THE WIZARD OF OZ

 The Wizard of Oz  by L. Frank Baum. 

Adapted by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Jeremy Sams. Music by Harold Arlen with additional music by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Lyrics by E.Y. Harburg with additional lyrics by Tim Rice. Directed by Jeremy Sams. Musical direction by Laura Tipoki . Choreography by Arlene Philips. Newly produced by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Produced in Australia by John Frost and Suzanne Jones by arrangement with The Production Company . The Festival Theatre. Adelaide Festival Centre. April 5-29 2018. Bookings at BASS 131246

 Reviewed by Peter Wilkins 

It is said that somewhere at the end of the rainbow there lies a pot of gold and I found it at last night at the opening of John Frost and Suzanne Jones’ glittering and spectacular production of The Wizard of Oz. Everything about this brilliant revival of L Frank Baum’s classic tale of a young girl’s tornado whisked-away adventures in the Land of Oz is pure gold.

As a child I watched the journey of Dorothy and her dog Toto with childhood fascination, enraptured by the antics of the Scarecrow, Tin man and Lion, terrified by the evil actions of the Wicked Witch of the West and entranced by the beauty and goodness of Glinda, the Good Witch. I understood the eternal battle between good and bad and I dreamed that someday I would find what lay beyond the rainbow in my magical Land of Oz. 

But last night at the Adelaide premiere of a revival that hurled us with captivating and thrilling force into the twenty-first century of technological wizardry, astounding set designs and spell-binding amplification, I watched this magnificent children’s classic with the eyes and ears of an adult who still remembers with astonishment the moment that Dorothy’s black and white world of Kansas turned to colour in the merry old land of Oz and I went with her and Toto, Scarecrow, Tin Man and Lion down the yellow brick road. It was magical and mind blowing in its time and I dreamed that I too would overcome every peril to find my brain, my heart and my nerve and return to the safety and  love of my own sweet home .

Last night I watched again with all the wonder of the child at the phenomenal stage effects, the exciting performances of a wonderful cast and a story that transcends Time to carry us through all Time. However, in the time of Trump, the production peeled away the innocent gaze of the wonder-filled child to reveal a more cynical view of the American way.  Is L Frank Baum’s classic tale a prophetic message for our time?  Is it a xenophobic salute to jingoistic isolation? Is there no place like home and Dorothy must be content to stay at home with Aunt Em (Sophie Weiss) and Uncle Henry (Paul Hanlon).  Is the Wicked Witch of the West (Jemma Rix) with her Cossack cohorts and alien gargoyle servants the threat of Reds under the bed or intruders from other lands? Or is this production still a wise morality tale, that like all good art, invites us to question why “if happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow why oh why can’t I”?  

Jemma Rix as the Wicked Witch of the West

 Perhaps both Baum and the cast and creatives of this magnificent retelling of The Wizard of Oz have hedged their bets to tell us through their art that there is no place like a loving home but beyond the rainbow is where we must go to discover the secrets to our dreams. In any event, this production will transport you to a world of wonder and excitement.

Devotees of the 1939 Oscar winning movie will be thrilled by the ultimate pleasure of seeing their favourite characters transferred to the live stage. It is as though the principals of this London Palladium production have channelled the stars of yesteryear’s triumph. Though somewhat older than Judy Garland, Samantha Dodemaide’s Dorothy captures the spirit and girlish innocence of the girl from the farmland of Kansas. Jemma Rix is Margaret Hamilton incarnate as the irascible Miss Gulch and the tyrannous Wicked Witch of the West, yet with her own brand of riveting wickedness. Lucy Durack gives a refreshingly different spin to Gilda, the good witch, with a performance that is feisty and fearlessly down to earth, avoiding the somewhat saccharine sweetness of goodness and displaying the might of the modern woman. The ghosts of Ray Bolger, Jack Haley and Bert Lahr inhabit Eli Cooper’s agile and rubbery-limbed Scarecrow, Alex Rathgeber’s metallic Tin man and John Xintavelonis’s cowardly Lion. Each actor brings their distinctive style to the role, while remaining true to the original film interpretations. It is this allegiance to every child’s vision of the characters in The Wizard of Oz that lends the production authenticity, wonder and charm.

