Sarah Kane dedicated this, possibly her best piece, to the author Mark Ravenhill, another wonderful writer of a similar age and daring style. Ravenhill has described her writing as ‘achieving canonical status’.

This powerful and dark, 1-hour play is based around the pain found in love; it is recommended for audiences over 16 yrs. It is being presented by the highly driven, WA Youth Theatre Company in the Theatre Underground Studio, within the State Theatre Centre, Northbridge each evening at 7.30 pm until Saturday 11th June.

The lyrics, ‘An Echo, A Stain’ on Björk’s 2001 album ‘Vespertine’ are based on this play.

The director played occasional soft chords on a bass guitar as a backing.

Crave takes place in an abstract world. The four actors stand static and facing the audience, on a low dais. The lighting design was by Dylan Dorotich-O’Keefe.

The author did not provide context, stage directions or descriptions of the four characters. Simply known as A, B, C and M. ‘A’ having the main, larger passages.

The two cast alternated performances. I saw cast two.

A: was Declan Brown alternating with Luke Binetti,

B: was Odne Stenseth and George Ashforth

C: was Ally Harris and Katherine Langford

M: was Daisy Coyle and Megan Hollier

Directed by the company’s artistic director, Renato Fabretti is honoured and eager to present ‘Crave’, a conversation on mental health amongst four WA’s young adults. Renato was assisted in his directing by Eloise Carter.

This ground breaking work does not dodge the complexities and realities of mental health, but embraces them. Sarah Kane, who tragically suicided, asked that the players should not simply ‘act’ their parts, but in an advanced Mike Leigh style of acting, where they should live, experience and be totally absorbed by them, for weeks before performing.

The cast had a nightmare script that comprised mainly of short snappy sentences, being delivered almost at random from each of the four characters. This meant that the normal continuity and feeding each other a line disappeared. The topics and events – some real, some imagined – that each actor described included rape, incest, paedophilia, anorexia, drug addiction, mental instability, murder and suicide, all in an unsystematic manner and so the script had to be thoroughly learned to ensure flow.

The delivery was precise, the diction clear, the pace perhaps a little too fast but a great deal of admiration must go to the cast for never dropping a line or missing a beat. I did however find that the vocal range was limited in all four actors, and that another register or lower octave would have enhanced their feelings.

There was some emotion in the complex performances, but the real depth, inner suffering and anger at the misery perpetrated upon them did not really come through. Good performances, but not quite enough experience behind these young actors.

This week, another friend of the director, Kate Dickie (of ‘Game of Thrones’ fame) has just become a Scottish ambassador for Alzheimer’s.

Like all of Sarah Kane’s plays, this is a drama that demanded so much more of this bold cast of young performers – their honesty, sensitivity, courage and their SOULS.

In her youth, Churchill started writing with feminist or Brechtian themes, but in her later years has swung around to the more surreal and ‘open writing’ approach.

This 95-minute collection of vignettes, produced by Theatre Arts at Curtin, can be seen at Hayman Theatre Upstairs, in building 102, Curtin University, Kent Street, Bentley. The parking in Carpark B13 is free after 5.00 pm. The performances are nightly at 7.00 pm until the 5^th March at the low-ticket price of $15.

The set was designed by Sally Phipps with input from Amy Tamati, and built by the Hayman stalwart, Ian Stewart. Sally has built a low-level stage, with three sides of plain white flats, allowing the audience to spy effectively in private, into the white box. There are three flush, white doors leading into the box. Half a dozen, 60 cms white wooden cubes symbolised such diverse objects as ‘hedgehogs’ and ‘cinema seats’. Dylan Dorotich and Sally Davies managed the stage.

Maddy Mullins conceived the massive selection of costumes. With the show being so fast moving, one wonders how the characters managed to change in time for their next appearance. I suspect that the assistant stage managers (Jack Bengough, Paris Fields, Ellen Parfrey) were also acting as dressers for the cast.

Lighting and projection designer, George Ashforth had a myriad of well thought out lighting combinations. He employed under floor lights and colourful lasers, as well as the normal LEDs. George also provided difficult to obtain videos, and projection slides. Monique Bertolini operated the lighting flawlessly. Ryan Hunt’s audio design was excellent.

With 57 different ‘Acts’, some lasting a couple of minutes and others as short as even ten seconds, I will simply list the hard working and impressive actors, who had roughly 10 parts each.

