★★★★★
Adelaide Fringe. Powersuit Productions. Holden Street Theatres. 7 Mar 2023
This is a cracker of a play and performance! Because the revelation of information is so exquisitely written - so subtly moving under the radar of action - you may want the same experience I had by approaching it with little foreknowledge.
Safe to say housemates – a vivacious young woman and witty homosexual – are cosily comfortable in their flat, which takes on a kind of Covid self-isolation. Their portals to their surrounding urban universe are via their regular podcast to an army of followers and the occasional foray to work and dating entanglements. They cuddle and converse like never-ending friendship. Everything is OK until something goes wrong and the characters are profoundly tested.
Playwright Laura Jackson is highly credentialed and experienced. Most of her creativity focusses on women’s experiences with street harassment, domestic violence (ie: not safe anywhere), online privacy and fertility. Jackson notes that The Culture was first written in 2014 but is now tweaked for today, and things are only worse since Rosie Batty was Australian of the Year.
Laura Jackson has written a completely modern play that mirrors urbanites aged 20s or so with complete veracity – a complex milieu of connection and trepidation. Jackson also plays the young female with effervescent exuberance, a-teeter between confidence and fragility. Mina Asfour is a theatre creative working out of Western Sydney. His performance is like none at all – so realistic and natural. Together, their characters’ friendship, loyalty and spats make for an easy verisimilitude.
The original production was directed in New York by Bethany Caputo and made ready for the current tour by Carly Fisher. The detail in the direction fosters the pace and the poignancy. A screen showing phone texts and podcasts is extremely useful.
There is a message about domestic violence but the narrative focusses on the damage and the response, not on the perpetrator, and we cheer our dynamic duo for making good decisions.
A terrific tale told with delectable realism. Bravo!
P.S. The Robson Jackson Foundation supports a charity in each city of their tour; in Adelaide, it is the Western Adelaide Domestic Violence Service (part of Women’s Safety Services SA). The foundation will match donations of up to $2000 in each city - $10,000 in total. Get onto it.
David Grybowski
When: 7 to 16 Mar
Where: Holden Street Theatres – The Arch
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