There is marvelous stage presence in Anthony Warlow’s Professor Marvel and the benignly fraudulent Wizard of Oz, and with a voice to match, Warlow commands the stage in his eponymous role. A lively Ensemble revel in the opportunity to fill the stage with Munchkin quirkiness, military precision and emerald posturing of the highfaluting citizens of the Emerald City.

W.C. Fields once warned, “Never act with children and animals.” In the case of Dorothy’s terrier Toto, he would have claimed his case. The young woman next to me capitulated utterly with adoring sighs at the sight and actions of Dorothy’s adorable canine companion. Toto (Trouble or Flick)) under trainer, Luke Hura, turned in an Oscar winning performance.

Dorothy and Toto in Kansas. Photo Jeff Busby

Harold Arlen’s music and E.Y. Harburg’s lyrics have stood the test of Time. The old favourites still work their magic in David Cullen’s orchestration and the exuberant playing from the pit. I am less enamoured of Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s additional music and lyrics, and as much as I appreciate the reunion of these two Wunderkids of Jesu Christ Superstar and Evita, apart from giving songs to characters who may have missed out originally, they add little to the adventure or the characters. Still it is rewarding to once again be amused by Rice’s gift for lyrics – “She’s clueless and I want her shoeless.”

Finale -  Home is a Place in Your Heart

Andrew Lloyd Webber’s inspired imagining of a timeless classic that touches every heart will delight and enthrall. With Jon Driscoll and Daniel Brodie’s exciting video footage of storms and demons, Robert Jones’s vibrantly colourful scenic and costume design and Hugh Vanstone’s magical lighting, the Festival Theatre explodes with colour and action. Cast and creatives under Jeremy Sam’s tight and energetic direction bring dreams to life on a journey of laughter, tears and thrilling excitement. In this not to be missed spectacle, young and old alike will be whisked away on a magical ride that they will never forget.

THE DEATH OF STALIN

Review by © Jane Freebury

Rated MA15+, 1 hour 47 minutes

4.5 Stars

With not much to do one evening, the staff at Radio Moscow only have to adjust the audio settings and enjoy a Mozart concerto while watching the beautiful pianist (Olga Kurylenko).

Then the phone rings. It’s Chairman Stalin (Adrian McLoughlin), calling to say his guard are on their way to pick up a recording of the live performance that is on air. Recording, what recording?

Knowing Stalin the way they do, it’s a mad scramble to set things right. The audience is stopped from leaving, and passers-by are press-ganged to fill in for those who did.

The musicians take their places again, but who will replace the conductor, who happened to knock himself out when he tripped over a fire bucket? All the other good conductors are in the gulag or otherwise disappeared.

One is found, eventually. He arrives in pyjamas and dressing gown, convinced he has been rounded up to be shot like numerous neighbours in his apartment building who, as it happened, were being carted off when he answered a knock at the door.

For the unprepared, this farcical political satire based on historical fact about one of the 20th century’s most barbarous regimes, could be a queasy cocktail. Unless you are prepared to go along with a feature length lampoon of a preposterous, vicious clique that once ran the USSR. The Death of Stalin is set in 1953.

Stalin receives his newly pressed recording, but tucked inside the sleeve is an unwelcome surprise which gives him such a turn that he has a stroke. This isn’t discovered until the next morning, the guards at his door too cowed to investigate the thump they heard as he hit the floor. The position of Russian leader is up for grabs.

As the great man lies prone, dead or dying, it’s over to the inner circle to try to work out succession. Seems there’s no plan.

It could be the dim, lugubrious party deputy, Gyorgy Malenkov (Jeffrey Tambor), Moscow party head, a toey Nikita Krushchev (Steve Buscemi, complete with New York accent), head of the secret police, Lavrentiy Beria (Shakespearian actor Simon Russell Beale) – or foreign secretary, Vyacheslav Molotov (Michael Palin), though he has only just been added to a list to be eliminated.

Now they can emerge from their sycophantic obedience and show their true colours. When Stalin finally dies, it’s game on.

Not one of these acclaimed actors has been required to speak with a Russian accent, though each of them surely could without any effort. It helps to set the tone for this wonderful absurdist political farce from Scottish director and co-writer, Armando Iannucci (In the Loop).

The humour owes much to the great British comedic tradition, and yet the original source material is French. The graphic comic book of the same name on which it is based, is due for release in English.

