PURE GENIUS - The Geoffrey Tozer Story - Palace Electric Cinema

 

Produced and directed by Raymond Hoefer and Peter Wyllie Johnston.

Cinematography by Raymond Hoefer and Oscar Nastri – Edited by Raymond Hoefer

Script by Peter Wyllie Johnston – Sound by Raymond Hoefer

Music selection and supervision by Peter Wyllie Johnston.

Presented by Hofland Music and The Estate of Geoffrey Tozer

Palace Electric Cinemas – 10^th March, 2026. Reviewed by BILL STEPHENS.

Memories of Paul Keating and Geoffrey Tozer spending quiet Saturday afternoons over coffee in The School of Arts Café planning renovations for the conversion of the Queanbeyan Convent into a conservatorium, were revived by an invitation to attend the Australian premiere screening of a new documentary film “Pure Genius - The Geoffrey Tozer Story”.

There is little doubt that Geoffrey Tozer was a musical genius, but to many Canberrans, he was best known as a part-time music teacher at St. Edmunds College.

Paul Keating's son was attending St. Edmunds in 1987, and it was then that the-soon-to-become Prime Minister first became aware of Tozer, when he saw him performing in a school concert. .

Captivated by Tozer’s extraordinary musical abilities, Keating became his champion, making it his business to ensure that such musical genius would not go unrecognised.

Geoffrey Tozer and Paul Keating.

In musical circles, Tozer was already celebrated as a pianist of exceptional ability having made his professional debut at the age of eight, playing Bach’s Concerto in F Minor on ABC national television.

In 1968 he became the world’s youngest ever recipient of a Churchill Fellowship, the first of two he would receive during his career, and had already given over forty concerto performances in Australia.

By age fourteen, Tozer was competing in piano competitions overseas becoming a semi-finalist in the Leeds Piano Competition in 1969, winning First Prize in the Royal Overseas League in London and First Prize in the Alex de Vries Piano Competition in Belgium, both in 1970.

Also in 1970, Tozer was presented to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth 11 and made his debut at the Albert Hall playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto in B Flat No 15 K450 with the BBC Symphony under Sir Colin Davis.

By age eighteen, in 1973, Tozer was a semi-finalist in the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in the United States, including among the pieces he played, his own composition; Aboriginal Sunrise.

That same year Tozer was awarded a second Churchill Fellowship, and in 1974 became the first Australian concert pianist to tour Asia under the auspices of Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Musical Viva, with performances in Japan, the Philippines, South Korea, Thailand and Singapore.

Under Keating’s auspices, Tozer’s International career continued to flourish, and it was Keating who in 1991 secured him a record contract with Chandos, allowing him to cement his position as one of the world’s leading concert pianists.

With Chandos Tozer recorded 34 CDs, receiving a 1993 Grammy Award nomination for his recordings of the complete concertos of Nikolai Medtner recorded with the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

But in 2009, Tozer died tragically, alone and penniless, leaving behind a vast catalogue including 150 compositions, musical diaries and performance notes, both published and unpublished. There are more than a thousand audio and film recordings of his performances from around the world; and more than forty commercial releases on Chandos and other labels, in archives in Australia and more than twenty other countries, most notably in Berlin where the Akademie der Künste has established the Geoffrey Tozer Archive.  

“Pure Genius – The Geoffrey Tozer Story”, produced and scripted by the executor of Tozer’s estate, Peter Wyllie Johnston, together with Raymond Hoefer, who is also responsible for the sound, focusses on Tozer’s massive musical achievements both in Australia and internationally.

The film is an homage to Tozer’s musical genius and a treasury for music lovers, preserving excerpts from fifty musical performances by Tozer. Among them, his historic 1982 performances filmed at the Sydney Opera House; his Hungarian debut in the Vigado Concert Hall in Budapest in 1987, and film of him in China becoming the first Western pianist to perform the famous Yellow River Concerto with the Xiamen Philharmonic Orchestra televised to an audience estimated at more than eighty million.  

Narrated by actor, Colin McPhillamy, the film includes cameo appearances by Hazel Hawke and Jill Goodall, with interviews with friends, colleagues and supporters who had close associations with Tozer, including Paul Keating, Patricia Conolly, Pamela Freeman, Ross Gengos, Imogen Burley and Judith Dowson who recalls her last day with Tozer when she flew from Perth to be with him in 2009.

