2019: The Gospel According to Paul by Jonathan Biggins

 The Gospel According to Paul, written and performed by Jonathan Biggins.  Canberra Theatre Centre Playhouse, March 26-31, 2019.

Reviewed by Frank McKone
March 26

Jonathan Biggins as Paul Keating, determined schemer.

According to the gospel according to Jonathan Biggins, Paul Keating said of recently-ejected Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull that he was “the only man who could make a real leather jacket look like vinyl”.  For me this one line ecapsulated both the perspicacity of Biggins and the subtle contumely of the real Keating.  It does not matter whether Keating actually ever said it: if he didn’t, we have no doubt he could have.

The Gospel According to Paul places Biggins one step above the other significant playwright of Australian Labor tradition – the late Bob Ellis who, with historian Robin McLachlan, showed us the Light on the Hill in A Local Man, his study of Ben Chifley.  (My review of its first performance in August 2004 and a later feature article in February 2007 were published in The Canberra Times; my original text can be accessed at www.frankmckone2.blogspot.com )

The ending of A Local Man might show Ben Chifley as a match for Paul Keating:

Just three days before his death:    (The lights begin to flicker.)  BEN: Hang on, the lights are going off ....  Bloody Liberal government.  Bunnerong and Bungeroff.  (The lights go out.)

Ellis successfully created the character of Ben Chifley in a script which is a major achievement, welding art and accurate history, revealing what were Ben’s personal devils, clawing away at his sense of self-worth.  In 2004, Bob Ellis said to me, as we discussed the then current Prime Minister’s understanding of history, “John Howard’s motto is ‘Ignorance is strength’ while Chifley took the opposite view that ‘Knowledge is power’ and should be made available to everyone.”

Ellis also told me “Bob Hawke wept on my shoulder” and “Bob Carr cried, perhaps the only time since his father’s funeral” after seeing A Local Man in its season at Sydney’s Ensemble Theatre.

Keating, in a setting representing his interests in art, music
and the 18th Century, at a self-analytical moment.

Yet Jonathan Biggins has done more.  Not only has he done the research, acknowledging “the three authors who I leant on most: Troy Bramston, Kerry O’Brien and Don Watson” and written the script, but then performs in the character he has created, directly in conversation with his audience – in a manner so true in word, intonation and physical action that we could feel without a shadow of doubt that this was Paul Keating himself on stage – even when his microphone played up and he had to duck into the wings to have it fixed.

Keating's slide show includes defeating Bob Hawke as Prime Minister
20 December 1991

As Ellis and McLachlan did for Ben Chifley, though the weeping for Paul Keating is more likely to be through laughing, so Biggins has thoroughly fulfilled his hope – in his Creator’s Note – to “shed the occasional light on the contradictions and complexities of a great leader whose vision, courage and determination are sadly missing in what passes for our contemporary political class.  Do better, ya mugs!”

Definitely not to be missed.

Photos by Brett Boardman

© Frank McKone, Canberra

2019: How to Rule the World by Nakkiah Lui

Michelle Lim Davidson, Nakkiah Lui, Anthony Taufa

How to Rule the World by Nakkiah Lui.  Sydney Theatre Company at the Sydney Opera House Drama Theatre, February 11 – March 30, 2019.

Reviewed by Frank McKone
March 16

2430 years ago, Aristophanes ripped into the stupidly destructive power play between ancient Sparta and his home town Athens in his satiric play Lystrata.  The women made it plain: no sex until you stop fighting.

William Shakespeare began his lifetime criticism of the rule of absolute monarchs (ie Queen Elizabeth) in the 1580s (Henry VI, Richard III) but soon realised he had to write obliquely, for his own safety, and turned to comedy (The Comedy of Errors and Taming of the Shrew)

In 1677 Aphra Behn established the place of women writers in The Rover, or The Banish'd Cavaliers, her satiric re-write of Thomas Killigrew’s Thomaso.

As World War I approached, George Bernard Shaw used the ancient Greek myth of Pygmalion in his most enduring comedy of manners, of Professor Henry Higgins and flower-girl Eliza Doolittle, nowadays in the musical form of My Fair Lady.

This is one tradition in which Nakkiah Lui has written How to Rule the World.

Fortunately she is in less physical danger from power-figures than Shakespeare, writing very directly about our current state of political shenanigans through the attempt by a threesome of millennials to create their own white non-entity independent Senator (à la Ricky Muir):

• a substantial urban educated Aboriginal woman very like the author, and played by Lui herself (Vic),

• a quite diminutive Asian immigrant-family woman, equally urban and educated, (Zaza, played by Michelle Lim Davidson)

• and a Kanaka-family Pacific Islander, physically large and assumed by whites to be a bouncer – but also highly urban and educated (Chris played by Anthony Taufa).

