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| The Fool (or Francesca Giselle) - Little Dove Theatre Art - Photo by Andrew Sirkorski |
Canberra Theatre Centre Courtyard Studio October 14 -16th, 2026
Opening Night performance reviewed by BILL STEPHENS
The festival’s second week showcased works created and
performed by female artists.
The Fool (or Francesca Giselle)
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| The Fool (or Francesca Giselle) - Photo Mathew Miceli |
Created and directed by Chenoeh Miller for Little Dove
Theatre Art.
Performed by Alicia Melonie Jones and Noa Rotem (co-choreographers),
and Monica Engel (musician and musical arranger).
Music and sound: Reuben Ingall – Lighting design: Theo
Carroll
In her program notes, award-winning theatre-maker Chenoeh
Miller explains that The Fool (or Francesca Giselle) has been more than
eight years in development.
This deeply personal, harrowing work explores how the body
retains memories of trauma.
Combining dance, Butoh, spoken word, and live and recorded
music, Miller creates a surreal, unsettling world. The three skilled performers
draw the audience in, even when the meaning of their actions remains elusive.
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| Noa Rotem in "The Fool ( or Francesca Giselle) - Photo: Andrew Sikorski |
As the audience enters the dark, haze-filled theatre, Noa Rotem dances energetically to loud party music. Her conversations with arriving patrons suggest a light-hearted performance ahead.
That impression fades as the lights dim further and Rotem begins
an extended, deeply personal monologue.
A lavishly costumed figure emerges from the gloom, miming an
address whose words are unintelligible. Another appears from beneath the
costume. Their purpose remains obscure in the low light, but the sequence
establishes the production’s distinctly unconventional character.
A series of episodes follows, with the trio changing
costumes and hairstyles, coating their hands and feet in black paint, running
on the spot, rolling on the floor and contorting their faces.
Reuben Ingall’s unsettling recorded soundtrack and Monica
Engel’s live singing deepens the work’s disturbing atmosphere. A confronting
ensemble sequence on a raised platform in which all three mime physical abuse,
reinforces its exploration of trauma.
Frumpus Landed
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| Frumpus in "Frumpus Landed" |
Beyond their three-person casts of co-creators, the week’s
two productions have little in common.
Sydney-based Frumpus gleefully defies categorisation,
revelling in its reputation as one of Australia’s most distinctive performance
ensembles.
The show opens on a nearly bare stage: three chairs, a small
table to one side and a white screen at the back.
Wearing frumpy red tracksuits and dark glasses, the trio
prowls the stage with yo-yos, apparently preparing to make a film in which all
three will appear.
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| FRUMPUS in Frumpus Landed. |
Water sounds and projected footage of a deserted mansion introduce the first scene. Now playing maids in white nightdresses, the three sit absorbed in embroidery.
A phone rings. Each answer in turn, but no one speaks at the
other end. When one maid pricks her finger and treats it by pushing it into a
bread roll, the show plunges into a gleeful slapstick parody of period films.
Cardboard boxes fly onto the stage, household chores descend
into mischief, and feathers fill the air as the maids prepare a feast.
They bring in a huge table and race to pile it with delicacies,
including an endless supply of fruit and vegetables.
Brilliant deadpan clowning sustains the escalating
absurdity. Ridiculous, unpredictable and irreverent, the show is uproariously
funny, ending in glorious chaos with the stage strewn with debris and the
performers visibly spent.
Together, these contrasting productions demonstrate the range of the festival’s second week. The Fool (or Francesca Giselle) offers an unsettling exploration of trauma, compelling in its physicality even when its meaning remains elusive. Frumpus Landed turns domestic routines into exuberant absurdity, delivering uproarious comedy through precise deadpan clowning. One disturbs, the other delights; neither settles for conventional theatre.
Frumpus photos supplied.
This review also published in AUSTRALIAN ARTS REVIEW.
