The Cat’s Paw

The Cat's Paw
Hoy Polloy
Carlton Courthouse
20 September 2009

Independent company Hoy Polloy continue to produce scripts that funded companies bypass and seek new, challenging writing by local playwrights. Currently at the Courthouse is The Cat's Paw, Christine Croyden's response to her observation of prostitution in Melbourne, particularly illegal street hooking in St Kilda.

Croyden has seen first-hand the worst side of the sex industry from working as a nurse in the Alfred hospital emergency department and running creative writing classes at the Sacred Heart Mission for women wanting to exit the industry. The Cat's Paw is not an examination of the legal sex industry; it restricts itself to the lives of girls who deal with gutter crawlers.

Croyden is angry and frustrated from seeing the violence, the desolation and the destruction of this world. It’s one thing driving past a young girl on the street and respecting her choice and another seeing her in an emergency room after being gang-raped and stabbed.

This anger is very clear in her writing, but within the dismal lives of these women, Croyden weaves the comfort and beauty of seeing that angels and our dead still watch the world - even if they can’t help.

Content aside, I want to see Croyden trust her characters more. Trust that they will show us what we need to know, rather than putting the 'right words' into their mouths. At times, I could hear the writer's voice rather than the character's voice. A teenager saying "the younger you are the harder it is to leave" doesn't feel real, while her excuses for not leaving scream the same conclusion. A woman telling us about the relief she feels after cutting, is not as powerful as her showing us how she cuts and how she feels after. Subtext is so loud on a stage, that it doesn’t need highlighting.

All else aside, the north or south side of the river debate is never far from any inner-city conversation. I live south: next to Saint Kilda (go Saints). I caught the 67 tram home from this show, along with girls heading to work the streets who look like they haven't eaten in month or been loved in their life. I walk down Carlisle or Grey street to go to brunch, the farmers market or the Prince. I know the points where the syringes and the used condoms stop littering the sidewalk. This is the world of The Cat's Paw and I didn't recognise any of it. The image of Grey Street covered in snow is stunning, but it depended on the audience knowing that street. I didn't see or hear anything on the stage that described or evoked Saint Kilda or Grey Street. I'm not sure if was just the standard depiction of grungy, dirty hooker land or if that is how 'northerners' really see the 'south'.

This review originally appeared on AussieTheatre.com.

The Real Thring

The Real Thring

Hoy Polloy and Triple R

12 September 2008

Triple R Performance Space

If you believe the legend, Frank Thring was outrageous, offensive and remarkably talented. For once, the legend is very close to the truth. Hoy Polloy’s premiere of Barry Dickins’s The Real Thring explores this legend (and his urban legends) here in the city where Thring created himself.

If you were born after 1970, you may not know Frank Thring. I remember him from his appearances on Blankety Blanks – which are now on DVD or U-Tube. Also, check U-Tube for a rather interesting Thring interview on Tonight Live. By the 1980s Thring was someone we laughed at, but in the 1950s he was performing Shakespeare, Shaw and Brecht in the West End, with co-stars including Laurence Oliver and Vivien Leigh. Moving to Hollywood his film appearances included Pontius Pilate in Ben-Hur (“loved Bad, hated Her”) and Herod in King of Kings. Thring was a rising star when he returned to his home town of Melbourne. Here he regularly appeared on stage, but was best known for his many voiceovers (he was the Continental Soup voice), for being a regular villain on Skippy the Bush Kangaroo and film appearances that included Alvin Purple Rides Again and Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome. He also hit the height of Melbourne sainthood by being crowned King of Moomba in 1982.

It isn’t clear why Thring decided to return to Melbourne. Was it just big fish (and Frank was a very big fish) in a small pond? Back home Thring was an original Fitzroyal; at a time when a terrace near Brunswick St was crossing over from working class to bohemian. He was very close to the city theatres, the Collingwood brothels and the RRR radio studio – all of which he loved and frequented with equal passion.

In The Real Thring, Thring is neither alive nor dead, but thinks he may be dreaming that he’s alive. He admits he “made narcissm feel like anonymity” and wishes that he “hadn’t tried to be so fantastic”. This leaves a memory of a sad and terribly lonely man who hid behind sarcasm, outfits of camp black and bling, and a joy in shocking anyone. The Real Thring doesn’t really consider that this was simply Frank. Certainly, it was a façade, but we all choose facades that are very close to our real selves.

Dickins’s script is quite remarkable. It is written with a dexterous rhythm and witty rhyme (St Pauls/balls, monster/imposter, severe/queer) that force you to listen. The wonderful words do get in the way of story though. It feels like there’s an assumption that we already know Thring’s story. On opening night, this was certainly the case, but I’m not sure how it will sit with less familiar audiences.

The Real Thring is also a loving tribute to the world of Melbourne theatre that was. Name-dropping Lawler, Hopgood and Carillo will always get a well-deserved snicker of recognition; however, there were so many names that are, sadly, no longer recognized. I want to know about Fred and Joan who lived in Kooyong Road.

Finally, it takes a fine performer to present such a difficult script. Michael F Cahill is such a performer. Filling a toga that big is a big ask. Cahill’s performance works, because he captures the essence of Thring, without trying to be Frank. He presents so much more than shock and bling, without ever making us feel sorry for him. Luckily he doesn’t force us to love or care about him too much either, as a sympathetic Thring would have been too far from the truth

As a celebration and exploration of a personality and a time that is slipping away from memory, The Real Thring is a glorious achievement. The script and this performance may not translate out of Melbourne (it may not even work on the South side of the Yarra), but the language and the character will ensure that it’s a script we see again some day.

This review appeared on AussieTheatre.com