The action focusses on their Pygmalionic choice, Lewis Lewis – a blank-slate with no family or friends nor any interests, especially in politics – who becomes 'Tommy Ryan' (I wondered if Lui knew about Thomaso), but who has one secret to be revealed in the play’s climactic point.  Hamish Michael is remarkable in this comic role (remember the slightly gormless Richard Stirling in The Crownies?), in a complete personal development transition from blankness to prime ministership.

The dramatic tension is built around the upcoming federal election in the first half, and the result in the Senate for the incumbent Prime Minister, played with elegant flair by Rhys Muldoon.

And just watch out for the amazing array of characters played by Vanessa Downing and Gareth Davies, including something vaguely akin to Barnaby J.

To tell you in more detail how this cleverly constructed absurdist satire progresses would be a spoiler.  Each scene and shift between scenes is surprising.  From the beginning we, watching, were in fits of laughter, eyes filled with tears.  At the very end, the satire bites – only the tears remain, in a play about the universal conflict between two human needs: for love and for power; for compassion and for success; for the personal and the political.

It is this depth at the core of the satire that firmly places Nakkiah Lui in this long theatrical tradition.

The directing, design (set and costumes), lighting, video, sound and terrifically comic choreography have come together in a triumph for the Sydney Theatre Company – acknowledgements below.  If there have been concerns about the tendency of the major performing arts companies to favour the ‘classics’ rather than put new Australian writing on stage, STC has broken the mould with How to Rule the World.  This is a classic.

But Nakkiah Lui fits neatly into her other tradition as well, beginning with the classic storytelling, of the shape-changing characters, going back over the tens of thousands of years of her Australian Aboriginal culture.  We saw these in Songlines: Tracking the Seven Sisters, the recent exhibition at the National Museum of Australia, created by the Mardi and many other peoples from Western Australia, from a base in Roebourne.  It’s a long way from Sydney, but make a visit to see the local women artists at work there, as I have, and you’ll begin to see the connections.

How to Rule the World satirises not only the inequities, subterfuge and hypocrisy of our European political system which cartoonists from James Gillray in 18th Century England to our David Pope in today’s centre of government, Canberra, have pilloried and exposed; but Lui also does what a satirist must – laugh at her own culture.  And so, in her play, Lui shows her recognition of the same lack of ethics and breakdown of political unity among her three who seek to game the parliamentary system, and by implication shows that politics in any human society, including her own, is prey to the desire for achievement at any price.

The final speech of the play – given by Vic, magically appearing out of custody – seeking Treaty, to complete unfinished business, is no longer funny, not just a criticism of ‘white’ rule, but tinged with sadness for everyone’s failure…so far, at least.




© Frank McKone, Canberra

2019: The Full Monty - Musical by SUPA Productions

The Full Monty – the musical, book by Terrence McNally, music and lyrics by David Yazbek (2000), based on the Fox Searchlight Motion Picture written by Simon Beaufoy (1997).  SUPA Productions at The Q, Queanbeyan Performing Arts Centre, March 8 to 23, 2019.

Reviewed by Frank McKone
March 8

Director – Chris Baldock; Musical Director – Katrina Tang; Choreographer – Jordan Kelly.

Principal Cast:
Dave Smith – Jerry; Max Gambale – Dave; Bailey Lutton – Malcolm; Michael Jordan – Harold; Garrett Kelly – Horse; Jake Fraser – Ethan; Lauren Nihill – Jeanette; Callum Doherty – Nathan (alternate: Josh Nicholls); Emma White – Georgie; Kirrily Cornwell – Vicki; Sarah Hull – Pam; Cole Hilder – Keno.

Ensemble:
Lottie Bull, Emily Byass, Hayden Crosweller, Chelsea Heaney, Bridgette Kucher, Brad McDowell.

________________________________________________________________________________
Ironic, perhaps, to see such a professional quality, thoroughly engaging show essentially about male bonding on International Women’s Day – but I’ll leave philosophical issues aside for the moment.

SUPA, the long-standing local Canberra-based musical production company, has maintained its remarkably high standard in stage directing and performance; music directing and performance; and even excelled on this occasion in Jordan Kelly’s choreography. 