Two of Stalin’s progeny, Svetlana (Andrea Riseborough) and Vasily (Rupert Friend), also try to take charge of the situation to hilarious effect, but too little of the old man has rubbed off for either of them to have any impact.

The medals strung across the chest of field marshal Georgy Zhukov (Jason Isaacs), on the other hand, really do mean something, and he ensures that a baleful chapter in Russian history is put to an end.

This is brilliant, wicked, eviscerating entertainment—a comedy of terrors, indeed.  In throwing a spotlight on the perversity and cruelty of Stalin’s regime, Iannucci shows no restraint as he lampoons each of his targets mercilessly.

A recent ban on this film in Russia is a delicious footnote. On our current understanding of the skills on hand in that country, we trust that The Death of Stalin may still be doing the rounds, circulating as an illegal file.


Also published at Jane's blog and broadcast on ArtSound FM 92.7

BLACK IS THE NEW WHITE

Written by Nakkiah Lui

Directed by Paige Rattray

Designed by Renee Mulder

Lighting designed by Ben Hughes

Music composition and sound design by Steve Toulmin

Presented by The Sydney Theatre Company

the Playhouse, Canberra Theatre Centre

Performance on March 31^st 2018 reviewed by Bill Stephens

 

 

 

What a delightful breath of fresh air is playwright, Nakkiah Lui. Her writing is witty, perceptive, informative and deliciously entertaining; her characters, believable, charming and very funny.

 In “Black is the New White” she addresses complex issues of race, class and identity by focussing on two middle-class Australian families, one of which, the Gibsons, is aboriginal.

Charlotte Gibson (Shari Sebbens) is an aboriginal lawyer. Her father, Ray, (Tony Briggs) was a prominent politician, who has now retired, together with his wife Joan (Melodie Reynolds-Diarra) to a comfortably upper-middle-class life. Their other daughter, Rose(Nakkiah Lui), is a successful fashion designer with her own brand, and is married to  former footballer, now banker, Sonny Jones (Anthony Taufa).

Francis Smith (Tom Stokes) is Charlotte Gibson’s fiancé and is an experimental classical composer. His father Dennison (Geoff Morrell) was a prominent conservative politician, now retired, together with his wife, Marie (Vanessa Downing), to a comfortably upper-middle-class life.

When Charlotte Gibson invites the Smiths to spend Christmas with her family at their holiday home as an opportunity to announce her engagement to Francis, the scene is set for a succession of explosive situations.

Paige Rattray’s direction is deft and insightful and her casting is spot-on.  She takes full advantage of Renee Mulder’s opulent setting to keep the tightly focussed action moving at a cracking pace, whether highlighting quiet moments of intimacy, or in the glorious slapstick nude scene, when Francis grabs a family photo off the wall to hide his embarrassment, or the uproarious food fight which involves the full cast.

Canberra audiences where fortunate to see the original cast in this touring revival, excepting for the role of the younger sister, Rose Gibson, now performed by the author herself, Nakkiah Lui, who was quite delightful as the young wife who took rather a long time to work out that her ex-footballer husband (charmingly portrayed by Anthony Taufa) was actually Tongan.  Shari Sebbens and Tom Ford bought warmth, hilarity and conviction to their roles as Charlotte and her intended fiancé, Francis, the young couple whose impending engagement is the catalyst for much discussion.

Equally pitch-perfect are Tony Briggs and Melodie Reynolds-Diarra, as the Gibsons, and Vanessa Downing and Geoff Morrell, as the Smiths, while Luke Carroll almost steals the show bringing easy-going panache to his role as the charming, ever-present narrator who links the dots by providing explanations and excuses throughout the play.

Undeniably enjoyable and diverting, the play felt a little too long, and while the issues it raises are pertinent, there are perhaps too many of them to comfortably digest in one sitting. Nevertheless, “Black is the New White” is an impressive and important new play from a talented new emerging playwright with some interesting things to say. It has certainly whetted the appetite for seeing more of her work in the not too distant future.

 

This review also appear in Australian Arts Review. www.artreview.com.au

   

 

MARY MAGDALENE

Review by © Jane Freebury

She was canonised a saint centuries ago, but it seems that the in-fighting among Christians over Mary Magdalene, the only female disciple, has continued. Who was she? A fallen woman or a steadfast virgin?

