2025: The Wrong Gods - Belvoir and Melbourne Theatre Company

 

The Wrong Gods by S. Shakthidharan.  Belvoir Theatre co-produced with Melbourne Theatre Company, at Belvoir Theatre, Sydney, May 3 – June 1, 2025.
Supported by The Hive – Supporting emerging talent at Belvoir

Reviewed by Frank McKone
May 11

CAST
Nirmala: Nadie Kammallaweera    Isha: Radhika Mudaliyar
Devi: Manali Datar            Lakshmi: Vaishnavi Suryaprakesh


CREATIVES
Writer and Co-Director: S. Shakthidharan
Co-Director: Hannah Goodwin
Set and Costume Designer: Keerthi Subramanyam
Lighting Designer: Amelia Lever-Davidson
Sound Designer: Steve Francis
Associate Sound Designer: Madeleine Picard
Composer: Sabyasachi (Rahul) Bhattacharya
Tabla performed by Aman Pal

Indian soundscapes recorded by George Vlad (mindful-audio.com)
Movement & Fight Director, Intimacy Coordinator: Nigel Poulton
Vocal Coach: Laura Farrell
Stage Manager: Madelaine Osborn; Stage Manager: Steph Storr
Assistant Stage Manager: Mia Kanzaki; Assistant Stage Manager:
Grace Sackman

Digital Program at https://belvoir.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/TWG-Digital-Program_v5.pdf
Cover photography by Daniel Boud
Rehearsal photography by Brett Boardman

The four women at a light moment in rehearsal as
Isha, Nirmala, Devi and Lakshmi
The Wrong Gods by S. Shakthidharan, Belvoir 2025

 

 

We are putting our faith in the wrong ideas. The wrong systems. The wrong gods.  That woman, in the valley. Her gods and our gods are going to need to talk to each other. They are going to have to work together. It will take an openness on both sides. They are ready.
But are we?

This is the ending of the Author/Director’s program note.  It’s where we begin to appreciate his play, written he says, because of his experience more than a decade ago:

She's sitting on the banks of her river, deep in her valley, in the remote heart of India. She's staring at me. I'm brushing off her soil from my lenses, my tripod, my cables. I've just finished an interview with her. As I head back up the mountain, to where my Australian arts colleagues are waiting, she yells: 'make sure you get our story onto that TV!' It's not a request: it's an order. Her cow bellows his [her?] support. 'I'll try, aunty,' I feebly call back down the mountain.

Not on television, but powerfully on real-life stage, The Wrong Gods makes its point in a straightforward manner, in 90 minutes, no interval.

That woman in the valley, with her cow but no man left to work, is Nirmala, a traditional small farmer, needing her teenage daughter to leave school to keep the farm going.  Isha has been told by her teacher, Devi, that she is very bright.  Isha insists on going on to school in the city.

Both mother and daughter are very determined characters.  Though Nirmala is afraid of ‘modern’ influences, after a highly emotional argument, she finally gives in and lets Isha go.

But soon Lakshmi appears, a modern executive, in a program to explain to the villagers how her American company is being funded, including by the Indian government, to dam the valley to supply clean water to the millions living in the city.  This will drown 40,000 people's homes.  In the theatre world, there are echoes here going right back to Henrik Ibsen and An Enemy of the People.  

On the side, I had a picture in mind of the town of Adaminaby, drowned in the building of the 1940s-50s Snowy Mountains water supply scheme in Kosciuszko National Park, not far from Canberra, Australia, where I live.

When Isha returns she is educated in science and sees the necessity of modern development, the new Indian god, while her mother refuses to leave and would rather drown than deny the traditional gods and thousands of years of her indigenous way of life.

I thought then of the sincere acknowledgement of the Gadigal Eora people, original custodians of the land where Belvoir stands,  given by Radhika Mudaliyar just before moving into the role of Isha at the opening of the play.  In the end, as Isha, she reconciles with her mother Nirmala – but as S. Shakthidharan says, are we ready?

