Cliffhanger by Mardi McConnochie. The Jigsaw Company directed by Lynette Wallis at The Street Theatre, Thursday to Saturday May 28 - 30 and June 4 - 6, 1998, 8 pm. Professional.
The Jigsaw Company must be the oldest fully professional theatre company in Canberra, coming up to 22 this year. Originally funded largely by ACT Education as our theatre-in-education company, Jigsaw has continued to win contracts every three years through the 1980's and '90's giving school children an education in and through theatre - and professionally developing the teachers.
Cliffhanger more than maintains Jigsaw's reputation - it extends into a new form of theatre. Like the new "young adult" novel, this is theatre which begins to cross over the boundary between genres.
It is no longer theatre for children. The characters are young but their chaotic feelings, their internalised restraints and excesses, and the power of the future over the choices they make now, place them in the adult world. Yet the theatrical form - the acting style, the design, the use of comedy - is directly in the theatre-in-education tradition. Probably the nearest other genres are the Workers' Theatre and Community Theatre of recent decades, but they usually espouse a clear political or social viewpoint.
McConnochie has stuck to the integrity of theatre-in-education which can raise issues but must not be didactic or polemical. Wallis's direction, and the characterisation and timing skills of Jane O'Donnell (Katie) and Nick Hardcastle (Stefan), create a play which is just as much an education for adults - about their own lives in retrospect - as it is for young people trying to deal with love in an unstable out-of-control world. It is a tough play, though leavened by humour, multi-media (used in very innovative ways) and stunts dangerous enough to require a stunt director (Adam Kronenberg).
Cliffhanger is playing school matinees as well as evenings at The Street. I think late teenagers and their parents should go, together or separately, and young ragers up to at least 25 will surely recognise themselves and enjoy the experience. I also recommend to Playing Australia that they help fund the projected country town tour, especially where an original Palais Picture Theatre still stands. See Cliffhanger, and you'll see why.
© Frank McKone, Canberra
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