The new film from Garth Davis, who directed Lion with such restraint and empathy, wants to set the record straight about the kind of gal she really was. It’s admirable, though I’m not sure I understand why any ongoing controversy should be resolved. She could have been one of life’s contradictions, for all we know.

The reputation of Mary Magdalene may not be sorted anytime soon, but I do like the way this film explores the woman she might have been. What her life was like before Jesus came along, what she wanted for herself and why she left her family behind.

The other thing I found intriguing – as a non-religious person interested in ideas - was the depiction of how a religion, any religion, might begin. Slowly, hesitantly, as a form of social resistance perhaps like any movement.

Life is harsh in 33 BC. Mary helps out when a woman gives birth, and she and her sisters haul in fishing nets heavy with the day’s catch.

However, an unusual lack of filial duty marks her out as a rebel who will not follow the path that her father and brothers have determined for her. She refuses to marry and chooses instead to follow a man called Jesus who is in the area. As the man of the people with a low-key but revolutionary message, Joaquin Phoenix is surprisingly plausible.

More interesting is the take on Judas Iscariot, audaciously depicted as personable and attractive, and just another impatient young man who wants Jesus to get on with the revolution

Davis’ film is set in the beautiful, stark, bare bones of southern Italy. The Australian cinematographer Greig Fraser, who worked so impressively on films like Bright Star and Zero Dark Thirty, was behind the camera. The otherworldly score is the work of the (late) Icelandic composer, Johan Johannsson and the cellist Hildur Guðnadóttir.

The film’s attention to period detail also helps make for an immersive experience. It takes you back in time to the shores of the Sea of Galilee and the city of Jerusalem, and the lives of ordinary people under the Romans. It offers its own kind of social realism.

Unfortunately the film lets itself down in trying to establish why Mary joins the disciples following Jesus. We get instead a number of vague, dreamy sequences of her descending into the blue depths as though her baptism was a rehearsal for oblivion.

And the conversations that she has with Jesus aren’t particularly persuasive support for her actions either. She could be simply be seen as a girl who didn’t like the man her family had chosen for her to marry. There could have been so much more to this.

Much more interesting is the film’s take on the figure of Judas Iscariot, who is audaciously depicted as personable and attractive, and just another impatient young man who wants Jesus to get on with the revolution. The French actor of Algerian descent, Tahar Rahim, with an open, smiling face incapable of dissimilitude, shapes a character who is bound for disappointment when the kind of revolution Jesus has in mind becomes clear.

Sometimes trance-like, cultish and surely not what the filmmakers intended

Rahim, by the way, emerged on the scene of the international film industry as a petty criminal caught up in inmate politics in prison in A Prophet, a powerful film directed by Jacques Audiard.

The black English actor, Chiwetel Ejiofor, is also memorable at the disciple Peter. A small part.

After two hours of screen time, there is not enough to know about Mary Magdalene. The alabaster serenity of Rooney Mara as the main character reveals so little of her motivations that watching her story unfold is sometimes like taking part in a waking dream. Sometimes trance-like, cultish and surely not what the filmmakers intended.

Actually, screenwriters Helena Edmundson and Philippa Goslet, have, while undertaking to write one story, written another. Mary Magdalene isn’t especially about its stated subject, who is still just the witness, but about how a religion or a movement might be born.

Despite wanting to reveal more of the true nature of Mary Magdalene, the film offers a low-key study of Christianity in its early days, and why Jesus was eliminated as a dissident.

From the paintings of the masters like Rubens and El Greco to the blockbusters based on the writing of novelist Dan Brown, it is clear Magdalene has intrigued artists and writers for centuries. Surely the curiosity over her true nature will continue. She was a woman in a man's world, after all.