 Geoffrey Tozer was just 54 when he died, following an extraordinary career in which he had travelled the world between 1963 and 2009, giving more than 2,500 performances in five continents. Yet despite attracting the patronage of eminent people he died alone and penniless under tragic circumstances.

“Pure Genius – The Geoffrey Tozer Story”, pays scant attention to the circumstances surrounding Tozer’s death, preferring to focus on Tozer’s many triumphs and musical accomplishments.

The suggestion that his demise was brought about by mismanagement and ill-treatment by the musical establishment, inevitably raises questions as to the nature of these circumstances.

Some answers are offered in a previous documentary “The Eulogy”, which focuses on the eulogy given by Paul Keating at Tozer’s funeral, currently available on streaming platforms, while a comprehensive biography by Peter Wyllie Johnston is scheduled for publication in 2027.  

Following its Canberra showing, “Pure Genius – The Geoffrey Tozer Story” is expected to be seen in all major Australian film festivals, as well as overseas film festivals, beginning with the Sydney Film Festival in June, followed by art house cinema release around Australian and overseas.  

     This review also published in AUSTRALIAN ARTS REVIEW. www.artsreview.com.au

 

MY BRILLIANT CAREER

A new musical based on the novel by Miles Franklin. Directed by Anne-Louise Sarks. Musical director Victoria Falconer. Choreographer Amy Campbell. Melbourne Theatre Company. Canberra Theatre, Canberra Theatre Centre. March 7-15.

My Brilliant Career is a long show with a grand vision and thanks in very great part to the almost never off the stage performance of Kala Gare as Sybylla Melvyn it certainly has impact. This Sybylla is very hard to ignore.

Not that the other performers are slouches. There are heaps of tightly observed characters in this world created originally in Miles Franklin’s 1901 novel and the show is teeming with arrogant squatters and horrible children and long suffering wives and people going broke.  Everyone’s on the verge of losing the lot. They comment on the out of work blokes drifting by, casualties of forces they cannot control.

Some may take issue with the modern perceptions and the anachronisms in the costuming but there’s an energy that never flags. Everyone appears to play a musical instrument, even the techies are roped in to do the occasional bit of performance.  There’s agreeable songs but they don’t particularly stick in the memory.

Sybylla doesn’t have too many choices. It’s a bit like Jane Eyre. When things get tough on the family farm in Possum Gully she’s sent off to affluent relatives to be groomed for and tested in the marriage market. At least she’s a reader and has picked up some piano skills. When her relatives run into financial troubles she’s packed off to be a governess to the huge and horrible McSwat tribe, a family who have no elegance nor learning whatsoever.

The handsome and charming Harry (Raj Labade) is certainly an attraction but the compromises might prove too much for her need for independence.

It’s all a bit of a surface take on a novel that has quite a bit more to say about the strictures on women and the general nature of Australian society at the turn of the 20th century. The show has reflective moments but sometimes seems more interested in how many ways the central piano can be climbed over. And the occasional sense that the central character is aware of a future where things might improve for a young woman blunts the anger.

The performers, with Gare’s rambunctious performance leading the way, do a good job with a big range of roles. But you might want to go and read the novel. What’s missing here is that anger and a certain fire that sits in Miles Franklin’s voice.

 

Alanna Maclean 

ORFEO ADELAIDE FESTIVAL 2026

Ensemble Pygmalion. Photo Frank Montagne

 

Orfeo . 

