Lot's Wife Edition 8 2013

PERFORMING ARTS
MELBOURNE FRINGE
FESTIVAL REVIEWS
It’s Happening in the Space
Between My Face and Yours
Hannah Barker
There is theatre that
makes you want to see
more theatre. There is
theatre that makes you
want to perform more
theatre. There is theatre
that makes you want to
design more theatre. There is theatre that makes you want to write more
theatre. Izzy Roberts Orr’s It’s Happening in the Space Between My Face and
Yours is theatre that makes you want to do a little bit of each.
When a young woman named Jack goes missing from her inner-
Melbourne share house, her roommates are at a loss. They can’t contact
their friend. They can’t pay the rent. They can’t resolve their various
sexual tensions. They can’t deal with the vacuous RIP messages their
acquaintances are posting on Facebook. They can’t ride their fixies too far
at night, can’t roll their cigarettes, can’t fill the void. They can’t drink the
soymilk because the replacement roomie is relentlessly stealing it. Said
soy-thief can’t even describe the new musical direction his band is taking.
Meanwhile, the audience is sporadically confronted by a sullenfaced
Jack (Jennifer Speirs), back from beyond the grave to deliver
ever-more graphic monologues on her experience of death. The stage
is also flanked constantly by two ever-vigilant, ever-scathing ‘wolves’
(Tom Molyneux & Meagan Lawrie), who wait their turn to spit threats
and obscenities that embody the sense of fear permeating through the
story. Mesmerising and penetrative, they might be distracting were their
purpose not so emblematic.
Co-presented by MUST and Spare Room, It’s Happening ran as part
of the Fringe Festival at Sketch and Tulip Café/Bar in North Melbourne.
The upstairs space lent itself to the dingy rawness of the show. Precarious
piles of chairs in either corner of the stage sank into the brick backdrop
seamlessly, and the transformative door cum table cum bed looked as if it
belonged to the venue. Dim lighting threw appropriately eerie shadows
across the floorboards, and across an LED sign to one side of the set ran a
series of alternately lyrical and blunt observations relating to each scene
(because what’s a Fringe show without a bit of Brecht?)
First-time director Nick Fry, also responsible for the lighting and set
design, deserves commendation for his efforts, and kudos similarly go to
sound designer James Hogan, who successfully matched the audience’s
eardrums and heart rates with the characters’.
I’m not saying it’s the most polished piece of theatre – it’s not. Some
scenes were rather clunky, and some characters appeared two-dimensional
and under-developed. That said, the entire cast was infuriatingly attractive
so I’m willing to suggest that these flaws were merely representative
of the kind of ungainly squalor and haughty individuals that every good
twenty-something share house encounters.
Reeking of poeticism and finesse, the script was penned by the
talented and charming Izzy Roberts-Orr, who, whilst gratified with the
production, promises to take the show back to the workshop for reinvigoration
before a second season sometime in the future or so.
Surreal and visceral, It’s Happening in the Space Between My Face
and Yours is at its core an exploration of sex and death, à la hipsterdom.
The tagline says it best: “We love. We fuck. We live. We survive. We’re
afraid.”
Gouti: The God of Them All
Hannah Barker
I honestly do
not have the
words to accurately
describe
the spectacle
that is Gouti:
The God of
Them All. A
two-hour long
combination of musical comedy and absurdist theatre, Gouti (pronounced
GOO-TEE) is a strange, boisterous adventure among the mythical Spanish
gods. It’s as charming as it is peculiar, and probably broaches some
sincere issues to do with human eccentricity - but I just can’t be sure.
Performed at The Owl and the Pussycat in Richmond, in a cramped,
cement space (which is actually cosier that it sounds), Gouti’s cast members
outnumbered the audience on the evening I attended (other nights
were sold out, though). Despite the scale and flamboyance of the show,
the intimate setting played to its advantage, heightening its melodrama
and absurdism tenfold. It also allowed for close admiration of the array of
crude and colourful costumes.
LOT’S WIFE EDITION 8 • 2013
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