Picnic at Hanging Rock.
Adapted
from the novel by Joan Lindsay by Tom Wright. Directed by Caitlin Baker. Stage
Manager Carmen King. Set design. Caitlin Baker. Lighting Design Disa Swifte.
Composer and Sound Designer Paris Sharkie. Costume Designer Helen Fojtas.
Producer Karen Vickery for chaika Theatre. Production Photography Jane Duong.
Chaika Theatre. ACT HUB October 23 – November 7 Bookings: ACTHUB.COM.AU
Reviewed by Peter Wilkins
There is an immediate sense of
mystery in Chaika Theatre’s haunting production of Tom Wright’s stage
adaptation of Picnic at Hanging Rock. A schoolgirl is writing in chalk capital
letters on a blackboard. THE ROCK IS A NIGHTMARE AND NIGHTMARES BELONG IN THE
PAST. The sentence is repeated over and over until at one stage it becomes distorted
before being resumed. There is mystery in its meaning as the rock looms large
as a symbol of an ancient geological past rising from the volcanic sediment of
a violent and eruptive past. Tom Wright paints a raw poetic portrait of an
untamed landscape, ancient and powerful, inhabited by venomous snakes, spiders
and crawling insects. It is a landscape, familiar to its indigenous inhabitants
and yet alien to author Joan Lindsay’s characters in her classic novel Picnic
At Hanging Rock. Lindsay’s plot made popular by Peter Weir’s 1975 film of
the same name centres on a visit to Victoria’s Hanging Rock by schoolgirls on
St Valentine’s Day in 1900 and the unexplained disappearance within the dangerous
rock.
Tom Wright’s adaptation focuses
on the four girls who enter the rock and their French schoolmistress. Director Caitlin Baker has cast five
outstanding actors who also take on other roles including the school
headmistress Mrs Appleyard, the coach driver Albert, Sarah a junior student
ridiculed by Appleyard and young Englishman Michael, visiting his wealthy
relatives and becoming embroiled in the drama. At the beginning of the play,
the actors work as a Greek Chorus, explaining the events against the background
of Wright’s vivid descriptions of the environment. The aura is palpable,
conjuring images that paint the portrait of a wild landscape perilous to the
unwary and unINitiated members and descendants of British colonization. As Sarah
defiantly cries out to her authoritarian headmistress, what good is your
British education. It is not reality.
The opening prologue of events
then evolves into a number of scenes, atmospherically captured by Disa Swifte’s
lighting design and Paris Scharkie’s composition and sound design into the
events that follow the disappearance of Miranda, Marion, Irma and Edith. It
becomes apparent through the interrogation, the privileged class’s tea party,
Appleyard’s rigid approach to learning and Michael’s confusion that the rock
stands high as a symbol of Nature’s power over humanity to be respected and
shared by a population who had occupied the land for thousands of years and had
learnt and earned a respect, the lack of which held deadly consequences for
those who ignored the land’s laws.
Ultimately, Chaika’s
thought-provoking and superbly staged production of Tom Wright’s adaptation
becomes a beacon of light to expose the cracks in the rock of our societal
fabric. What is our relationship to and responsibility for the land? There was
no Welcome To Country in 1967 when Lindsay wrote her novel, so some progress
has been made, but Chaika’s production reminds us all that we continue to owe
respect to those who inhabited and learned to respect the land before an alien
and ignorant culture imposed its custom, its education and its laws.
The programme handout out says that
Chaika’s production of Picnic At Hanging Rock is an amateur production
by arrangement with Origen Theatrical on behalf of Nick Hern books. Chaika
Theatre’s production is highly professional in every sense of the word. Baker’s
vision and direction is powerfully engrossing in ACT HUB’s intimate space. Her
casting is exemplary and performed by a cast who excel in every role. This is
ensemble work of its very best. Karina Hudson, Jessi Gooding, Thea Jade,
Breanna Kelly and Paris Sharkie give performances equal to any on a
professional mainstage. For seventy minutes without an interval the cast take
us on a fascinating journey into the mysteries and conundrums of our
relationship with the land and people of our nation. Whether it is based on
fact or fictitious imagination, the lessons are there to be learned and Chaika’s
production of Picnic At Hanging Rock proves to be the best teacher.
Do not miss this excellent
production’s short season.