Composer Luigi Rossi. Libretto by Francesco Buti. Conductor Raphael Pichon. Pygmalion choir and orchestra.  Adelaide Town Hall. Adelaide Festival. March 4 and 6 2026

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

Luigi  Rossi’s 17^th century opera Orfeo with libretto by Francesco Buti received a rapturous  ovation in a concert performance in Adelaide’s stately Town Hall. The fact that the opera was performed without the embellishment of a full scale production did nothing to diminish the sheer power and passion of Ensemble Pygmalion’s performance under the baton of the company’s founder Raphael Pichon. Singers and orchestra were unparalleled in their performance. The fact that it was a concert offering with minimal action and unpretentious modern day costuming heightened my appreciation of the opera and the unique period instrumentation. Although written almost four hundred years ago, Ensemble Pygmalion’s performance was both contemporary and relevant to our time. Rossi’s Orfeo was no museum piece in spite of its baroque composition and 17^th century period instruments which lent an unique authenticity to the performance. The singing by the principals and the chorus accentuated the drama of the fateful myth of Orpheus (Xenia Puskarz Thomas) and his beloved Euridyce (Julie Roset)

The opera opens on Euridyce’s wedding day to Orpheus. The couple are warned of bad omens but ignore the warnings and continue with the wedding much to the dismay of Aristaeus (Blandine de Sansal) who is desirous of Euridyce. He seeks the help of Venus (Camille Chopin)) to prevent the union. Venus uses deception to manipulate events and cause the ensuing tragedy. During a dance, Eurydice is bitten by a serpent and rejects any help. She dies in Orpheus’s arms and descends to Hades. Grief stricken, Orpheus implores the Fates (Laurence Kilsby, Rene Ramos Premier, Renau Bres) for help and they grant him the permission to descend and find his beloved Euridyce. In Hades, Orpheus soothes the King of the Underworld Pluto (Alex with his voice and is allowed to take Euridyce back to the earthly world. However, he must not look back or Euridyce will die and remain eternally in the Underworld. As they ascend, Euridyce takes hold of Orpheus who turns to her face and once again she dies in his arms, leaving him to bear the enormous burden of grief. The opera ends with Orpheus alone pleading with Death to let him die with his bride.

The first modern revival of Orfeo was not until 1976 in Belfast and it received its first production in Italy at La Scala in 1982. It is difficult to believe that a work so beautifully composed and orchestrated should have taken three hundred years to gain the reputation it so richly deserves. Ensemble Pygmalion has breathed life into Rossi’s remarkably relevant work and Pinchon’s mercurial interpretation lends the work an immediacy that is exciting and emotionally powerful. His use of instruments of the period such as the harpsichord, the harp, the Fagotto and the theorbos complement along with the traditional violins, violas guitas, organ and double bass an aural landscape of emotional diversity. Love, loyalty, deception,, jealousy, fate and power are  all players in this destiny of the lovers.

Rossi has written the roles of Orpheus and Aristaeus for castrato. Mezzo soprano Xenia Puzkar Thomas strikes the heart with her powerful display of grief. There is a touch of style and sophistication in her white pants suit that lends grace to her performance. Blandine Sansal’s Aristaeus sings with a despairing passion that paints her as a victim of her own weakness. Soprano Julie Roset, dressed in red, personifies sweet innocence. It is a tender performance totally befitting her naivety. There are fine performances from the other characters in this dramatic tragedy. Bass Alex Rosen fills the town hall with the power of Pluto’s authority. The real strength of the performances in this straightforward enactment of Rossi’s and Buti’s opera is Pinchon’s attention to characterization. Orfeo is Shakespearian in its scope, embracing the dark emotions of the human psyche as well as the moments of comedy that are unexpected. There are whimsical touches in the costuming and a cheeky absurdity in the portrayal of the old woman, Vecchia (Dominique Visse)

Though Ensemble Pygmalion’s performance of Orfeo may be considered minimalist in the Adelaide Town Hall setting, this is a work that still resonates through the ages. The themes are universal, the travails of life and death, the fears and the dreams that rule our destiny. Under Pinchon’s baton Rossi’s Orfeo is exceptionally innovative, bridging as it does the Italian and French traditions. It is because of this influence that we can be still surprised by the emotional shifts and variations as the characters love, suffer and die. On a narrow stage Ensemble Pygmalion’s performance  is highly dramatic and at other times, gentle and tender as in the Act 1 duet between Orpheus and Euridyce. Singers, orchestra and choir create a musical landscape of such passion and humanity that we are swayed by the myth and Pinchon’s magical interpretation of Rossi’s centuries old work.

