1997: An Ordinary Day by Franca Rame and Dario Fo and Can't Pay Won't Pay by Dario Fo

An Ordinary Day by Franca Rame and Dario Fo and Can't Pay Won't Pay by Dario Fo.  Ugly Duckling and Canberra Independent Artists in the Fo Festival at The Street Theatre Studio 7.30 pm till September 13 (Tuesdays to Saturdays).

    The Fo Festival's second opening night last Thursday turned out to be a more exciting evening of theatre than the first night.  The band led a more substantial and lively audience, and Can't Pay Won't Pay is not so intent on following logical twists and turns of political polemics as Accidental Death of an Anarchist. 

    The program alternates Waking Up / Accidental Death with Ordinary Day / Can't Pay on the weekday evenings, but on Saturday September 6 at 5.00 pm Waking Up is teamed with Ordinary Day, while on Saturday evenings Accidental Death and Can't Pay go together.  Be prepared for a long evening on Saturdays.

    For me, the best combination for performance quality would be Waking Up and Can't Pay Won't Pay.  An Ordinary Day makes a slow start because it is presented too naturalistically until towards the end when her "ordinary day" finally gets the better of the woman who no longer wants to commit suicide but is about to be mistakenly committed as insane.  The play, like all Rame / Fo plays, is essentially expressionistic and needs to emphasise the humour until the last moment when the reality of life's absurdity hits home.

    Can't Pay Won't Pay is much closer to commedia, farce and circus and is performed with appropriate gusto.  Its theme - that people must take things into their own hands and not wait for governments, unions or (in the Italian tradition) even the communist party to solve society's problems - is built into the fun revolving around apparently pregnant women rounded out by bags of food nicked from the supermarket whose manager blames "market forces" for high prices.  Being light-hearted, like Waking Up, I feel the satirical points sink in more firmly and the characters become more human than in Accidental Death of an Anarchist.

    Performances will soon settle in: you will need to go to two shows to get the best of the Fo Festival and the best is worth seeing.
   
© Frank McKone, Canberra