And then I thought – in 200 years modern progress has already brought us far worse than the damming of many valleys like Nirmala’s.  Even if we can limit the CO2 in the atmosphere with our net-zero plan by 2050, we are already past tipping-points according to most scientists – like Isha becomes in the play.  Can we ever be ready for a world-wide future so inhospitable as to be incapable of supporting human life?

The Wrong Gods pulls no punches.

Isha and her mother Nirmala
in rehearsal reacting to the inevitability of modern 'progress'
as Lakshmi and Devi explain.
The Wrong Gods by S. Shakthidharan, Belvoir 2025

 

Copyright: Frank McKone, Canberra

 

2025: Harold Pinter Double Bill - Ensemble Theatre

 

 

The Lover and The Dumb Waiter by Harold Pinter.  Ensemble Theatre, Sydney May 2 – June 7 2025.

Reviewed by Frank McKone
May 10

Director: Mark Kilmurry
Set & Costume Designer: Simone Romaniuk
Lighting Designer: Matt Cox
Composer & Sound Designer: Daryl Wallis
Stage Manager: Lauren Tulloch; Asst Stage Manager: Yasmin Breeze

Cast:
Nicole da Silva; Gareth Davies; Anthony Taufa


Harold Pinter.org
www.haroldpinter.org › plays › plays_lover offers an interesting view of The Lover when it was first presented at the Arts Theatre UK in 1963.  

‘Richard’ (husband) or ‘Mark’ (lover) both played with precision by Gareth Davies is English upper middle class to a T.  ‘Sarah’ or ‘Whore’ even more so by Nicole da Silva, I thought – partly because I think Pinter gave her opportunities for more varied emotional responses to situations.

But an un-named reviewer in The Financial Times (who perhaps may have attended the same long boring meetings as Richard) wrote in 1963:
“Harold Pinter is [by] far the most original, as he is also the most accomplished, of the younger generation of playwrights. And lately he has added to his other remarkable qualities an extreme formal eloquence. This quality will not, I suppose, endear him to the sterner of my younger colleagues, who regard formal eloquence as a sign of frivolity. They are all for ragged ends edges and untidy ends. But for those with any feeling for shape this addition to Mr. Pinter’s range is an uncommon delight.”  

He (I assume all financial journalists were ‘he’ in those days) goes to praise Pinter’s “absolute economy of means to produce a ... precision of effect. The little play works simply beautifully, like a perfectly adjusted piece of miniature machinery; except that machinery is dead and this play is scintillating alive.”

Gareth Davies as 'Richard' and Nicole da Silva as Sarah
in The Lover, Ensemble 2025

I was young at 22 in 1963 (Pinter was 33) and could not have agreed with The Financial Times more.  Now I have some doubts.

Mark Kilmurry and his actors, including Anthony Taufa as the milkman in The Lover, have honoured Pinter’s reputation for precision exactly, but what else has Pinter left us with 60 years later?

The idea of risky game-playing between a couple now ten years into their marriage seems to offer a warning – if we feel there needs to be a serious intention behind the play – in just one line.  She asks why does he want to stop, and he replies “Because of the children.”  I’m not clear whether Pinter meant only a plot device – that is, the sons will be home soon from boarding school – or whether he meant that parents need to stay married without having to play such games, to prevent emotional confusion damaging their children.

Today we would perhaps ask for more on this kind of issue from the most original and accomplished playwright of our younger generation.

And I wonder, too, then, about The Dumb Waiter.  Davies and Taufa got their Londoner accents pretty well from the Teddy-Boy parts of the city my father made sure I didn’t go near, and the play makes something out of the idea of political power coming down from above, but my literary studies in its year, 1959, emphasised The Dumb Waiter as a clever writer playing another kind of theatre game – called Absurd Drama.