It is a privilege to be introduced to this work, performed so magnificently by singers and musicians of extraordinary talent and insight. Pinchon’s conducting is playful and liberating. He inspires exceptional originality in the playing and in the performances of his principal artists and the choir, who at one point sing from the balcony, surprising, delighting and filling the auditorium with the thrill of the performance.

Originally, the opera was staged with huge scenery and complete operatic spectacle. I found myself fully immersed in the passion and the performance in concert with only the musicians and the singers to make Orfeo an unforgettable highlight of the Adelaide Festival.

Photos by Claudio Raschella

Orfeo Programme. af26-show-programs-pygmalion-orfeo-fv.pdf

MY BRILLIANT CAREER - The Canberra Theatre

 

Kara Gare as Sybylla Melvyn in Melbourne Theatre Company's production of 
 My Brilliant Career.

Book: Sheridan Harbridge & Dean Bryant – Lyrics: Dean Bryant – Music: Mathew Frank

Director: Anne Louise Sarks – Musical Director: Victoria Falconer

Choreographer: Amy Campbell – Set & Costume Designer: Marg Horwell

Lighting Designer: Matt Scott – Sound Designer: Joy Weng

Presented by Melbourne Theatre Company – Canberra Theatre - 7 to 15^th March 2026

Opening Night performance on March 8^th reviewed by BILL STEPHENS

Kala Gare as Sybylla Melvyn in My Brilliant Career.

How appropriate that Canberra be the first city outside Melbourne to experience performances of this joyous, much-lauded new musical since its Melbourne premiere in 2024, given that in the main street of nearby Queanbeyan is a plaque honouring Miles Franklin whose 1901 novel provided the inspiration for this musical and who lived much of her life in this district.

Happily, it is obvious from the moment the cast of Melbourne Theatre Company’s audacious musical adaptation of My Brilliant Career take the stage, it is clear that they, and the creative team, not only understand Miles Franklin’s fiercely independent heroine, but relish her contradictions.

Sheridan Harbridge and Dean Bryant’s book and lyrics, and Mathew Frank’s music brim with vitality, wit, and a distinctly Australian sense of place. 

Drew Livingston - Cameron Bajraktarevic-Hayward -Kala Gare - Victoria Falconer - Raj Labade in My Brilliant Career 

 The restless energy of Sybylla Melvyn is captured in an extraordinary central performance by Kala Gare that is as mercurial as it is magnetic. Her command of the stage is remarkable, often addressing the audience directly, one moment tossing of a sardonic quip, the next revealing a flash of vulnerability that makes her journey all the more compelling.

Gare is supported by the original multi-skilled ensemble cast who all play musical instruments, perform Amy Campbell’s clever evocative choreography, as well as bring to life, the multitude of diverse characters who inhabit Sybylla’s world over the years.

Directed with an un-erring eye for visual interest and performance possibilities by Anne Louise Sarks, Raj Labade earned sighs as Harold Beecham, the romantic suitor who almost succeeds in persuading Sybylla to abandon her life’s priorities.

Kala Gare (Sybylla Melvyn) - Raj Labade (Harold Beecham) in My Brilliant Career.

Drew Livingstone, Cameron Bajraktarevic-Hayward, Ana Mitsikas, Christina O’Neill, Jarrad Payne, Melanie Bird, (replacing original cast member HaNy Lee) as well as musical director, Victoria Falconer, who moves through the show as an ethereal, non-verbal musical muse underlining nuances and heralding changes of mood with her violin, all contribute captivating characterisations, except perhaps for the McSwats , who, while entertaining, definitely belong in cartoon-land.   

Visually, the staging is a delight. Marg Horwell, aided by Matt Scott’s painterly lighting design, cleverly conjures up dusty expanses of the bush, elaborate mansions and ballrooms with a set that shifts seamlessly between pastoral beauty and the claustrophobia of small-town life. Her costumes are equally imaginative, allowing the storytelling to move through years without the need for the actors to leave the stage for costume changes.

Similarly, the tapestry of lilting folk-infused melodies and punchy ensemble numbers that make up Mathew Frank’s tuneful score, together with Dean Bryrant’s perceptive lyrics propel the story forward without ever feeling forced. Particularly memorable are “In the Wrong Key” in which Sybylla pinpoints her own personality and “Prince of a Girl”, her father’s perceptive description of his daughter.