Rated M, 2 hours

3 Stars

Also published at Jane's blog, and broadcast on ArtSound FM 92.7

42ND STREET

 

Music by Harry Warren – Lyrics by Al Dubin

Book by Michael Stewart & Mark Bramble

Directed by Chris Baldock – Musical Direction by Nicolas Griffin

Conducted by Ian McLean AM CSC - Choreographed by Michelle Heine

Costume Design – Victoria Home, CLOC – Fiona Leach, Free-Rain

Set Design by Martin Searles, Susie and Steve Walsh

The Q – Queanbeyan Performing Arts Centre until 15^th April 2018

Reviewed by Bill Stephens

Sam Ward - Sophie Highmore - Louiza Blomfield -and ensemble in "42nd Street" 

Photo: Steph Burgess

 

From the moment the curtain raises on dozens of tapping feet the audience is transported into the razzle dazzle world of show-biz as the cast of the Broadway musical “Pretty Lady” busily rehearse for their big opening night. Young dancer, Peggy Sawyer (Sophie Highmore) arrives late, but manages to catch the eye of leading man, Billy Lawlor, (Sam Ward), incur the wrath of leading lady, Dorothy Brock (Louiza Blomfield) and the curiosity of big time producer, Julian Marsh (Jarrad West). And as this is a musical, no prizes for guessing who gets to go on and save the show when Dorothy Brock breaks her ankle just before opening night.

The quintessential Broadway musical, “42^nd Street” is packed with recognisable songs, big dance numbers, and a captivatingly corny storyline.  Free Rain Theatre does it proud with a lavish production, under the experienced direction of Chris Baldock, which manages to capture a great deal of the spectacle and excitement expected of a Broadway show.

To the exciting sounds of a classy, appropriately brassy, band, conducted, with his signature attention to detail, by Ian McLean, the large, talented cast sing and dance their hearts out in a breathtaking succession of  tightly drilled, spectacularly costumed dance routines devised by Canberra’s queen of tap, Michelle Heine.  Scenery changes featuring dazzling LED images provide the production with a professional gloss.

In her first leading role, Sophie Highmore impresses as the young ingénue, Peggy Sawyer. She dances brilliantly, sings with charm and confidence, and has no trouble convincing that she could lead a Broadway show. Louiza Blomfield chews up the scenery in a very funny performance as the fading star, Dorothy Brock, while Jarrad West scores with his likeable portrayal of the Broadway producer, Julian Marsh.

Louiza Blomfield as Dorothy Brock

Photo: Steph Burgess

 

Among the large supporting cast, Debra Byrne as Maggie Jones, Sam Ward as Bill Lawlor, Karina Hudson as Ann Reilly and Michael Miller as Abner Dillon all delight with particularly strong performances.

With this production of   “42^nd Street” , Free Rain Theatre have not only succeeded in achieving an excellent realisation of an iconic Broadway musical that captures and celebrates the very essence of Broadway, but which also delivers scintillating musical theatre which should not be missed by anyone seeking an evening of delightful theatrical  escapism. 

 

 

 

This review first published in the digital edition of CITY NEWS on 29th March 2018.

BLACK IS THE NEW WHITE

Black is the New White by Nakkiah Lui. 

Directed by Paige Rattray. Designer. Renee Mulder. Lighting Designer. Ben Hughes. Composer and Sound Designer. Steve Toulmin. Sydney Theatre Company. The Playhouse. Canberra Theatre Centre. March 28-31. 2018

Reviewed by Peter Wilkins

The cast of Black is the New White. Photo by Prudence Upton

After being enthralled by the Sydney Theatre Company production of Black is the New White by award winning indigenous playwright, Nakkiah Lui, I decided to make a return visit during its sadly too short season at the Playhouse at the Canberra Theatre Centre. This hilarious, sad and perceptively biting tale of race, privilege, politics, family and ambition has lost none of its freshness and brutal honesty. The cast approach the roles with total conviction and commitment to the issues that are hurled between characters during a Christmas get-together of the family of legendary black activist, Roy(Tony Briggs) with his arch political rival and nemesis, Dennison Kennedy (Geoff Morrell) , his wife, Marie (Vanessa Downing)  and son, Francis (Tom Stokes), who is engaged to Roy’s lawyer daughter, Charlotte (Shari Sebbens)  . The revival is worth the return to see Nakkiah Lui take over the role of Charlotte’s fashion designer, Rose from Melodie Reynolds-Diarra.

