Tiger Country by Jonathan Gavin
SBW Stables Theatre - Stablemates
29 November 2007
As first published in The Daily Telegraph.
When you set out to write any Australian play that is set on the fringes of society and includes a male murdering a female, critics predictably compare it to the classic play (and later film), The Boys. 
It's a predicament that forces many Australian playwrights to stay away from domestic violence and social breakdown as subjects.
Yet Jonathan Gavin has written a breathtaking play that captures degeneration on the suburban fringe with style, humour and an inescapable truth.
In an unspecified suburb in the deep southwest of Sydney's sprawling metropolis are theUrwin brothers who are getting ready to celebrate Christmas.
Eddie (Josef Ber) is a brutal yet charismatic husband to sweet Kylie (Eve Morley). There is the naive Howl (Matthew Moore), the most easily influenced and younger of the brothers - who is protected by the stronger character of Rachelle (Nicole Winkler).
Finally there is the violent elder brother Chuckles (James Evans) who sweeps into every scene like a great white on a crowded surf break.
Gavin captures a real sense of tension, and although it is slightly predictable, he creates a hunger for the audience to know what will happen next. It is horror fiction live on stage.
The direction here by John Sheedy shows its hand far too much. He has created a caricature of the characters compared to what Gavin wrote. Their motivations are lost and it feels patronising towards have-nots who populate the play (and world).
Coupled with this is an over-the-top musical design (RobinMcCarthy) that over-plays the horror.
It is a shame the text wasn't more subtly dealt with, as it may have silenced those itching to put another play under the long shadow of The Boys.
Until 22nd December
$22/29
Call 1300 306 776
griffintheatre.com.au
Monday, 17 December 2007
Review: Tiger Country
Posted by Nicholas Pickard at 1:57 pm
Labels: Australian Plays, Independent Theatre, Review, Theatre
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
6 comments:
Having worked with Jonathan Gavin for several months (and shared a dressing room with him) there is no doubt he is one of the brightest and most creative young people working in Sydney theatre. Along with Toby Schmidz (sp?) and Brendan Cowell, these are actors who also write extremely well. It bodes well for the future, and the next wave of Sydney playwrights.
I walked out of the show shaken, disturbed and thinking - 'OK, so there was something there [there had to be – all his previous work had been overtly – but in a good way - socio-political] but it hasn't become coherent for me'.
I read the writer's note and he explicitly says he's got a 'bigger idea' in mind, but I couldn't put it all together. Does it destroy a play to state it's 'meaning' in the programme? I'm not sure it does, but I can understand why you would be reluctant to spell it out.
Perhaps the 'fault' of the writing is that the imagery doesn't come through with clarity [for a simple lass like me] in a straight naturalistic presentation of the play....but that's what the director is for no?
I got the idea of abused power and the rhetoric of 'protecting the family' being used to justify the abuse and entrenchment of power. I got an 'alternative' presented in Rachelle's [a one-note, monotonous performance in an otherwise excellent cast] line: 'What happens to one of us happens to all of us.' And Howl's [which I thought was "Howard" for a moment] idealised world of chemists giving away medicine because they 'would realise you needed it' had raised itself above the parapet of my mind without clearly taking hold.
So the show I saw was a skillfully directed and acted melodrama made from a much more interesting potential play about nationalism and political rhetoric in Oz....but I think that to get that you need to talk to the writer because in carefully watching the [hilarious and excitingly dramatic] production I totally missed it. [As have all the reviews I've read until now.]
It is testament to the skills of the production team that I enjoyed a great tale and was shaken by the horror of the story but I think there's another level to the play that gets hidden by this production’s many fine qualities.
Possibly the dialogue is so sharp and characters so well drawn that they are irresistibly seductive to actors weaned on a diet of rather shallow writing that dominates so much of what we laughingly call an Australian actor's career.
And the performances are, with one exception, splendid work – and I should not be too hard on that one as everyone else has held it up as one of the best in the show…must be what I ate that night.
The direction is a superior example of naturalistic work - although there are [as you have said] some relationship details signaled too early and the announcement of the death of the mother staged so that we cannot see the effect that news has on the character it affects most crucially.
Has the director has been seduced by the serial killer surface story. He says in his note that the play brings you 'face to face with the beast that lies in human nature'. That isn't the limit of this play. Its title is "Tiger Country" and it's the second word that's most important. It's not the tiger that lives in us - it's the tiger we live in. Are we an economy or a community? What can be excused as 'in the national interest'? And who pays that price? What does it mean to be true-blue?
If instead of radio voice-overs about the serial killer [and scene changes that were not much more than slightly embarrassed re-arrangements of furniture accompanied by loud tiger roars and slow-mo gunshot effects] we had been given political excerpts about 'it's in the best interests of the country', workers getting sacked and offered reduced pay and conditions, executive salary explosions, talk about the extra stresses on families from "work choices", refugees mistreatment, denials about being told about AWB, weapons of mass destruction, non-core promises, the rhetoric of sorry/regret etc we might, as an audience, have spent less time thinking anxiously about violence and reflected on the society that brought this about.
I guess I'm asking for framing devices to detach us from the drama for a moment and let us think....I know my Brechtian G-string is showing "but that's me, that's just who I am."
It was a great night in a shallow theatre, powerfully effecting and disturbing - but it could have been all that and also taken us into the deeper water where the darker monsters stir.
Am I alone in finding the writings of Cowell and Schmidt sloppy and juvenile and two drafts short of a rehearsal copy?
noam plume, thanks for your detailed response.
As you are aware I was quite underwhelmed by the direction of the piece but I absolutely agree that there is something even deeper in this script.
That's why I felt that the caricature's that the actors were displaying sadly ignored a possible more powerful performance(but interestingly I really liked Rachelle's performance).
And that's why I knew that other reviewers would be quick to compare to The Boys. It's nothing like The Boys and is a newer play in a newer post September 11 - with the rumblings of a destructive war just over the channel in Iraq.
I am not so sure about your Brechtian leaning - in fact one of the major reasons I disliked the production was the heavy handedness. The script alone is extremely powerful but when jack-hammered through by the sound and direction it weakens the message.
(Where oh where has subtelty gone from our theatres?? Are theatre creatives being sucked into the dolby surround sound pop culture where EVERYTHING HAS TO BE LOUD OK!!!!!!)
By the way Nicholas, would you please include the link to James Waites' blog on your list of theatre blogs? Waites has long been one of the best observers of Sydney theatre we've had.
Totally agree with the LOUDNESS of theatre today...but I hope that a director would apply a subtle Brechtian brush. [A glimps of the g-string rather than a full on pole-dance-fuck-me-boys-I'm-here-for the-entire-crew disaster...did I just go too far?]
I was just musing about how that production could be tweaked to bring forward some of it's depth....
I'm constantly intrigued by the perception of performance. It is so varied. The night I watched I felt that Rachelle was a caricature and absent of variation or nuance and that the other performances had such sublty in spades. Am I right that you felt the other way around? I went along in the second week - did you see a more evolved/ later show?
Must run. Love ya gear.
Post a Comment