What impresses most is the production’s tonal balance. It honours Franklin’ s century old text, while speaking directly to a contemporary audience, never shying away from the grit beneath the romance. The humour is sharp, the pacing brisk, and the emotional beats land with satisfying precision.

In short, My Brilliant Career is a joyous, intelligent, and deeply Australian musical that celebrates self-determination without sentimentality. It’s the kind of theatre that leaves you walking a little taller, and perhaps like Sybylla herself, a little more determined to write your own story.

Fresh from a sold-out revival season in Melbourne and following its Canberra season, My Brilliant Career moves on to seasons in Sydney (Mar. 21 – April 26) and Wollongong (May 8 – 17).  If it comes your way, don’t miss it.

Karla Gare in My Brilliant Career.

                                                             Photos by Pia Johnson 

   This review also published in AUSTRALIAN ARTS REVIEW. www.artsreview.com.au

MY BRILLIANT CAREER

 

Book by Sheridan Harbridge & Dean Bryant

Music by Mathew Frank, Lyrics by Dean Bryant

Directed by Anne-Louise Sarks

Melbourne Theatre Company production

Canberra theatre Centre, Canberra Theatre to 15 March

 

Reviewed by Len Power 8 March 2026

 

Miles Franklin’s much-loved 1901 book, My Brilliant Career, became a deserved success as a movie in 1979. Could lightning strike twice with this new musical staging of the story? The answer is a resounding ‘Yes’!

The story focuses on a young woman, Sybylla Melvin, in rural Australia in the late 19^th century whose aspiration to become a writer is at odds with society’s expectations of a woman at that time.

The cast of 10 create a series of vivid country characters and, when they’re not acting, they’re the musicians as well! With the band onstage throughout and part of the action, it’s like being at a bush concert with a story. Marg Horwell’s clever set design suggests the time and locations and her costume design adds period colour to the actors’ characterizations.

Kala Gare (Sybylla)

Outstanding in the Melbourne Theatre Company cast is Kala Gare in the central role of Sybylla. From the beginning, Gare draws the audience in with her energetic, brash, funny and deeply sensitive performance as this young woman. She sings superbly and dances like a whirlwind.

Kala Gare (Sybylla) and cast members

The other cast members play multiple roles. There is particularly fine work by Raj Labade as Harry, the man who wants to marry Sybylla, Drew Livingstone as Father and Jay-Jay, Ana Mitsikas as Grannie and Christina O’Neill as Mother and Helen. Melanie Bird, Lincoln Elliott, Cameron Bajraktarevic-Hayward, Victoria Falconer and Jarrad Payne also give vivid characterizations.

Kala Gare (Sybylla)

Mathew Frank, music, and Dean Bryant, lyrics, have produced a rousing score that blends contemporary pop, bush ballad and raucous pub rock. There are several memorable songs including, This Piano, Turn Away From The Mirror, I Will Wait With You and Someone Like Me. The whole cast play and sing this appealing musical score very well.

Expertly directed by Anne-Louise Sarks, this is a magical show that offers everything that a good musical should. The music lifts the story to another level emotionally, while the cast offer striking performances in this strong, well-presented story with an atmospheric setting.

 

Photos by Pia Johnson

This review was first published by Canberra CityNews digital edition on 9 March 2026.

Len Power's reviews are also broadcast on Artsound FM 92.7 in the ‘Arts Cafe’ and ‘Arts About’ programs and published in his blog 'Just Power Writing' at https://justpowerwriting.blogspot.com/.

 

My Brilliant Career - Melbourne Theatre Company

 

 My Brilliant Career, adapted as a musical from the novel by Miles Franklin.  Melbourne Theatre Company at Canberra Theatre Centre, 7 – 15 March, 2026

Reviewed by Frank McKone
Opening Night March 8

CREATIVES
Director Anne-Louise Sarks
Musical Director / Additional Music Arrangements Victoria Falconer
Choreographer Amy Campbell
Set & Costume Designer Marg Horwell
Lighting Designer Matt Scott
Orchestrator / Vocal Arranger James Simpson
Sound Designer Joy Weng
Associate Director Miranda Middleton
Associate Set & Costume Designer Savanna Wegman
Assistant Musical Director Drew Livingston