Tom Stokes, Luke Carroll and Tony Briggs. Photo. Prue Upton

Luke Carroll (call me the Spirit of Christmas) plays the narrator of this explosive comedy, keeping the audience up to date and glued to the action with a spritely sense of impish mischief. His cheeky delight in revealing the secrets, flaws and inevitable consequences of his characters’ follies and foibles ensures that we don’t take the characters too seriously, while Lui’s Christmas cracker paced plot compels us to consider the conflicts, arguments and consequences with an earnest consideration of our own opinion. Lui sets her audience up for a rollercoaster ride of laughter, tears and judgement. Her plot twists and turns, arousing comedy in one instant as a naked Francis surprisingly appears before Charlotte’s astounded father (Tony..) and mother Joan (Kylie Bracknell – Karrljilbra Karrdn )and then creates inevitable tension when the uncomfortable young suitor attempts to shake the father’s hand. Lui then releases the tension with a series of comical gaffes and politically incorrect jokes that do nothing to relieve the atmosphere.

Anthony Taufa, Nakkiah Lui and Geoff Morrell. Photo: Prue Upton

Black is the New White is a play for our time with issues and human relationships for all time. It would be easy to dismiss the play as riddled with clichés. Privileged black girl, Charlotte is in love with white struggling composer boyfriend, Francis.  Aboriginal leader with a Martin Luther King complex, Roy, reaps kudos from his black wife, Joan, who writes his speeches for him. Francis is the son of Dennison, white former liberal minister, racist, mysoginist and intolerant of his son’s classical avant-garde musical talent and survival on a Trust Fund, set up by his grandparents. Sisters Charlotte and Rose are chalk and cheese, and Sonny, Rose’s husband, Sonny (Anthony Taufa) has turned to Jesus after his preacher father’s death and wants to become a missionary, while Rose wants to keep the race alive with beautiful black babies. Cliché or not, the plot splendidly exposes popular attitudes, prejudices and family conflicts with razor sharp wit, incisive irony and a delicious dismantling of façade with a swipe at bloated ego and hypocrisy.  The audience stops laughing long enough to take stock of serious implication. Shakespearian in its antitheses, Black is the New White  brings tidings of comfort and joy as we see opposing forces collide and in the end thaw and resolve into amnity and family conviviality and acceptance. This is after all a morality fable and it all ends happily ever after.

Tom Stokes,Vanessa Downing,Shari Sebbens, Geoff Morrell and Tony Briggs

Black is the New White is a minted coin of conciliation. It shows what is, and what could be in a land of Epiphany. Realization flies about the stage as Christmas food is flung in all directions during a cathartic abandonment of rivalries and resentments. Unfulfilled Marie comes out. Sonny learns that as the revered Aboriginal captain of the Wallabies he was actually Tongan and Ray and Dennison resolve to create a treaty to right all wrongs. The stuff of fairy tales? Perhaps, but the power of Lui’s play is the vision to see what is and prophesy what might be. That is what makes this new play a scintillating, provocative and revelatory comedy of manners for all Australians. If laughter is the best medicine, then Black is the New White has cured a thousand wrongs and administered the power to initiate some rights. Perhaps then we can make white and black right together.

Directed playfully with infectious joy by Paige Rattray, cast and creatives revel in the vitality, humanity and intelligence of this romp into taboos and the issues that keep us apart and possibilities that could bring us together. Lui knows too well the seriousness of her theme, but has the wisdom and the talent to understand the power of laughter to lead blacks and whites towards a brand new day.

Black is the New White has left Canberra but if it passes your way on its tour, it is a new Australian play not to be missed!

Black is the New White

Black is the New White by Nakkiah Lui.  Sydney Theatre Company at Canberra Theatre Centre Playhouse, March 28 – 31, 2018.

(This production premiered at Roslyn Packer Theatre, Sydney on March 1, 2018.  The original production premiered at Wharf 1 Theatre on May 10, 2017.)

Director – Paige Rattray; Designer – Renée Mulder; Lighting Designer – Ben Hughes; Composer and Sound Designer – Steve Toulmin; Voice and Text Coach – Charmian Gradwell.

Cast:
Ray Gibson – Tony Briggs; Narrator – Luke Carroll; Marie Smith – Vanessa Downing; Dennison Smith – Geoff Morrell; Joan Gibson – Melodie Reynolds-Diarra; Charlotte Gibson – Shari Sebbens; Francis Smith – Tom Stokes; Rose Jones – Nakkiah Lui (replacing Miranda Tapsell for the Canberra season); Sonny Jones – Anthony Taufa

Reviewed by Frank McKone
March 28

There is a special sense of coming together in this new form of comedy of manners.  It is both a romantic comedy, but also a questioning comedy.  What does it mean to be ‘black’ or ‘white’?  Lui’s highly sophisticated writing says it’s very funny.  Standing ovation kind of funny.  Seriously exciting kind of theatre.