 

Lauren Beeton

Declan Brown

Eloise Carter

Chelsea Gibson

Anna Lindstedt

Holly Mason

Nelson Mondlane

Jess Nyanda Moyle.

Director Teresa Izzard and her assistant director Becca Jackson were faced with a cliff face to tackle in presenting this play. The playwright has not created any characters, names and often, even the gender is not mentioned. There are no direction instructions, nor hints on how to approach the extremely varied topics – just dialogue. Subjects like sex – it had to be there – along with torture, children’s problems, marriage and anti-vivisection are all included in the three-score topics. The director had to invent the scenarios and then encourage the cast to add any of their own experiences to the story threads. This major challenge was proficiently conquered with the whole cast giving the numerous characters instant and recognisable personalities.

The show went at a tremendous pace, with only two or three of the stories not working (the writer perhaps being a little too adventurous). A very enjoyable night at the theatre, with something a little offbeat. It is always pleasant to see a team trying something new.

This 80-minute, high drama can be seen for one week only, at The Blue Room Main Theatre, 53 James Street, Northbridge. Performances are nightly, at 7.00 pm until Saturday 13^th December.

A two-metre high, wire fence, with barbed wire around the top surrounds the rough and tough senior school. The yard is littered with leaves, school desk, an old rusty oil barrel and the stark concrete walls of the school, with steel girders as their hard, crowning glory (Designer, Patrick Howe and built by Bianca Stewart, Jennifer Scullion, Annika Jane, Eleanor Davison and Alexander Gerrans). Christopher McIntosh sourced the unusual props.

        In the corner of the schoolyard sits 14-year-old Eva (Eloise Carter), a slightly nerdy introvert. Because her Grandfather was on the Kokoda Trail, and her brother, Clint (Ryan Hunt) is serving in the forces in Afghanistan, Eva is obsessed with war history. Much to her mother, Trish’s (Ashleigh Morris) horror she wants to join the forces.

Latching on to Eva’s infatuation with history, the two school bullies, Sophie (Zoe Street) and Cate (Gemma Middleton) attack her ruthlessly, and regularly, Eva has to be rescued by her caring teacher, Ms Carlton (Amelia Tuttleby).

Eva’s only real friend is the shy youngster, Lucy (Amy Johnston) who may have designs on Eva. Lucy is forced by the school slut, Paige (Holly Dodd) to find her customers. Poor insecure Harry (Kane Parker) is ripped off in his determination to discover ‘the meaning of life’.

Eva’s older sister, Matilda (Violette Ayad) is pregnant to her abusive boyfriend, junky Turk (Sean Guastavino). Will Eva take Ms Carlton’s advice and leave the area?

McCall has cleverly blended present day tragedies with flashbacks of the horrors of war, as Eva recalls her Grandfather’s stories. There are dozens of good solid, interesting storylines in this meld of human psyche and life’s inevitable route. These are brought to life with the photographs (Leigh Brennan) and visual projections, Tristan McInnes.

A few months ago, many of these actors were in the wilderness, but director Mark Storen, to quote a school movie, has ‘taken them from crayons to perfume’. There were some amazing performances, all were WELL above average, but top marks must go to Eloise Carter and Sean Guastavino. The dramaturg was under Michelle Endersbee guidance, and she had the large group of actors perform well in the small space. With a flash of light, or an explosion, the schoolyard was converted for a few seconds to the trenches, the horrors of internment camps with the inmates clawing the wires, before returning to a parallel situation in modern life. The comparisons were at times quite horrific.

The clever costume choice described the wearers’ personalities perfectly (Sally Ostrowski and Amanda King). The lighting effects (designer, Karen Cook) were well thought out and presented. From blood red sets to the stark coldness of the battlefield. The lighting operators were Rhiannon Peterson and Aaron Smith. The sound effects were numerous, but the most spectacular being the overhead helicopter (Soundscape Elliot Macri, George Ashforth and Stephen McGuire).

Samantha Barrett and her deputies, Kharla Fannon and Amy Tamati, efficiently handled the stage management.

A very powerful play, with many metaphors on life over the years. From the seedy to the brave, the controlling to the dominated, this show has it all. One of Curtin’s best presentations. Try to catch it and admire how all aspects have been undertaken and conquered.