CAST (alphabetical order – Collective Ensemble)
Cameron Bajraktarevic-Hayward; Melanie Bird; Lincoln Elliott
Victoria Falconer; Kala Gare; Jack Green; Raj Labade; Drew Livingston
Meg McKibbin; Ana Mitsikas; Christina O’Neill; Jarrad Payne

Key acting roles:
Kala Gare as the protagonist Sybylla Melvyn. The ensemble includes Raj Labade (Harry/Peter), Drew Livingston (Father/Uncle Jay-Jay/M’Swat), Ana Mitsikas (Grannie/Rose Jane), and Christina O'Neill (Mother/Aunt Helen/Mrs M'Swat)


The very best theatre happens when the source material is emotionally honest and the writers, directors, designers, choreographers, musicians and actors create an original way to present on stage a work both thoroughly entertaining and true to its source.

This adaptation of Miles Franklin’s My Brilliant Career as music theatre by Melbourne Theatre Company is a wonderful example.  It takes Franklin’s understanding of herself as a woman growing up in 1899, making it available for our young generation in the 21st Century through music, song and dance as the story which Sybylla Melvyn tells us is “about – me!”

In this way, Sybylla – in effect the young Miles Franklin – takes us into her confidence.  As her mother shows her, to see herself in a mirror is to see her external attributes; but it does not reveal her real self.  

Entirely appropriately for our modern concerns about, for example, the destructive effects – especially in girls and young women – of the misuse of imagery on internet social platforms, Sybylla’s search for how to find and, for herself, how to become “someone like me” – very often generating shout out loud comedy – creates for us empathetic depth.  We feel for Sybylla, for Miles, for ourselves as we react to and reflect on their experiences, and so by a kind of osmosis understanding grows.

While writing the original My Brilliant Career, Miles Franklin was what we know nowadays as a young adult, just turning 21 as her first novel was published.  Opening night at the musical was full of cheers and whistles, and sighs – not only from the young, though I admit as an octogenarian I only clapped in admiration – standing with everyone for the final ovation.  

To achieve such great theatre, all the performers work as an extraordinary ensemble company, playing out all the characters over time as musicians, dancers, singers, mimes and actors with such precision, in itself a powerful reason to not miss My Brilliant Career – the Musical.

Though, as Sybylla insists, her story will not be a romance, and has no plot, I think it is fair to say that the performances by Kala Gare and Raj Labade as Sybylla and Harry are especially memorable.

It’s exciting to watch; ironic humour abounds; thoughtful on social issues; and emotionally honest.

A brilliant career for Melbourne Theatre Company; a brilliant theatre experience here in Canberra.

Kala Gare as Sybylla 
My Brilliant Career - Melbourne Theatre Company 2026

MARY SAID WHAT MARY SAID ADELAIDE FESTIVAL 2026

  

Mary Said What She Said 

Directed by Robert Wilson. With Isabelle Huppert. Text by Darryl Pinckney.Music by Ludovico Einaudi. A production by Theatre de Ville-Paris. Festival Theatre. Adelaide Festival Centre. Adelaide Festival March 6-8 2026.

Credits.  Costumes by Jacques Reynaud. Associate director Charles Chemin. Associate set design. Annick Lavallee-Benny. Associate light design Xavier Baron. Associate costume design Pascale Paume.  Collaboration for Movement Fari Sarantani. Sound design Nick Sagar. Makeup design Sylvie Cailler. Hair design Jocelyne Milazzo. Translation from English Fabrice Scott.

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

Isabelle Huppert as Mary Stuart in
Mary Said What She Said

I open this review with a qualification. I do not speak French. I was seated in the fourth row of the Dress Circle, quite a distance away from Isabelle Huppert playing Mary Stuart Queen of Scotland and the Isles. I found it very difficult to read the fast surtitles although there was considerable repetition of historical facts and events and focus at the same time on Huppert’s remarkable performance. Perhaps like some I know I might have been less alienated in the stalls and more unconcerned with close attention to Pinckney’s text as it flashed across the screen.