Not only are the two thugs waiting to kill on the orders from an unknown gangster above their station in criminal society, but they were clearly just a variation of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot.  Beckett was in his fifties by now, and Pinter barely 30 – and ready to prove himself as good at absurdism.  I still think Beckett was better.

Gareth Davies and Anthony Taufa
in The Dumb Waiter, Ensemble 2025

Ensemble’s production of the two plays as a Double Bill certainly brings up plenty to laugh at, especially with such top-class actors (and an amazing scene change in only 20 minutes during interval); and for people much younger than a stern oldie like me there is much to learn from Pinter’s originality and “extreme formal eloquence”.

I see plenty of being “all for ragged ends edges and untidy ends” on social media today.  Stop it, I say – as I suggest Pinter meant.

Copyright: Frank McKone, Canberra

2025: When the Rain Stops Falling by Andrew Bovell

 

When the Rain Stops Falling. Based on the play by Andrew Bovell. Mockingbird Theatrics at Belconnen Arts Centre May 8-17, 2025

Directed and designed by Chris Baldock

​Reviewed by Frank McKone
May 8

Cast:
Gabriel York – Chris Baldock
Elizabeth Law (Older) – Liz St Clair Long; Elizabeth Law (Younger) – Ruth Hudson
Joe Ryan – Bruce Hardie
Gabrielle York (Older) – Jess Beange; Gabrielle York (Younger) – Jayde Dowhy
Gabriel Law – Leonidas Katsinas; Henry Law – Zac Bridgman
Andrew Price – Dyllan Ormazabal

Production Team:
Director: Chris Baldock; Stage Manager: Rhiley Winnett
Assistant Director: Zac Bridgman; Properties: Natalie Trafford and Chris Baldock
Set & Projection Design: Chris Baldock; Projection Realisation: Rhiley Winnett
Sound Design: Chris Baldock
Lighting, Sound and Projection Operation: Rhiley Winnett
Costumes: Chris Baldock and Cast

As Gabriel Law and Gabrielle York

When the Rain Stops Falling is among the most significant Australian plays.  This is because it’s like an Argyle diamond.  Of all diamonds in the world, it has a special character, which is peculiar to Australia.  

The diamond itself at core is emotional as a study in more than 20 scenes of a family in regeneration over a lifetime.  The emotion is centred on Gabriel York’s need to re-connect with his only son after he left his wife some 20 years before when he was 30 and Andrew was 8.

But the diamond is bigger than it first seems.  Gabriel senses a connection back to his grandfather, through a series of family links over 80 years, which finally bring Andrew to find his father.  It is in the playing out of these links of loves, and failures to love enough, full of hopes and ironies, that the diamond shows itself to be Australian, of many colours.

As I wrote about the original Sydney Theatre Company production in 2010, “‘The play is unrelievedly bleak but with a denouement of unexpected hope: a moving, almost revelatory evening of theater’ [Richard Zoglin, Time] while the Australian audience on opening night in Canberra responded to the many moments of ironic humour which are built into our culture.  We certainly found the unexpected hope, but not an unrelieved bleakness.  In fact, without laughter, I suspect, the unexpected hope at the end would have been maudlin and sentimental.  In this production, it was ultimately satisfying to know that Gabriel and his son Andrew, with the help of a fish falling from the sky, could at last enjoy each other’s company after four generations of emotional disaster.”

Chris Baldock’s production of When the Rain Stops Falling, in a small scale in-the-round setting, captures Gabriel’s frustrations and final happiness in Andrew’s company, but is more subdued in tone.  This is because there are facets of the diamond which bring to light issues, especially about the natural environment and social behaviour – including the fish falling out of the sky – which encouraged a higher level of Australian ironic laughter on the bigger stage, particularly on the contrasts between the Englishness of the attitudes in Gabriel’s grandparents and the realities of colonial life.

Yet the seriousness, especially of the women’s lack of status as against the men’s belief in going their own way no matter what, certainly comes through as it should, perhaps even more so in 2025 than in 2010, making this production well worth seeing.

