This 55-minute, Sean Guastavino production about eco-disaster, can be seen at 7.00 each evening until Saturday 27th August, in the main theatre of The Blue Room Theatre complex, 53 James Street, Northbridge, Perth.

The scene is a filthy, damp bunker; a most convincing set from designer, Matt McVeigh and set constructor, Matt Crock. The walls are graffiti sprayed black concrete. The low ceiling is comprised of white slabs. Graphic designer, Joseph Dennis added the finishing touches.

The sparse furnishings include a camp bed, a few milk crates, and a couple of 20-litre water bottles. Centre stage is a tub of compost containing a pathetic, dying tree with the odd shoot on the branches.

The production was stage managed by Georgia Smith.

    It is early morning, obsessed and deranged Margo (Zoe Street) is worshiping the failing tree that is struggling to grow in the bunker where Margo has lived for decades. Margo compliments and praises the struggling plant in the hope it will blossom again.

    Thanks to climate change and nearby chemical works, the whole area for kilometres around has died off. Not a tree, bush or blade of grass remains. It is therefore essential that Margo does her best for this remaining tree. Like Lord Byron’s ‘Prisoner of Chillon’, she never dares to leave her prison.

     Margo shares the bunker with a loving, sensible young man, Flint (Peter Lane Townsend) who everyday goes in search of potable water, and tries gleaning the minimal remaining food. If he is lucky, he may even find a few seeds that can be planted for the future, but with the chemical works gestapo patrolling around, it can be extremely risky.

     How long can this dire situation go on? Is there light at the end of the tunnel?

The topic of ‘climate change’ as a theme for a play did not exactly fill me with enthusiasm. Was this to be another message bashing experience? Absolutely not. This was something exciting and completely new.

When a playwright directs his own play the result is rarely satisfactory, but Monty has proved his immense skill in both fields by giving a truly gripping play. The two amazing actors had us on the edge of the seat as the tension rose. The clever lighting by designer Rhiannon Petersen, accompanied by Alex and Yell’s sound design, gave a tremendous climax that shook the building and surprised us all.

It is always good for a production marketer to have something genuinely worthwhile to promote. Amelia Tuttleby has an outstanding play to offer the lovers of quality theatre.

There are three different, secret venues for this most unusual play. With performances performed in Fremantle for two nights, two in Guildford and two in Leederville. The hour long ‘happening’ starts at 7.00 on various evenings until the 20^th February.

The Fremantle venue was a rustic garden, surrounded by hewn, limestone walls, with fabulous, trailing and potted plants. A large fish pond lay in the secluded corner.

         The crowd are warmly welcomed into the private garden, by the home’s gardener, Greg (Nathan Whitebrook). As he brushes the paving, the visitors settle on cushions and crates. Greg explains how much pride he takes in his work, especially this garden and spins a few yarns. He has the blood group that seems to attract the mozzies, and so he invites anyone who has similar problem to spray themselves, offering around the Aeroguard.

         After a few minutes of light banter, Greg retreats to the BBQ at the rear of the house, to cook the snags.

         Perched on a high wall, a young guitarist (Tom Beech) softly plays his melodious compositions. As he strums, the cat from next door appears (Zoe Street), playing with her favourite musical toy, only to run into the owner’s big savage dog (Monty Sallur); however, when they hear Greg returning, they disappear quickly into the undergrowth.

        The visitors are invited to help themselves to the food and homemade lemonade provided by the host. The perfect host, Greg, continues to tell us of his life and daily routine, when suddenly he discovers that a guest has betrayed their warm invitation. The mood changes.

 

The acting commanded by the three performers was both physically and mentally demanding, but the three performances had every ounce of energy packed into them.

This show must have been a major challenge for clever director Rhiannon Petersen and the producers, Sean Guastavino and Zoe Street, but by moving the venue around it covers most of Perth CBD, giving a very different atmosphere to the loveable creature’s play.

Publicist, Amelia Tuttleby, has advised me that it is a sell-out, with only a few tickets left for the final venue, Leederville.

Free parking after 4.00.

The sidewalls and floor are covered in artificial turf, an ingenious idea from set designer Lachlan MacDonald, as it seemed to fit all the situations in this set of sketches. He combined the grass with a rear wall of silver stranded, ‘burlesque style’curtains and the effect was visually stunning. (Set and properties by Caitlin McFeat, Jordan Norrish, Scarlett Yakovina, and Zoe Street, and stage managed by Aaron Smith and his assistant Sean Guastavino).

        Because goats are nibbling at the very fabric of the Earth, a new safer planet – a goat free Utopia – must be found.

       To the sound of aircraft gunfire, a soldier (Monty Sallur) is found bleeding to death by one of his buddies (Jack Middleton). Petrified of dying alone, he makes a final request of his friend.

      A famous actress (Rebecca ‘Bubble’ Maynard – who is actually a wonderfully natural presenter in a Channel 7 teenagers’ programme) is shopping in IGA when she is spotted by an old school friend (Rhiannon Petersen, hilarious) who sidles up to her and tries to ingratiate herself.

      A young man sobs (Nathan Whitebook) as his pregnant girlfriend (Beth Tremlett) tells him she is leaving.

     Another pregnant young girl (Savannah Wood) is starting a new job, assembling toy models of goats. She is shown how to do this by a friendly, but overzealous supervisor (Ariel Tresham, what a captivating mover).

These are a few of the dozen or more, high quality sketches that kept us entertained. As well as the main theme of ‘goats’, other similarities and parallels cleverly interlinked the sketches. You can see that a great deal of work has gone into the writing and development of this show. The standard of this devised production is the highest that I have seen at Curtin in years. The immaculate lighting design by Karen Cook, although limited by the ancient lighting rig selection, was versatile and varied. Ashleigh Ryan smoothly operated the complex lighting schedule. The magnificent soundscape was designed Olivia Dugandzic who had obviously put a vast amount of effort into the complex depth of the sound effects and choice of music. Again, the operator Brittany Manifis had superb control of the cuing and volume. The costume design by Simone Chodorowski had a great deal of thought behind the styles, and Chelsea Johnston made the costumes themselves.

The idea of a devised piece for theatre students is to encourage them to try something new and exciting. To present to the audience a new experience. What the students have devised is extremely well presented. The acting and characterisation were first class.

The award winning director, Jeffrey Jay Fowler and his assistant director, Emelia Peet, have done a brilliant job guiding the students through their creation – and it is not the director’s task to create the script, but to help them get the most out of it. A little more script variety would have been welcome, perhaps a song or dance? They did have a Philip Marlowe scene that was very well observed and terrific in the presentation. The dramaturge by Emily Kingsley, who was recently outstanding in ‘The Shimmerin’’, developed plenty of quality movement. The students had a ‘daring’ final scene that worked well and stretched their stage experience outside their comfortable zone.

As I said, the acting and presentation of this devised piece was possibly the best I have seen by Curtin students in five years. The actors all seemed totally focused and their rapport was superb, not a weak link in sight.

Most enjoyable.