The Flu Season

‘The ‘Flu Season’. The title stands for ‘the fatigue resulting from all the sick-days wasted in coming up with a title’. New York writer and Pulitzer Prize Finalist, Will Eno, renowned for his mad-hat comedy ‘Thom Pain’. Edward Albee has said, ‘Will Eno is one of the finest young playwrights I have come across in a number of years’ high praise indeed from a master of the theatre.

This production is showing at the Hayman Theatre, Building 101, Curtin University, Bentley. Performances start at 8.00 pm, with the shows running until 14^th May.

         The setting is a hospital, and an autistic man (Jordan Nix) is being signed in by a doctor (David Cronin), across the corridor a withdrawn woman (Elizabeth Frodsham) is helped by a euphoric nurse (Rebecca Miller). They are committed to the same mental institution, where the carers are just as disturbed as the patients. The total hospital staff is embodied by this nurse and doctor, theoretically sane characters. They employ the methods of Scottish existentialist and anti-psychologist, Laing, showing whether we are rock-bottom, insane patients or skilled medical practitioners, that we can't always control the journey through our fragile lives.

        The two non-participating characters are the optimistic, sensitive Prologue (great performance from first year student Sophie Kesteven) and the dark, unhappy Epilogue (Taylor Russert); advise us from the wings what we are watching and how it was written. At times this narration is lucid, but more often it is deliberately vague or even confusing, as the playwright inventively experiments with his own feelings and prejudices, along with those of his characters.

       When the analysis sessions take place, inevitably the man and the woman will lie there, as the self-centred doctor relates his life story and the bubbly nurse pours out tales of her world trips.

        As time goes by, the patients meet and fall in love. Will this be the ideal ending?

        Prologue, recognising that despite its often genuinely dark humour and beautiful language, states this is a difficult play.  She reminds the audience that the performance they have just seen never actually took place but was simply words uttered by actors to give the impression of a real event.

With the author’s wild but talented use of evocative similes, metaphors, hackneyed catch phrases and consistently confrontational words, combined with very clever use of puns and the meanings of words. Not only is this show quite taxing for the actors, by demanding a great deal of vigour and concentration, but it is exigent for the audience, who may have become too absorbed to appreciate the full intricacies of the disciplined script. Watching this play with a ‘chewing gum for the mind’ attitude the audience will think the play pointless and stupid. Listening to the extremely clever dialogue can be most satisfying.

The director of this challenging work is Leah Mercer, assisted by Lawson Reeves. It is good to see a theatre studies lecturer having the courage to tackle such a difficult project for the benefit of the acting students. It is so much easier to put on a well-tried piece that is a guaranteed audience draw, but of little benefit or experience for the cast.

As the inmates changed from peaceful to bipolar, Karen Cook’s lighting became harsher and spots set at unusual angles were used most effectively. The lighting operators were Chantal Victor and Amber Moore.

Shane Tan’s set design was realistic, with some unusual props sourced by Christopher Hill and Brooke Ewens. Well chosen costumes by Erin Hegarty.

The standard of acting was excellent, smooth with good enunciation, however many of the play on words needed to be delivered with a little more punch for the audience to have appreciation.

True this is a drama with an indefinable theme and plot, but for the student the writing is ingenious -  although somewhat ethereal - with the characters being protoplasmic (dramaturg by Alex Brittan) and changing throughout, a definite ‘must’ for all students of English, who admire good playwriting and a writer’s ability to play with words. For the average man in the street, this is a tricky, but satisfying light tragedy, filled with laugh-aloud humour. Let the audience decide at what level they are appreciating the play.