This play premiered at The Dunstan Playhouse, Adelaide On 9 August 2022
Supported By Simona Kamenev
Reviewed by Frank McKone
November 9
Cast:
Steve Budge - Ezra Juanta; Pat Novitsky - Ana Maria Belo ( in place of Catherine McClements ); Cheryl Filch - Michelle Ny; Douglas Housten - Nathan O’keefe;
Denise Hart - Susan Prior; Anna Park - Stephanie Somerville
Understudies: Ana Maria Belo, Glenn Hazeldine, Shirong Wu
Photos by Prudence Upton
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| Susan Prior and Stephanie Somerville, book week as The Very Hungry Caterpillar and ??? Chalkface 2022 |
Director - Jessica Arthur; Designer - Ailsa Paterson
Lighting Designer - Mark Shelton; Composer & Sound Designer - Jessica Dunn
Assistant Director - Clement Rukundo
Stage Manager - Bridget Samuel; Assistant Stage Manager - Sybilla Wajon
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| Chalkface: Arrival on Day 1 Term 1 Pat confronts the Principal |
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“You
must be mad to be a teacher”, since as everybody knows since my
favourite playwright George Bernard Shaw said, “those who can’t do,
teach” with its rather cynical corollary, “those who teach, can’t do”.
Chalkface,
which includes this joke, is a farcical representation of a primary
school teachers’ staffroom, over the year in which their most
experienced teacher of twenty years’ standing, Pat Novitsky, engineers
her departure when Hurricane Little is made to repeat Year 6, in her
class, because he is too immature emotionally to start high school.
At
this point I diverge temporarily while you check my correct use of the
apostrophe, and note my minor lapse of style in my first sentence. Pat
makes the point that learning grammar is essential.
No farce is capable of providing solutions to real world problems, but the good ones – like Chalkface – can bring everything up (rather like the unfortunate child I saw this morning who spewed all over the bakery doorway). Chalkface
is more than suitably spewy, getting more and more madcap until its
explosive penultimate scene (thanks to Hurricane Little and/or perhaps
Devon’s father, the parent from hell).
The short reflective scene
as Pat says farewell just before the final mayhem allows us briefly to
return to sanity after experiencing the funniest play I’ve seen in
years.
The top quality of Sydney Theatre Company’s actors was
demonstrated especially by the understudy Ana Maria Belo who had to come
on at very short notice because of Catherine McClements’ illness. Not a
beat was missed, as far as I could see, despite a terrifyingly complex
array of actions and responses, let alone words, and the full-farce
panoply of startling entrances and exits that all characters performed.
Beyond
the apparently very ordinary staffroom set was an extraordinary sound
and lighting design which, I feared, would light up literally as
thunder, lightning and explosions became the order of the day. But in
the end applause, whoops and whistles won the night. No worries. Just
enjoy – and have a few thoughts about what it’s really like to be a
teacher.
© Frank McKone, Canberra
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