The nature of this modest national capital city of 400,000 sited mid-way between Sydney and Melbourne, each with 10 times our population and vying internationally as the best-living cities in the world, means that much theatre here is technically amateur or at best semi-professional.  While many on stage and backstage have professional experience and training, few can earn a living as full-time theatre practitioners.  Over its history of some 20 years,
Supa Productions Inc’s mission is to be a community based theatre company bringing quality amateur theatre productions to the Canberra area. Our vision is to be the leading theatre company of the region. Our core values are:

    Quality We deliver theatre productions with pride and to a standard demonstrating professional excellence.
    Integrity We act honestly and ethically in all our dealings with our members, sponsors and the general public.
    Development We provide our members with the training and support to allow each individual to grow in confidence and artistic ability.
    Rewarding Experience We provide an environment where all members can experience a rewarding and enjoyable theatrical association.



The Full Monty, in my view led by a stunning performance by Dave Smith as Jerry (‘Gaz’ in the original movie) who solves his child maintenance payment problem by persuading his co-ex-workers – as Buffalo, USA, industrial centre shuts down – to perform naked on stage, absolutely fulfills SUPA’s mission.

All the performances showed detailed intelligent design and direction, confirming Chris Baldock’s reputation, and to this extent Smith stood out because Jerry is the central driving character.  His singing was powerful and effective, but the key to his success was his movement work choreographed by Jordan Kelly, who in his notes gives special thanks to “my main man Jake [Jake Fraser, who played the comic role Ethan]…for all the extra effort you went to with the boys to form the awesome unit….It really was appreciated and meant a lot to me.”

Of course, I was never present in workshop and rehearsal stages of the production, but in Kelly’s words and in practice on stage I saw the product of SUPA’s focus on Quality, Integrity and Development, and the resulting Rewarding Experience.

So now I turn to International Women’s Day. 

I saw the show without having previously seen the original movie.  You may not believe that, considering its world-wide popularity and awards, but that’s the truth.  I had some vague impressions of men dancing naked, but knew nothing of the storyline.  I did know it was British and was a bit surprised to discover the musical is an American adaptation.  But, I assumed the basic story of men losing their jobs in Buffalo would be a reasonable parallel to the setting of the original.  And I could see the sense of a musical format since the men were supposed to dance.

Something about the women in the show made me feel a bit uneasy, though.  The wives – Georgie, Vicki and Pam – were played as strong women very effectively by Emma White, Kirrily Cornwell and Sarah Hull: very appropriately for International Women’s Day, I thought.  But some of the language and attitudes of the working-class men didn’t quite ring true for American industrial workers; while the girls in the various minor roles seemed very much like silly and sexy American girls. 

I seemed to be watching Americans even pre The Pajama Game.

So I explored Youtube and found that the movie of The Full Monty was indeed very definitely Midlands English. 

The ending of the American musical, despite the truth in the job-loss story, became basically a very successful fun performance for our enjoyment; while the re-establishment of good relations between Jerry, Dave and Harry with the women, and Jerry’s son Nathan was a touch too sentimental for me.

But the movie was set in Sheffield, with a two hundred year history of fine steel making, as its culture was being destroyed – by Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister in the 1980s.  The film was not so much about men bonding and gaining confidence, or even women finding independence and regaining love, but about a community coming together in the face of attack. 

The difference could be seen in the final scene Let it Go. 

For the musical, the choreography – perfectly made for the music and the American scene – was clever, witty, and sophisticated, showing the men’s development of dance skills.

In the movie, the men are still not anything like good dancers, but are now OK about performing because it is their statement of defiance – with the support of the women and even the police and the priest – against an unforgiving world of drip-down economics.  You feel proud of them for doing it, glad that the men and the women of the community now stand together, but sad in the knowledge that the jobs have gone and a one-night stand won’t bring them back.

I would love now to see the play version of The Full Monty, which I discovered was written by Simon Beaufoy, who wrote the original film  – but only after the musical version – and which became winner of the UK Theatre Best Touring Production award 2013.  Yet The Independent report said in 2014:

“The stage version of smash hit film The Full Monty is to close just over a month after opening in the West End. The news comes shortly after the production was nominated for one of the UK’s top theatre awards.

The play about unemployed steelworkers who turn to stripping opened at the Noel Coward Theatre in London on February 25 and will stage its last performance on March 29. It had been due to run until mid-June.”

I wonder why, but I still certainly say, go and see SUPA’s musical production of The Full Monty because it so well done.  You can deal with the philosophical issues later.

© Frank McKone, Canberra

2019: The Changing Landscape of Australian Documentary by Tom Zubrycki

The Changing Landscape of Australian Documentary by Tom Zubrycki. Platform Papers No 58: Currency House, Sydney, February 2019.

Commentary by Frank McKone

If theatre, and therefore its modern offshoot film, is all illusion, then what exactly is ‘documentary’ film?  Should we regard, say, Shakespeare’s Richard III as documentary history, or as a biassed view of that king’s reign which we can regard as ‘art’ even though we know it was not all the truth?