Looking at Black is the New White from the white side, as I inevitably must, I see a picture which reminds me of when I was a £10 invading Pom some 60 years ago.  I was fascinated then by my culture’s 18th Century cartoonery and social commentary pictures.  William Hogarth comes to mind.

             An Election Entertainment featuring the anti-Gregorian calendar banner "Give us our Eleven Days", 1755

I came to understand that to see the whole picture, I had to accept equally all the diverse characters in Hogarth’s typically crowded scenes – from the grotesque to the ‘normal’; from the low class to the high.

L-R: Anthony Taufa, Vanessa Downing, Luke Carroll (above), Shari Sebbens,
Geoff Morrell, Melodie Reynolds-Diarra, Tony Briggs, Miranda Tapsell, Tom Stokes
in Black is the New White by Nakkiah Lui

Joan Gibson's Christmas speech
Photo: Prudence Upton

Nakkiah Lui’s picture of today’s middle class in Sydney – black, white and Tongan – is as humorous a view as Hogarth’s and brings me up to date.  Though I was an unwitting invader at the age of 14, I feel better about being here now, thanks to the many Aboriginal playwrights and performers whose work I’ve seen (and some reviewed here and at www.frankmckone2.blogspot.com ) from the days of the National Black Theatre in Redfern which I attended in 1973, through  Jimmy Chi's 1990 musical Bran Nue Dae and many others, to Nakkiah Lui. 

The first work of hers I reviewed, Kill the Messenger (February 20, 2015) was beyond impressive.  Black is the New White thoroughly establishes her place among our great writers on the Australian stage.  She makes the crossover between cultures understandable and acceptable.  Lui is an enormously generous writer.

The quality of the production of the play goes without saying, after last year’s success at Wharf 1, though I would have liked to have seen Miranda Tapsell (not to disparage the author’s performance here in Canberra).  I first noted Tapsell’s acting while she was still at NIDA, in Dallas Winmar’s Yibiyung ten years ago, with Wesley Enoch directing, and later in Louis Nowra’s Radiance, directed by Leah Purcell, and would love to have seen her here in such a different role.  Tapsell’s story alone shows where Indigenous theatre is travelling.

Luke Carroll, Miranda Tapsell, Anthony Taufa
Photo: Hon Boey

In this rehearsal picture, you see not only Miranda Tapsell (Rose) and Anthony Taufa (Sonny), but an important figure in the background, Luke Carroll as The Narrator.  From her Indigenous culture, Lui has clearly drawn upon the storytelling tradition in this dynamic character, but also on the idea – regarded as new when Tennessee Williams wrote The Glass Menagerie last century – of a member of the family standing aside from the action to explain to us outsiders what is really going on inside.

While Tom tells much of his own story in The Glass Menagerie, director Paige Rattray writes of Black is the New White, in answer to the question  “What can the narrator be and what can’t it be for it to work well here”,  The improvisations were useful.  We pushed that character to see how far he could be involved in the world of the other characters.  We found a few little moments of overlap, but it’s actually much better if he is outside the reality, observing.  He’s more connected to the audience than he is to the characters.

I found The Narrator especially important in two ways.  The first is as a simple device for changing scenes as one bit of the story ends and another begins.  But this character knows all the little details of the family members’ behaviours, do’s and don’ts, wishes and real intentions.  He is absolutely Aboriginal, though so well dressed in ‘white’ suits.  He moves as if dancing (including with a front-row audience member!) and talks with a glint of humour in his eye.

I found myself imagining The Narrator as a kind of ghost-figure, but the opposite of a Kadaitcha (the harbinger of death).  This Narrator is the epitome of life, both romantic and questioning – but never with rancour.  Observing, yes – but to me, at least, he is much more, connecting the audience to the characters.

If there’s a parallel in my culture, it must be in the independent clownish philosophers in Shakespeare’s plays, but never with the cynicism of a Jacques.  It’s at this level that I place Nakkiah Lui’s art.

Director Paige Rattray with playwright Nakkiah Lui during rehearsal
Photo: Hon Boey