I'm scared to review: Wild Bore

Wild Bore
Malthouse Theatre
18 May 2017
Beckett Theatre
to 4 June
malthousetheatre.com.au

Wild Bore. Zoe Coombs Marr. Photo by Tim Grey

Wild Bore. noun
1. Those who talk out of their arse, dribble shit and don't understand dramaturgical intent.
2. Theatre reviewer.

It's also Zoe Coombs Marr, Ursula Martinez and Adrienne Truscott's response to critical responses to their own work, and that of others. Opening to a critical contingent of two at Malthouse on Thursday, its verbatim(ish) mash-up of memorable reviews is as much a celebration of arts writing as it is a hilarious damnation of us who write those so-wanted-but-so-hated reviews.

Readers of reviews and critical writing in Melbourne will recognise some of the quoted voices.

But I'm not cunty enough to have been quoted.*

I don't know how I feel about that.

It's really nice to be quoted.

There are plenty of theatre makers who think I'm a bitch. I've seen the letters about my ignorance and know about the quest to get me banned. Most of these criticisms of the critic have been over writing about women's voices, women's points-of-view and how women are presented on stages.

I should have said feminist (bitch).

Wild Bore is mostly about people who write about women with a gaze that makes women feel so fucking special.

It's why these performers continue to make theatre that also encourages critical responses that use less-quotable words like gender, privilege, diversity and gaze. And why that writing can get a bit sweary because we're fucking over having to explain why we're fucking over it.

Remember when Jane Montgomery Griffiths wrote a response to reviews on ArtsHub that questioned a gender bias in reviews about her interpretation of Antigone (Malthouse, 2015)? Grab a snack and go deep into the comments – some are in the show – and know that the ones that were going on in a not-so-public sphere were funnier, smarter and bitchier. Some of us do censor our public voices.

Wild Bore. Ursula Martinez Photo by Tim Grey

This work – which they've been developing in their three home continents while performing their own shows – naturally focuses on the negative reviews and the failure (perceived or willful) of the writers to understand (or accept) the intent of the works.

With their best cheeks forward – the talking-out-of-the-arse imagery is clear –, each discuss reviews of their work that didn't get chosen for their pull quote of adoring adjectives or appropriate number of stars. Having seen the shows discussed, it was confronting to hear only the negative voices.

As artists and creators, do you really listen to those voices? Are the positive, researched, sat-up-until-4am-trying-to-get-the-words-right, you-made-me-feel-and-care reviews dismissed by the negative?

Of course, it makes far better theatre to use the negative voices – and the Wild Bore performances as described by the reviews may be worth the pain of those bad reviews. But it highlights why the bad bad reviews are encouraged, and why the responsibility of a reviewer's voice isn't necessarily considered.

Negative, bitchy reviews with memorable metaphors get read. They get shared. They get clicks. They encourage engagement and conversation. And so writers are encouraged, and often paid, to write more reviews like that.

It's awesome to be read.

It's brilliant to get paid to write.

Arts writers are writers. WE LOVE BEING READ.

Verbose metaphors get read.

Can anyone who read Byron Bache's corn-in-the-poo quote ever forget it? The show (The Crucible, MTC 2013) may have been forgotten, but not that quote. It got him regular paid work; the dream of most arts writers. But despite him continuing with some excellent writing and critical comment, he might only be remembered as the corn-in-the-poo quote critic. Arts writers understand irony.

Those gloriously hideous reviews are read.

They not only get read more than the positive ones, they get a bloody wonderful feminist theatre show made out of them.

 And, shhh, Krishna Istha.

Wild Bore. Adrienne Truscott & Zoe Coombs Marr. Photo by Tim Grey

*Or nice enough to be in nice quotes on the web page.

Time to Talk with The Guardian, 23 May after the 7 pm performance, Van Badham joins the cast to talk about their encounters with critics.

Monash Meets Malthouse, 27 May at 5 pm at  Jane Montgomery Griffiths, Alison Croggon, Cameron Woodhead, Richard Watts and Fleur Kilpatrick join the cast to discuss artists responding to critics.

The reviews

Maxim Boon: themusic.com.au

Alison Croggon: The Monthly

Cameron Woodhead: The Age

Rose Johnstone: Time Out

Keith Gow: keithgow.com

Kate Herbert: Herald Sun

GUEST REVIEW: The Secret River

The Secret River
Arts Centre Melbourne presents a Sydney Theatre Company production
10 March 2015
Playhouse
to 19 March
artscentremelbourne.com.au

Review by Byron Bache

 The Secret River. Trevor Jameison.

BB: This is the review I was commissioned to write for the Herald Sun. It's not running either in print or online. Neither the paper nor my editor censored me or my views. Once you read it, you'll see it's really not a very Herald Sun approach to reviewing mainstage theatre, so its non-publication is on me. If I'd filed it earlier, there might have been time to refashion it into something more conventional. But there wasn't, so it's here. I'm glad it's here.

For 228 years, we've been killing Indigenous Australians. We've done it with guns, knives, smallpox blankets, even our bare hands. We're still at it, but now our weapons are regulatory, systemic, silent. Institutionalised discrimination doesn't kill quite as fast as a musket, but in the end it's statistically just as efficient.

Kate Grenville's 2005 novel, The Secret River, a brilliant and deliberately myopic tale of emancipated convict William Thornhill, ends with the violent murder of an entire Dharug family group. At the culmination of an impossible land dispute, fuelled by fear and an insurmountable language barrier, these men, women and children, who Grenville never even gives names, are left dead, as the white man contemplates his own crippling ennui. It's the kind of mirror that should be held up more often; a gut-twisting reminder of the colonists' disregard for human life.