In a theatre with a stage and live actors we are necessarily conscious of the artifice and look for the artistry.  But in a movie theatre, unless we can recognise the actions of the camera – its angles and length of shot, and use of filters – and understand what the director and editor may have done in the cutting room, we find it hard not to believe that what we see is what there really was.  This is true of watching fiction when we know it’s fiction, let alone if it’s apparently ‘faction’ or supposedly the historic truth.

How do we know, then, whether a documentary film is ‘the truth’ or a director’s interpretation of the truth?  Is it no more than a work of art?

Originally a maths and science teacher, Tom Zubrycki’s first film, after several years as ‘a leading participant in the video access movement’ – Waterloo (1981) – is described as “a historical account of a battle by residents against the redevelopment of their inner Sydney suburb”.  Later titles are Kemira, Diary of a Strike (1984); Friends and Enemies (1986); Billal (1995) tracing “the impact on the life of a Lebanese-Australian family disrupted by a racially motivated attack”; Homelands (1992) telling “the story of a refugee family torn apart by their conflicting desires for a new life or a return to their homeland”; and many others including “the highly regarded The Diplomat (2000), a profile of freedom fighter Jose Ramos Horta in the turbulent year of his campaign to secure independence for East Timor”.

Zubrycki has no doubt that, though documentary is “as much an art form, as about real life”, it has an especially important function:

Documentaries matter now more than ever.  Documentary storytelling is a vital way to explore, and make sense of, our world and of who we are as a nation: it is essential to a healthy and democratic society.  It allows us to walk in another’s shoes, to reflect the life, hopes, dreams of ordinary people, to build a sense of shared humanity, to give a voice to the marginalised, and to strive to hold those in power to account.  Documentary is about telling stories that matter.

More Shakespearan than Shakespeare himself!  But we have no doubt where Zubrycki is coming from, and we soon learn why he is so concerned about the nature of “The Changing Landscape”.

The landscape of still photography changed in 1896 with the first Australian documentary – “essentially nothing more than a silent recording of an event” – the Melbourne Cup.  By Federation in 1901 “every available camera in Australia was owned by the Limelight Department of the Salvation Army” who were well ahead in the proseletysing game, adding “small docudramas” to their lanternslides and gramophone records in their lecture presentations.  And so the fascinating history begins.

Where does it end?

Half a century later, still sounding a bit like the Salvation Army, “for many of us more ‘established’ filmmakers there is nothing new in the concept of working intensively to take films to the public….restricted by the publicity we could muster: pinning up posters on community notice boards, depositing flyers in cafes, chatting up friendly journalists to write a story, and hoping for ‘word of mouth.”  Then came the TV broadcast, the educational distributor, and now “with the help of the internet and social media platforms, filmmakers are able to carry their documentaries much further than they could ever have done before.  They don’t need a distributor.  They can self-distribute using cinema-on-demand platforms, YouTube, Facebook and many more new and yet to be invented.”

Why the concern?

It’s the change in the landscape.  “It is often the case that ‘factual’ is conflated with ‘documentary’.  Documentary is not television (i.e. factual); documentary has its own character and imperatives….A decade ago the opportunity existed to grow and develop a nation-wide cottage industry to make precisely these kinds of films…but [there has been ] the growth of large, vertically integrated companies, which now work across different genres: drama, format television, and documentary.  Most are now local branches of international companies, and are no longer Australian-owned….The auteur independents, and the small companies specialising in one-offs, struggle to survive.”

It’s a valuable exercise to read the details of Zubrycki’s story.  When he writes “A decade ago” you soon realise the political import, especially of the effect of the infamous combination of Attorney General cum Arts Minister George Brandis (now representing us in London, no less).  In theatre we are now in the thick of sorting out the proper relationship for our culture between the ‘mainstage’, the small scale and the community arts.  In the face of streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime, Zubricki concludes, they “could potentially become key players in commissioning Australian documentaries, as has happened in the US…[while] the European Parliament [has] approved a set of guidelines by which a minimum of 30 per cent of all content on streaming services operating in the European Union will have to come from the region….This is why quotas are not just necessary, they are essential”.

The parallel with theatre’s concerns shows as Zubricki writes: “we should keep in mind the ubiquitous nature of documentary: that niche projects have equal intrinsic value to ‘blockbuster’ documentaries.  We owe it to our predecessors to preserve the rich diversity of the form that historically has given us so many memorable works.  Independent documentary filmmakers are the chroniclers of our age, the narrators of our nation.”



© Frank McKone, Canberra