And not to forget that Climate Change is the brightest political facet of this play.

__________________________________________________________________________________

For follow-up, I think it’s fair to say that Bovell’s playscript is a twist-and-turn experience in trying to catch on to the stories in Gabriel’s family history.  

If you need help, here is a family tree, based on Cygnet Theatre; ShowerHacks.com. "Genealogy, the ancestry of When the Rain Stops Falling."; and www.sustainabletheatre.org/index.php/narrative/climate-change-generational-influence

 As they appear in their various scenes:

Grandfather Henry Law in his Forties in the 1960’s
Grandmother (younger) Elizabeth Law in her Thirties in the 1960’s
                        (older) Elizabeth Law in her  Fifties in 1988
Father Gabriel Law at Twenty-eight in 1988
Mother (younger) Gabrielle York at Twenty-four in 1988
                (older) Gabrielle York in her Fifties in 2013
                Joe Ryan (married to Gabrielle York) in his Fifties in 2013
Gabriel York at Fifty in 2039
Eliza Price – Andrew’s mother doesn't appear.
Andrew Price at Twenty-eight in 2039
 
The pictures below are from Cygnet Theatre, San Diego, California

 

This was created by the Cygnet Theatre while producing When the Rain Stops Falling to explain the connections of the characters. With this, we can understand the generational repetitive actions that involve the change in climate.  

 

Copyright: Frank McKone, Canberra

2025: Blithe Spirit - Canberra REP

 

 

Blithe Spirit by Noel Coward.  Canberra Repertory Theatre - Season: 2 – 17 May 2025

Reviewed by Frank McKone
May 2

Directed by Lachlan Houen
Written by Noel Coward

Cast:

Winsome Ogilvie - Elvira
Alex McPherson - Ruth
Peter Holland - Charles
Elaine Noon - Madam Arcati
Antonia Kitzel - Mrs Bradman
John Stead - Dr Bradman
Olivia Boddington – Edith

Creatives:
Set Designers: Andrew Kaye & Michael Sparks OAM
Lighting Design: Leeann Galloway
Sound Design & Composition: Marlené Claudine Radice
Costume Design: Suzan Cooper; Props Coordinator: Gail Cantle




Blithe Spirit is a satirical farce about the English upper classes in the 1930s, with references to the class structure, marriage relationships, and at a comically deeper level about their capacity to believe fantasies about the nature of truth and falsity.  And about death.

“He wrote it in a week. He referred to it as “An Improbable Farce in Three Acts” and took the name from the first line of Percy Bysshe Shelley's poem, To a Skylark. The play opened at London's Piccadilly Theatre on July 2, 1941—just six weeks after it was written. On November 5, 1941, it premiered on Broadway.” (Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival - Blithe Spirit:A High-Spirited Comdey...)

I was born in January 1941, evacuated from London to a small village, Coedpoeth, in rural Wales, in the wake of the Battle of Britain.

The reality of war was not a farce.  But Coward’s instantly successful play was a metaphor, making absurd laughter out of the upper class who had not wanted to understand that reality.

At www.bard.org/study-guides/noel-coward-as-the-mirror-of-a-generation there’s a neat article: Noel Coward as the Mirror of a Generation by Lynnette L. Horner (Utah Shakespeare Festival).

So, as I enjoyed the laughter along with everyone else at Canberra REP last night, I was also asking myself why?

Why should REP in 2025 choose this play?  Is it enough to laugh at the cast's excellent reproductions of the mannerisms and accents of Noel Coward’s 1930s, as you notice in the corner the maid Edith peddling away on her exercise bike to keep fit like Elaine Noon's totally energetic Madam Arcati, just for the sake of having a bit of fun?

Or might something more substantial been made of why we should laugh at them – in their time, or in our time of international mayhem?  In 1941 British and American audiences could make the connections for themselves.  Maybe today we need a bit of help – unless like me, you were there at the time.

