BOMBSHELLS

 

 

Bombshells by Joanna Murray Smith.

Directed by Jordan Best.Stage Manager Brittany Myers. Lighting designer Jacob Aquilino. Set/props designer Roz Hall. Costume designer Jens Nordsrom. Sound design Jordan Best. Musical arrangements and recordings and vocal coaching Andrew Hackwill and Lisa Keen. Choreography Jenna Roberts and Lainie Hart. Additional music William Best and Jordan Best. Production photography Photox- Canberra Photography Services. Echo Theatre. The Q Theatre Queanbeyan Performing Arts Centre. July 18 – 27 2024. Bookings: 02 6285 6290.

Re4viewed by Peter Wilkins

Amy Kowalczuk as Meryl in Bombshells

Take a playwright of the calibre of Joanna Murray Smith and six of the local region’s finest female performers and you have a performance of Murray Smith’s Bombshells that is second to none. Echo Theatre’s production is a blast of magnificent writing brought to life by six highly idiosyncratic and exquisitely defined performances under the sure direction of a director who intuitively understands Murray Smith’s comment on the experiences faced by her characters.

Kate Harris as Tiggy 

The play consists of six beautifully written monologues, performed by six very different women . Amy Kowalczuk plays the fraught mother, plagued by guilt and desperately trying to fulfil her role as mother of three and wife to Barry. This is a finely nuanced performance probing the depths of Meryl’s anxiety and frustration. Kowalczuk’s performance is achingly real, reverberating with the experience of every mother faced with the challenges of motherhood. It is in sharp contrast to Kate Harris’s Tiggy, who uses her address to the Queanbeyan East Cactus and Succulent League to vent her fury at husband Harry who has left her for a younger woman. Harris’s shift from her adoration of cacti to her tempestuous rage is perfectly timed that we are swept along by the hellish fury of a woman scorned. Murray Smith’s deft landscape of pathos turning comedy is hilariously performed by Sally Taylor as Mary, a St Clare’s schoolgirl  at the school’s Talent Quest. Taylor is a natural comedienne, easily capturing the bravado that disguises her adolescent vulnerability. Her performance of Mr. Mistoffeles from CATS is a comedic tour de force, topped only by her interpretative performance of Shaft.

Sally Taylor as Mary

Ella Buckley’s bride Theresa perfectly portrays the excitement that can turn to doubt and confusion on the wedding day. It is a moment of mixed emotions delighting in the euphoria of the wedding dress and projecting the disappointment of future possibilities. Jacob Aquilina’s lighting transitions give momentary glimpses of the six women within set designer Roz Hall’s carefully staged settings to suit each character. Alice Ferguson is brilliantly cast as the widow, recounting her predictable activities from Bridge to Book Club and times with other widows. Ferguson’s Winsome lives up to her name, seeking the unexpected in a life of the predictable. Ferguson gives a totally plausible performance as the older woman who finds herself seduced by a young blind man. As she rises to her feet, we are swept up in the joy of her emancipation. Lanie Hart’s Zoe comes as a complete surprise as she plays a singer who defiantly overcomes addiction and  rises from washed up singer to durable diva. Hart once again demonstrates her versatility as an actor and surprising talent asa  singer.

Alice Ferguson as Winsome

Director Best has elicited outstanding performances from her actors. Murray Smith’s Bombshells exposes the fears and dreams, frustrations and disappointments and the individual character of each woman. Moments of hilarity segue to pangs of pathos. Murray Smith and Best are orchestrators of emotion  and empathy. Women in the audience will identify with each character’s experience. Men in the audience will hopefully understand and recognize their role and responsibility. Bombshells is Echo Theatre’s gift to everyone. It touches the heart and opens the mind. Bombshells is a tale of Everywoman , beautifully told, insightfully  directed, perfectly performed  and creatively staged. It is a highlight of the Q Theatre Season that is not to be missed.   

Ella Buckley as Theresa

Lainie Hart as Zoe