Jane was 16 Yesterday

A couple of years ago Tony Moore was watching a film called “Suddenly Thirty” about a teenage girl who woke up to find herself thirty years old. It wasn’t a particularly good film and although he was aware that the premise wasn’t meant to be taken seriously Tony began thinking about the various culture shocks that would actually hit a young person in this situation. Really, could a thirteen year old actually cope with a thirty year old’s life and, what is more, do a thirty year old’s job? This has been the theme of a number of films over the years starting with the original “Freaky Friday” and passing through “Big”. In that situation could you really cope with adult attitudes to money, sex and day to day life? Tony didn’t think so. The end result was “Jane was 16 yesterday”. How to create the situation? Well despite the fact that there are no credible reports of anyone waking from a coma Tony decided that this was more likely to happen than some mystical or magical transference of the mind and put his heroine in a coma due to an accident at her 16th birthday party. 24 years later she wakes and meets with a forty year old face in the mirror, a mother who looks like her grandmother and the fact that her father took legal action to have her life support turned off. Could you cope, if it was you? Jane can’t! The play follows Jane and her therapist through several meetings as she comes to terms with the situation. She will never go to her senior formal. She never will play Miranda, even though she finds herself in a Brave New World. Will her mother ever let her out of her wheel chair? Who the hell is Wes Carr, and what is Australian Idol? And at forty, will she ever graduate from high school? Presented by Spotlight Theatre Co, directed by the author and featuring respected Adelaide actors Joanna Webb and Maxine Grubel, the play is coming to the 2010 Adelaide Festival Fringe. It can be seen at J’ahz Lounge from Tuesday 16th Feb to Saturday 6th March 2010. Times vary so please check with the Fringe Guide for individual performance times.