Having said that,and occasionally choosing to escape the surtitles and focus entirely on the stage, Mary Said What She Said is an extraordinary production. That is hardly surprising given Robert Wilson’s legendary reputation as an experimental director of the avant-garde whose productions envelop the senses and infuse the intellect. Of course, with the legendary Isabelle Huppert as his Mary, Wilson is assured of a tour de force performance and for almost two hours Huppert commands the stage with a performance that galvanizes and commands complete immersion.

A plush red scalloped curtain hangs across the proscenium arch. In the centre of the curtain on a small screen is a film of a dog chasing its tail again and again. At times it stops, staring bewildered out towards the auditorium. And then it begins again, a premonition of what will come as Mary grapples with her demons, her history and her tragic fate. Throughout the performance Darryl Pinckney’s poetic translation is repeated time and time again, as though Mary is besieged by her thoughts, her fears and her unjust fate.

 

The curtain rises on the vast Festival Theatre stage. A silhouetted figure stands facing the steel blue lit cyclorama with a single light beaming out towards the audience. Wilson’s design is enigmatic, inviting an audience to seek meaning. The bright light appears celestial, a gateway to destiny. Ludovico Enaudi’s composition is tempestuous, overpowering as an omen of impending doom. It is operatic, underscoring the drama of the performance and the passion of the text.

Slowly, Huppert turns towards the audience.  Her white face comes into view, the lips part and Mary’s story unfolds in a monologue that tumbles from Mary’s mind, sometimes recounting the events of her life, sometimes confused, abused, betrayed, 

Darryl Pinckney’s text translation is relentless in its poetic account of Mary’s fated life. It is the rousing libretto to Einaudi’s soaring composition. We see Mary through a silhouetted figure against a light that leads her on away from this earthly realm. Her fate is assured. Her destiny still uncertain.

Huppert plays a woman possessed and obsessed. Born in 1542, Mary is crowned Queen of Scotland when she is only one year old. At fifteen she sails to France to be betrothed to the Dauphin and is accompanied by four maids all called Mary, as is Mary’s mother, the Dowager Queen. At the age of 15 Mary is married. What follows is a life of three marriages, plots, intrigue and murders and eventual imprisonment by Queen Elizabeth to prevent any uprising. For eighteen years she is kept in captivity until Elizabeth finally signs the death certificate. She is brutally beheaded in 1587, leaving behind her son James who will one day succeed to the English throne on the death of the Virgin Queen. It is Mary’s ultimate revenge from the grave.

On a bare stage, Huppert inhabits the vast space with magnetic control. Her voice is amplified creating a cavernous echo to her suffering, her betrayal by Mary Fleming and the loyalty of her best friend Mary Beton. Stillness gives her strength. The flailing arms and repetitive movements heighten the turmoil and the pain. Memories of love and happier times sway in her dancing. Huppert’s performance is remarkable. She is in every sense a queen. There is defiance and despair as she reiterates the events and the people that have brought her to her terrible fate.

Finally the flailing ends. The repetitive railing against her fate subsides. Huppert unveils a Mary now resigned to her fate, accepting of her imminent death. There is pause to reflect on Mary’s cruel fate. It is here in the final moments of the play that we may empathize. Huppert’s stylized performance of the fated historical figure is highly representational, a marionette of history’s destiny. Huppert is one possessed by the torments of the mind, an abstraction of her earthly fate. In Wilson’s stylized vision Mary Said What She Said reveals more poignantly the struggle for any woman to claim her rightful place in the world.

 

 

Isabelle Huppert is Mary Stuart in
Mary Said What She Said.

Perhaps this is the enlightenment that collaborative artists Wilson, Huppert, Pinckney and Einaudi have constructed and challenged the audience to see. It is for those who submit themselves to the search for the light to learn and understand what Mary said.He was due to appear and

Robert Wilson never lived to see Mary Said What She Said performed to standing ovations at this year’s Adelaide Festival. He died last year, leaving a legacy that will be a lasting inspiration to theatre makers the world over. Huppert’s performance as Mary Stuart in Mary Said What She Said is a shining testimony to Wilson’s gift to the theatre. The Adelaide Festival performance is a gift to audiences fortunate enough to see this trailblazing director’s work.

Photos by Lucie Jansch