and Sweet 2019. Billed as “a tale with a twist about sibling
rivalry, Scrabble and Snow Angels, The
Snow Angel of Antarctica is a beautifully crafted ten minute play that
explores human interaction, the effect of loss and the tenacious clinging to a
dream. This is a work that touches the heart, funny and sad, that skirts the
threat of cliché and opens audiences to the intellectual and emotional experience
– in a mere ten minutes! Singular awards
for The Snow Angel of America went to Best writer Connerty, Best established Short
and Sweet actor, Crawford and best emerging Short and Sweet actor, Haddeill,.
Additional Awards went to Rachel
Hogan for her direction of Virgin by American William Orem, Helen Way for her
prolific participation over the past ten years and Adam Salter, long time
supporter and director of the second Short and Sweet Festival in Canberra.
The Gala Final of Short and Sweet
2019 is more than a showcase of the best works by writers of ten minute plays
and local directors, performers and creatives. It is an expression of the
passion and dedication shown by all participants who invest their time, energy
and talent in a festival that offers the opportunity to be part of a community
that cares about theatre and their society. Three time Artistic Director
Trevar Chilver leaves for Victoria and a new director will be shortly
announced. He leaves a festival that thrives and demonstrates a vibrancy
amongst the alternative theatre community. It is Adam Skillicorn who is left to
utter the final words , “Give it a go!”