After staking his claim on a seemingly unoccupied stretch of the Hawkesbury River, Thornhill (Nathaniel Dean) sets about building a life for his young family. But the land is far from unoccupied, and soon enough he's face to face with Ngalamalum (Trevor Jamieson) and the Dharug people, neither man able to communicate with the other.

In his adaptation, playwright Andrew Bovell gives the Dharug names, routines, relationships. They're people, instead of just "the other". But in striving for a certain brand of authenticity, Bovell and director Neil Armfield make the same mistake as the fictional Thornhill. What's intended as tolerance, compassion and understanding is literally lost in translation. Speaking only in un-surtitled Dharug, it's tough to shake the feeling that we're being presented with that icky narrative trope: the magical other. Armfield's production is slick, moving and beautiful, and the cast manage to telegraph plenty of what's going on, but something's off-kilter the whole way through.

When the historical note in your program does a better job of telling the story of the Dharug than your show does, you might be doing something wrong.

As the story of a white man and his family, The Secret River works. As a morality tale, a warning, a sober reflection, it works too. But inescapable in its engineering and execution is the fact that this is a white man's adaptation of a novel by a white woman, directed by a white man. The Indigenous voices ring loud and clear, but they're denied the agency, the immediacy and the basic humanity of being understood.

Bovell and Armfield's vision isn't insensitive. It's not racist. It doesn't apologise for unforgivable atrocities. It's a lesson – one we should all hear. But it's not the subversive, illuminating thing that it could be.

The ending will make you weep. The aftermath will leave you speechless. But being forced to observe the Dharug like the subjects of a nature documentary carries far less power than it might if they were given language the audience could understand. A version of this play in which the Dharug speak English, and the Thornhills speak an unintelligible dialect is one that illuminates. One that doesn't just prod at hearts and minds, but alters them. Imagine if The Secret River didn't fetishise otherness as a storytelling device. If instead of detailing how things were lost, it showed us what was lost.

As an unexamined piece of entertainment, it's a triumph. As a political act, it's a mess. And as a lesson in the inescapable common ground of humanity, it's token at best.

This is black theatre made by white people. Are we okay with that?

The Secret River

And a bit from me

SM: The Secret River is a wonderful piece of theatre. I loved it from the smell of burning gum in the theatre to hearing an audience member cry.

Every review and rave about the performances are spot on. As are the raves about Stephen Curtis's endless gum backdrop that makes us feel insignificant, Iain Grandage's live score and his interaction with the story, and Tess Schofield's not-now-not-then costumes with everyone in some form of white make up

This is theatre that lets Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists tell OUR story with empathy and understanding and the hope, and belief, that our current and  future selves really will learn from our past.

But I wasn't completely in that world; I always felt like I was watching.

At first I thought it was because I knew the story, but I cry every time I watch the last minutes of Six Feet Under or Terms of Endearment.

And it's not like the moments of gut-dropping horror, with no humanity on the stage, aren't there.

I wanted the moment of being so in another person's skin that you understand their world as they see it. The moment that makes you realise that you could be that person – or are that person. That confronting moment when a quiet part of your brain says, "Yep, I think I'd have done the same if that were my world."

Because even with all our hope and understanding, there's still far too much that hasn't changed.

The Sublime discussion & links

The Sublime

MTC

mtc.com.au

Photo by Jeff Busby

The response to my commentary about the MTC's The Sublime has been positive and nearly overwhelming with so many social media and real life conversations resulting.

I wrote about the aspects of this play that disturbed me the most (and I wanted to keep it less than a thesis). But there IS much more to say about it, including how honestly the men are portrayed.

Many of the conversations have been about the intent of the playwright, the director, the company and everyone who has had an input into the production – that's a lot of people.

It seems like the creators couldn't see what they were saying about young women and power because all they could see is what they were saying about men caught in football world.

Theatre is something that we all see through different eyes. You will never have the same experience that the person sitting next to you has. Please read all the reviews and rants or decide to see or not see it without reading the commentary. And #mtcSublime is worth a visit on Twitter.

But be thrilled that we have a critical arts community that wants to discuss our theatre and writing. Here are some links. I'll add more as they happen.

**NEW**
Alison Croggon saw it last night (10/9/14). She published this on alisoncroggon.tumblr.com (11/9/14).

Eloise Brook on The Conversation (12/9/14). However, I can't tell if she's seen the play.

I also have to add that so many of the conversations about this play are happening in private and away from public glare.

The others (from 5–6/9)

Me on AussieTheatre (3/9/14). I'll publish it in full here next week.

Richard Watts on RRR's Smart Arts (4/9/14). About 1hr 45 min in.

Peta Mayer on ArtsHub (5/9/14), with an excellent discussion about how the female character doesn't sit comfortably in a work that's wanting to be an honest depiction of society.

Byron Bache on his blog (5/9/14). Byron was the first on Twitter to call any negative response and I too stress his point that NO ONE has accused the MTC or this play of condoning rape. Read what we say, don't cherry pick trigger words.

MTC management on Crikey's Daily Review (2/9/14) while the reviews were positive. And why is anonymous "management" commenting? Surely it should be AD Brett Sheehy?

Chris Boyd in The Australian (1/9/14). And a text version if the pay wall stops you.

Andrew Furhmann on Crikey's Daily Review (29/8/14).

Cameron Woodhead in The Age/SMH (29/8/14).

Kate Herbert in Herald Sun (29/8/14).

Reuben Liversidge on ArtsHub (30/8/14).

Peter Craven in The Saturday paper (6/9/14).

Brendan Cowell in The Age (6/9/14, but the interview was during rehearsals).

Brendan Cowell in The Age (18/8/14).

And here's playwright Brendan Cowell talking about it the 2014 MTC season launch.