AWAY - Canberra Repertory Society.

 

Callum Doherty (Tom) - Elaine Noon (Vic) in "Away".

Written by Michael Gow – Directed by Lainie Hart

Choreographed by Caitlin Schilg – Lighting designed by Nathan Sciberras

Set designed by Andrew Kay - Costumes designed by Helen Drum

Sound designed by Neville Pye

Canberra Repertory Theatre - September 5 - 21^st   2024.   

Performance on September 7^th reviewed by BILL STEPHENS.

 

Michael Gow’s 1986 play Away depicts the lives of three internally conflicted Australian families who, during a 1967 Gold Coast holiday, find their lives becoming inexplicably entwined. It’s become a classic, and the most widely produced Australian play of all time, partly because of being included in the curriculum of high schools in states around Australia.

The play makes conscious nods to Shakespeare, beginning with a school production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and concluding with a reading from King Lear. The characters embrace the gamut of Australian society of the time, or at least, what we like to think was Australian society at that time.

For her production for the Canberra Repertory Society, Director Lainie Hart has avoided the temptation to chase cheap laughs through her characters.  Instead she opts to concentrate on the humanity inherent in their situations, which results  in a production rich with laughs, but also deeply moving and on occasion, ethereal.

Jim Adamik (Roy) - Andrea Close (Coral) in "Away". 

Hart’s carefully chosen cast is outstanding, led by Jim Adamik as Roy, the school’s headmaster, and Andrea Close as his wife Coral whose severe bouts of depression and dementia cause strain on their marriage. Both actors offer fascinating multi-faceted performances that are laugh-out-loud while capturing the humanity and authenticity of their characters. 

Peter Fock (Harry) - Elaine Noon (Vic) in "Away"

 

Peter Fock and Elaine Noon play English migrants Harry and Vic who love everything about Australia, but particularly the performance of their son, Tom (Callum Doherty) who plays Puck in the local school production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and who is attracted to Meg (Erin Blond), who is also in the play.

Doherty gives a luminous performance as the troubled teenager with a distressing secret. The difficult scene in which he presses Meg for sex is sensitively staged by Hart, and touchingly performed by both actors.

Callum Doherty (Tom) - Erin Blond (Meg) in "Away".

Meg’s father, Jim, portrayed by Peter Styles, is supportive of the budding romance, but her mother Gwen, in an excoriating portrayal by Christina Falsone of a woman who sucks every moment of pleasure out of any occasion, is fiercely discouraging.  

When these three disparate families find themselves unexpectedly holidaying together at the same Gold Coast resort, a series of compelling events involving shared secrets, unresolved dilemmas and deeply felt pain rapidly unfold.

Christina Falsone (Gwen) in "Away".

Gow’s brilliance in revealing the motives that drive his characters, and the adroitness with which Hart draws cleverly nuanced performances from her actors, who also include Andre Le, Claire Noack and Kara Taylor portraying the various subsidiary characters essential to the storytelling, are combined in an engrossing and entertaining evening of theatre.

However, in the telling of his story, Gow’s play requires many changes of locale.  Andrew Kay’s solutions for these scene-changes combined with Harts imaginative stagings which incorporate locally composed music and choreography, while interesting, are not entirely successful.  

The Rep Theatre, like many contemporary theatres, lacks a fly tower. This presents its designers and directors with significant challenges when producing plays written at a time when those features were de rigueur for most theatres.

For this play Kay’s designs work best when they were at their simplest, as for the second act beach scenes when it was almost possible to feel the heat of the sun and smell the salt spray. The staging of the storm sequence was particularly effective.

Michael Gow’s Away is an Australian theatre classic and is here given a memorable production by the Canberra Repertory Society. If you haven’t already seen this play, or a keen to refresh your memory of it, don’t miss this opportunity.

 

Aandre Le (Camper) - Jim Adamik (Roy) - Peter Stiles (Jim) - Helen Noonan (Camper)
 Claire Noak (Camper) in "Away"

                                                Photos by Kate Harris & Eve Murray