Appalling behaviour
Fri, 25 Mar 2011, 08:07 amGordon the Optom1 post in thread
Appalling behaviour
Fri, 25 Mar 2011, 08:07 am‘Appalling Behaviour’ was written by AWGIE winning playwright, Stephen House. Stephen has also been granted the Australian Writers’ Guild Award twice and short listed for the Patrick White and the Queensland Premier’s Award. This Professional Collective production, straight from a most successful, but somewhat controversial, Adelaide season, is showing at The Blue Room Theatre main theatre, 53 James Street, Northbridge until Saturday 9th April. All performances are at 8.30 pm.
The show then travels to Melbourne, Queensland and India.
At the corner of the Rue de Rivoli in Paris, there is a rap band playing. Nearby a dishevelled, filthy alcoholic (Stephen House) is dancing clumsily. Slowly this middle-aged Australian, who has staggered around the world to reach his nadir in one Europe’s most beautiful cities, starts to tell his story.
It is obvious from his quality of diction, range of vocabulary and phraseology that this is a man who, despite telling us that he came from a slimy city, was once of reasonable social standing. Now with only a few miserable possessions in his shoulder bag, he is alone.
Then he spots the most beautiful sight that he has seen in years, a young girl called Caroline, his Parisian Princess. They build up a friendship; at last he has someone in the world who will speak to him with affection. They meet another street dweller, Romano, now the wino has an admirer.
Will things slowly get better or dive into a deeper morass?
On the way to the theatre I had to negotiate my way around a piece of human detritus sleeping on the ground, I thought why don’t the police or social workers get rid of these people?
Stephen’s 80-minute performance was riveting, starting with repulsion at this embarrassment of a man. He takes you through an extremely well observed two or three days in the life of a street dweller. The insecurity, the bipolar changes, the highs and lows of drugs – yes, this wasn’t a pretty sight, but one that every social worker and caring profession should experience. A stunning play, poetically written but confronting. The sudden outbreaks of temper initially were bothersome and disturbing to the glass-encased security of the audience, but slowly you felt yourself swing around to having compassion and understanding. This life change could happen to you or your children. You experienced his intense need for love, the appalling distress from loneliness.
Stephen’s whole body portrayed the picture. Every muscle twitched, tears were shed. An absolutely amazing performance and piece of writing. Brilliant.
Extremely well directed by Justin McGuinness, but I still feel that Stephen has ‘been there, done that’ and that much of the movement would have been almost innate.
Peter Neilson’s backdrop of sound, with all of the traffic and vendors gave a genuine Paris street feel.
Simple but effective lighting by Nic Mollison and Alex Plisko
When I went back to the car park and walked around the human bundle sleeping on the pavement, I looked again with a much different light, what was this man’s story? Could he have been a teacher or doctor, will he ever get back to his old status?
Some will hate the confrontation of their conscience by this play. Other will be repulsed by his manner, but if you open your heart and soul you will come away with a different attitude.
Not an easy night out but certainly a superlative one.
‘Appalling Behaviour’ was written by AWGIE winning playwright, Stephen House. Stephen has also been granted the Australian Writers’ Guild Award twice and short listed for the Patrick White and the Queensland Premier’s Award. This Professional Collective production, straight from a most successful, but somewhat controversial, Adelaide season, is showing at The Blue Room Theatre main theatre, 53 James Street, Northbridge until Saturday 9th April. All performances are at 8.30 pm.
The show then travels to Melbourne, Queensland and India.
At the corner of the Rue de Rivoli in Paris, there is a rap band playing. Nearby a dishevelled, filthy alcoholic (Stephen House) is dancing clumsily. Slowly this middle-aged Australian, who has staggered around the world to reach his nadir in one Europe’s most beautiful cities, starts to tell his story.
It is obvious from his quality of diction, range of vocabulary and phraseology that this is a man who, despite telling us that he came from a slimy city, was once of reasonable social standing. Now with only a few miserable possessions in his shoulder bag, he is alone.
Then he spots the most beautiful sight that he has seen in years, a young girl called Caroline, his Parisian Princess. They build up a friendship; at last he has someone in the world who will speak to him with affection. They meet another street dweller, Romano, now the wino has an admirer.
Will things slowly get better or dive into a deeper morass?
On the way to the theatre I had to negotiate my way around a piece of human detritus sleeping on the ground, I thought why don’t the police or social workers get rid of these people?
Stephen’s 80-minute performance was riveting, starting with repulsion at this embarrassment of a man. He takes you through an extremely well observed two or three days in the life of a street dweller. The insecurity, the bipolar changes, the highs and lows of drugs – yes, this wasn’t a pretty sight, but one that every social worker and caring profession should experience. A stunning play, poetically written but confronting. The sudden outbreaks of temper initially were bothersome and disturbing to the glass-encased security of the audience, but slowly you felt yourself swing around to having compassion and understanding. This life change could happen to you or your children. You experienced his intense need for love, the appalling distress from loneliness.
Stephen’s whole body portrayed the picture. Every muscle twitched, tears were shed. An absolutely amazing performance and piece of writing. Brilliant.
Extremely well directed by Justin McGuinness, but I still feel that Stephen has ‘been there, done that’ and that much of the movement would have been almost innate.
Peter Neilson’s backdrop of sound, with all of the traffic and vendors gave a genuine Paris street feel.
Simple but effective lighting by Nic Mollison and Alex Plisko
When I went back to the car park and walked around the human bundle sleeping on the pavement, I looked again with a much different light, what was this man’s story? Could he have been a teacher or doctor, will he ever get back to his old status?
Some will hate the confrontation of their conscience by this play. Other will be repulsed by his manner, but if you open your heart and soul you will come away with a different attitude.
Not an easy night out but certainly a superlative one.