Don’t miss REP’s Blithe Spirit, which is very stylishly done.  But don’t be afraid to wonder what it means in today’s Trumpian world.


Copyright: Frank McKone, Canberra

2025: Magic Realism at CIMF - Canberra International Music Festival

 

 

Magic Realism at CIMF.  Presented by TURA, Canberra International Music Festival and The Street, with recorded Soundbed Performers, at The Street Theatre, Canberra.

Part 1        O Spectabiles Viri
Part 2        Mungangga Garlagula

Reviewed by Frank McKone
May 1


Because, over my four-score years and four, I have never had formal training or education in music, I respond to the sound of music in an unsophisticated immediate emotional way.

Viewed as offerings in an International Music Festival, both O Spectabiles Viri and Mungangga Garlagula are interesting as examples of unusual music presentations, but from my point of view as a theatre critic they were both less effective than they might have been.

Since there did not seem to be any particular connection between the two items in the evening’s program, I’ll discuss them separately.

In each case, though, I heard not just the music but saw a performer presenting us with a show of their own devising: Jane Sheldon in the role of the early 12th Century European composer Hildegard von Bingen; Mark Atkins in the role of a lonely travelling Aussie bushman camping out on country with a 60,000 year history.

Each had a co-creator/performer in Erkki Veltheim, with backstage support from a dramaturg, Ruth Little; a lighting designer, Niklas Pajanti; and set/costume designer, Emily Barrie – plus a team of recorded musicians from Soundbed Performers; engineers and management from the Tura Production team; technicians from The Street; and overall production management from CIMF’s Joshua Robinson, who gave an introductory speech.

I have read about Hildegard, who was clearly a forceful feisty woman in her day, 1098 – 1179, as a “German Benedictine abbess and polymath active as a writer, composer, philosopher, mystic, visionary and as a medical writer and practitioner during the High Middle Ages”, according to Wikipedia.  

She obviously organised everybody in sight, and yet it still took until 2012 before Pope Benedict XVI declared her to be a saint.

I found Jane Sheldon’s performance of Hildegard’s music essentially sad, rather than uplifting, and I wondered if our modern concerns about women’s glass ceiling were influencing what seemed to be Hildegard’s frustration when more expansive moments in the singing more or less died away – often into silence.  Too much in the 15 minutes was time waiting for a new development to happen, which in the end never eventuated.  

I read up more about Hildegard after hearing Jane’s piece, and felt Hildegard would have insisted on more action.  Or perhaps Jane was representing that thousand years’ wait for canonisation.

Mark Atkins’ un-named bushman (I think – or perhaps I missed his name in some of the muffled speaking into the microphone) was a very different story.
 
Though I was a naive invading Pom as a teenager, I was a regular overnight bushwalker most of my life, including in outback Queensland.  But it was in Far-West New South Wales, in Broken Hill country where I actually saw the MinMin lights he speaks of as mysterious spiritual connections to the old country of his traditions.

I saw them one time following down along a station property wire fence.  On another occasion, they were less like a light-bulb, more like a lighted mist, floating down a creekbed in Mootawingee.  And I spoke to a woman who had been frightened by a big bright MinMin following close beside her car while driving towards Broken Hill from the South Australian border.

I’m sorry to say, in response to the spiritual idea, that the scientific story was they are examples of static electricity forming between layers of different temperature air.

Though I found Mark’s characterisation a bit of an odd mix between old whiteman bushman stories and Aboriginal tradition. I heard bushwacker stories around the campfire – sometimes between my mouthorgan accompaniment to Click Go The Shears –  but I could only be amazed at Mark's dramatic performances on the didgeridoo.

The pace of his total presentation, even accounting for the old man bush character, was rather too slow for me, but his sounds of the didgeridoo brought his work to life.

And this is what a Festival is for – to bring out the unusual, where magic and realism meet in a 12th Century chant or the rhythm of an ancient didgeridoo.

Copyright: Frank McKone, Canberra