Away by Michael Gow
Directed by Lainie Hart.
Chreographer Caitlin Schilg. Set dsign Andrew Kay. Lighting design Nathan
SCiberras. Sound design Neville Pye. Stage Manager Maggie Hawkins. Production
Manager Simon Tolhurst. Canberra Repertory Society September 5-21 2024.
Bookings 62571950
Reviewed by Peter Wilkins
Canberra Rep under the direction of Lainie Hart has produced an outstanding production of Michael Gow’s iconic play, Away. The play recounts the story of three families who go away together to the Queensland coast during the school holidays. Set in 1967/8, it would be easy to regard the play as a stereotypical account of the lives of people during that time. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is set against the time of the Vietnam War. The White Australia Policy is still in force and the indigenous peoples of Australia have only just been given the vote. Gow’s characters are white anglo Saxons. School headmaster, Roy, played with his unique comic brilliance by Jim Adamik, espouse the prejudice against the “new Australians” It is a time only too well remembered and recounted by Gow and performed with unerring truth by Hart’s outstanding cast.
It would be a mistake to judge
the play as merely a document on its era. The play assumes Shakespearean
proportions that imbue the play, the performances and the production with the
universality of the human condition. The opening scene presents a school
performance of Midsummer Night’s Dream, a joyful romp of hope and jubilation
set against a beautifully painted backdrop.. At the campsite a tempest rages,
compelling the characters to confront the truths, secrets and their humanity.
It closes with the class’s reading of King Lear and Tom’s prophetic delivery of
Lear’s absolving of his authority. Callum Doherty’s reading is powerfully
poignant. He is a young actor of astounding emotional maturity and with a
talent of enormous promise.
Gow wrote the play almost forty
years ago and the Australian landscape has changed considerably in that time
but Gow and Shakespeare attest to fundamental family conflicts and
reconciliation.It is the intrinsic quality of human nature that Hart has
elicited in every member of this fine cast. There is the mother and daughter
conflict between the emotionallfraughtGwen (Christina Falsone) and Meg (Erin
Blond). There is the optimism expressed by Vic (Elaine Noon) contrasted with
the deep sense of pending loss confessed to Jim (Peter Stines) by Tom’s father
Harry (Peter Fock) . The trials of an unmatched marriage and the search for escape
are clearly portrayed in Andrea Close’s
aloof performance as the headmaster’s wife Coral. Tom and Meg’s awkward
confrontation with teenage sexuality is touchingly revealed in a scene upon the
beach. Doherty and Blond create instant believability and I look forward to
future stage partnerships between these fine emerging actors.
Director Hart is well supported
by Rep’s excellent team behind the scenes, giving the production a unity and
authenticity. Choreographer Caitlin Schilg creates an amusing folk dance in the
opening scene and conjures the sense of the tempest in her dance ably assisted
by lighting designer Nathan Sciberras
and Neville Pye’s sound design. Andrew Kay’s open stage set design with
projected images and flowing drapes lend the production a fluid motion that
allows director, choreographer and cast a freedom and the production a momentum
that carries the audience along. All in
all this is a production that satisfies, entices, makes one laugh and evokes a
tear.
I saw this production at the end
of the run and only two performances remain as I write this. Rep’s production
of Michael Gow’s Away is proof enough of
its place as an Australian classic and a significant addition to school
curricula. All the world’s a stage and Michael Gow’s Away takes centre stage with this excellent production.