The Web

‘The Web’ Kate Mulvany’s latest play, on its World Premier tour, is presented by the Black Swan State Theatre Company and HotHouse Theatre, nightly at The Playhouse Theatre, 3 Pier Street, Perth at 7.30 (Sundays at 5.00 pm) until the 11^th October.

         In a dark, back alley of the remote WA coastal town of Chapman, Fred (Robin Goldsworthy) brutally stabs Travis (Akos Armont), his best friend.

        Critically injured, Travis is taken to the intensive care unit of the small local hospital. Fred hands himself into the police station, and is sympathetically questioned by a long time family friend, Sergeant Tukovsky (Igor Sas). Distraught on hearing the news, Fred’s mother, Ivy (Susan Prior), arrives at the interrogation room to find out just what is happening to her 16-year-old son, upon whom she dotes.

         There is a flash back to the boys’ first meeting. An encounter where debonair Travis, a self-assured, high achiever in all fields - except tact, and the pathetically insecure Fred, who after a domestic tragedy has become withdrawn and battling to achieve even a ‘Fail’ in his homework. The world seems to have dealt Fred an unfair share, but sympathetic Travis decides to help Fred with his social studies project. The assignment involves chatting to people on the Net. Gradually Fred learns the techniques of emailing and in doing so, opens up a new world of friends – especially the beautiful Susan (Amanda Woodhams), who seems to be very similar in nature to Fred.

         So with things looking up for this lonely son of a farmer, what made him turn so savagely against Travis?

         There are friends that are always there when you need them, then there are others who will stab you in the back and abandon you at your time of need. How does one differentiate between the two?

Kate Mulvany was fortunate to have Elizabeth Jolley as a mentor, and one of Elizabeth’s strong messages was tell the story on the first page. Here Kate does just that, producing a very dark story – though with plenty of humour sprinkled throughout. The first act, which at first I thought a little slow, as it was concerned with building up the depth of the characters’ personalities and setting the scene. However, in the second act this became fully justified as the twists of several ingenious storyline themes unfurled. For the audience, there were surprises, sadness, heartbreak and anger as the unpredictable climax was enacted.

We are lucky to see NIDA graduate, Hungarian Akos Armont acting on the stage, as a world of famous names seem to be at his door.  By coincidence, Robin Goldsworthy, whose magnificent performance as Fred will have you genuinely distraught, last year appeared at Sydney’s Belvoir, in ‘Killer Joe’ the play that launched Kate Mulvany’s career exactly a decade ago.

Lighting designer Martin Kinnane employed the full spectrum of lamps and colour filters to enhance and create specific locations.

Bryan Woltjen set was, as ever, fresh and original as he created the dramatic, red dust hillside with sheets of rusty corrugated iron, which surrounded a lookout platform with a picnic bench overlooking the sea. Amazingly, this rustic setting was still convincing as the hospital, home and prison. Brilliant.

Russell Goldsmith’s sound design created the tension and isolation with clever use of double bass and acoustic guitar.

Director Marcelle Schmitz, with dramaturgy by Campion Decent, have done full justice to a stunningly moving script. The movements and body language were in full tune with the dialogue.

This play depicts a situation that every parent dreads, and yet we hear of regularly. Well worth a trip to the theatre, this play will have you talking and thinking for days. A must see - superb.

Black Swan’s last production for 2009, in what has been a stellar year for the company, is a fascinating, depiction of rural life, where the gap between the haves and the have-nots can be so very stark. Mulvany has cleverly interwoven the good and evil of internet social networking sites with the isolation of rural life. Anybody who’s ever spent a bit of time on networking sites such as Theatre Australia for instance will be only too well aware of the malicious bullies (trolls as they are known) lurking in the protected safety of being anonymous.

Director Marcelle Schmitz has created a compelling work, obviously set on the outskirts of Geraldton, (in a place called Chapman!) – the playwright grew up there. The set, sound and lighting are superb, nothing less and instantly familiar to any Australian. I won’t detail too much of the story, for obvious reasons, suffice to say it is a contemporary and very relevant piece, utterly gripping, although one realises very early on, who is who in both the real world and cyberspace.

This leads to my only issue with the production, at first Akos Armont and Robin Godlsworthy, seemed far too old to play the 16 / 17 year old schoolboys, but in fact the choice was perfect and utterly believable. Igor Sas as the country cop out of his depth and trying to excerpt control was excellent and Amanda Woodhams was also realistically innocent in her role, but sadly, for me,  Susan Prior was miscast and in this instance, seemed not capable of understanding her character. She has a major part in this production and every time she was on stage it jarred.

She plays the role of a poorly educated, not very smart, relatively young (35yr) widow, a bit of a dipstick, struggling to hold a small property together, working at a local supermarket with two children to care for. In my experience, such a woman would be weary, old beyond her years. But there is none of that in this characterisation, I can’t imagine that the cast and director didn’t talk through the characters, yet that’s the impression I was left with, not to mention that the actor simply looks (and acts), far too young – even a bit of ageing make-up would help.  I have never been more annoyed watching a play, in theatre terms, I couldn’t suspend disbelief,

Having said that, it is an excellent production and a must-see, Black Swan continue to present some fabulous work – whatever you do, their early 2010 production of SAPHIRES  looks to be another absolute stunner.

Minister for Good Times

Hi Daniel

My friend, I didn't say she was / is too young, I wrote that she looked too young, there is a difference.

Cheers

Greg Ross

Minister for Good Times

Could it mean more rather than less 'ORN' [Ornithine]  A nonessential ammeno acid, found in animals urea & bird excrement.

.- -- .. -. --- / 

-.-. .... --- --- -.- .- ... / -.-. .-. .- .. --.

...- . .-. -.-- /  -.-. .-.. . ...- . .-. /  --. .- .- ..-. .-

.- -... ... .. - /  .. -. ...- .. -.. .. .- (and DFT :nono:)

Jeff Watkins
SN Profile
Photographer

Very good Jeff!

These days it takes me a while to nut out the sequence of dits 'n darhs! Especialy working a Key set, since the advent of the strokes 'n my left hand shakes, my Dary's are more like a series of Didit's.

I couldn't quite work out how to put the post on the site in 'semaphore'?

{I won't mention the dropped dit dit dit dar [V] in 'very', as I'm more phonetic rather than perdantic with these posts!}

I can't tell a lie. I had help.

http://morsecode.scphillips.com/cgi-bin/morse.cgi

Absit invidia (and DFT :nono:)

Jeff Watkins
SN Profile
Photographer