All-Mother devised by barb barnett, written by Matt Marshall, directed by Scott Wright. Serious Theatre at The Street Theatre January 25 to February 4, 8pm. Bookings 6247 1223.
All-Mother is a fantasy, quite fascinating for its unlikely origins in bureaucratic Canberra where the myth of Lilith seems a little out of kilter with our daily experience. Maybe our built environment, however much we like to call it a bush capital, makes people feel the need for a story which somehow links our ever conflicting emotions, especially in our sexual relationships, to an explanatory point of origin.
barb barnett has chosen to work over several years on the apocryphal story of Lilith, of whom you may not have heard. In the Bible, God apparently creates people twice. In Genesis Chapter 1 Verse 27 "God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." But in Chapter 2 Verse 7 "God formed man of the dust of the ground" and in Verses 21/22 "he took one of [Adam's] ribs ... and made he a woman." Confusion reigned until the 11th Century when a Hebrew text claimed that the Verse 7 woman was Lilith, Adam's first wife - who argued with him on the grounds that they were created equal - while the Verse 22 woman was the well-known Eve, who could never claim to be equal in origin to Adam.
All-Mother presents us with Punch and Judy representing Adam and Eve, while Lilith, played by barnett, is shown in scenes in which she clashes with Eve, her story going backwards to the point of her creation. In this version of the myth, which corresponds more with Bernard Shaw's Back to Methusaleh, Lilith is the original creation - the mother of Adam and all human life ever since. Her retreat backwards is perhaps justified when we see Punch and Judy traditionally bashing each other, until they both die, return as ghosts and continue arguing about whether they are in heaven or hell.
The on-stage puppetry, the scenery, lighting and sound track are excellent, in keeping with Scott Wright's day job as director of Erth-Visual and Physical Inc who brought Gondwana to the National Museum recently. I found the mythical scenes rather slow, trying too hard to be "significant", but All-Mother is unusual theatre, if not entirely successful.
© Frank McKone, Canberra
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