Review: Short and Sweet 09 Top 30 Week 2

Short and Sweet 09 Top 30 Week 2
Short and Sweet
27 November 2009
Chapel off Chapel

I love the Short and Sweet festival, but this year I can’t find takers for my plus one.

And I don’t blame anyone. It’s like a tin of assorted shortbreads that has been in the cupboard for too many years that are still unappetising after a few festive sherries and even the dog doesn’t want to scoff the treats. At the end of last year’s festival I thought that maybe it needed a year off, but when events take a year off – they tend to never return, so we should be cheering first-time festival director Rachel Baring for creating a program this year. But what can be done to bring Short and Sweet back to can’t-get-enough chocolate ganache and balsamic strawberry tart quality?

Remember when it sold out and the writing was original and crafted and the best directors, performers and companies in town wanted to be involved? This year’s best plays might not have even made the Wildcards of those first years. Perhaps next year could include a ‘best of’ section featuring old favourites. It would set the standard for new scripts and give us something to look forward to.

Or just tell me a story. Please, tell me a story. Think of your favourite film, book or joke. Do you like its conviction or its story? How many children want to be tucked into bed at night asking to be read the junk mail from their local politicians? Who loves being cornered at a party by a bitter sod who tells you the intimate details of their life and as you try to walk away (because you’ve spied a delicious looking tin of shortbreads), but they grab your arm and get upset when you don’t give them a hug because they made you realise that your opinions are wrong and theirs are right?

For the love of Robert McKee*, tell stories. Tell tales with beginnings and middles and ends and action, surprises and change. If you can tell your story in one minute, your play is nine and a half minutes too long.

The only one I enjoyed in Week 2 was Swagman, because the director (Scott Gooding) and cast (whose names aren’t in the program) saw its absurdity and knew that the words alone could induce a coma or a riot, so they grabbed what was intelligent and relevant in the script and made us laugh by taking the rest to such an extreme that we had re-engage our brains and were able to think.

Every play this week could so easily be improved with some honest feedback and a re-draft. Most of them could become really good and a couple of them are, at least, lessons in how not to write. However, it’s a brave thing to put your words in a public forum, knowing that people like me can write whatever we like about them. Of course, everyone want us to write good things, so here’s what I thought was good about them.

Canadian Tuxedo: Terrific hit man set up with twins dressed all in denim and a good rhyme.

Pink Dress: An authentic and engaging relationship between the brother and sister on the stage.

Vienna Syndrome: The script wasn’t half bad and with different direction, it could be very different and much funnier.

King Hit: Had heart and love.

The Swagman's Song: Made me laugh.

The Big C: Let the performers have a go at silly voices.

The Tale of Babboo Sabbi: I too like the view from tall buildings.

Actual Fantasy: The idea of actual fantasy gamers is a fab concept.

The Controlled Use of Heroin: The performances were good.

The Road to Hell: It was a fine joke and it was the only play of the night with an ending.

*If you write and you don’t know who McKee is, please read his book called “Story”. You don’t have to agree with a single word of it and you may know better – but read it anyway.

This review appeared on AussieTheatre.com.

Week 1
Week 3

Here’s what Tom Doig thought about Week 2

What's on this week? 13 November

What's On This Week: November13

December in Melbourne without the Speigeltent is a bit strange, but it gives us time to see other things.

Pretty Baby
Friday 13 Novemer ONLY
MTC,  Lawler Studio
A playreading of Declan Greene's latest, commissioned by the MTC's Young and Emerging Artists program with Anne Browning, Georgina Capper, Francis Greenslade and Peter Houghton. What a cast!

14 November
And it was terrific! Dec is fearless, but his absurd (and Absurd) content always comes from and returns to the most delicate observation of our lives. Who else could have every women (and most of the men) in the audience empathising with a gelatinous blob and a swamp woman.

Africa
My Darling Patricia
Malthouse Theatre
Malthouse commissed this one, which runs until 29 November.
review

Trio
fortyfivedownstairs
Finishes on Sunday 15 November.
If you rightly love how Yvonne Virsik directs.
review

Diane Peters Trio
Sunday 15 November
Jazz Harp
Bennetts Lane

Short and Sweet
Chapel on Chapel
The annual short play festival has moved venues, but there's still three weeks of short plays. Some will be crap, some will be brilliant.

Mikelangelo and the Tin Star
Order of Melbourne
Friday 20 December
I haven't seen Mikelangelo's new posse, but how could they not be great?

Avast

Avast
Malthouse Theatre and Black Lung Theatre
15 Novemebr 2008
Tower Theatre, CUB Malthouse

I’m not sure if Black Lung’s Avast is the beginnings of pure brilliance or utter crap.

Malthouse Theatre let notorious independent company Black Lung loose in the Tower Theatre, bolted the doors firmly, and left them to see what would happen.

The Tower has been transformed into a death-themed kitsch hovel, where mounted animal skulls complement the crucifixes, and an atrocious velvet matador carpet seems perfect in the inbred atmosphere.

Avast opens as dense fog ascends and a large-cocked corpse breaks out of his coffin, shoots his widow and proceeds to watch his two sons discuss their existence. One son wears black jocks, a small gun and is covered with crucifix tattoos, while the other sports a long, well-worn leather coat and spends his time in a washing machine. They’re by no means derivative.

Black Lung don’t want to create a nice night at theatr". They like to shock and see just how far they can take their subject matter. After such a strong opening and following their Deliverance-meets-Neighbours Short and Sweet play, I was ready for something dark, slightly painful and hilarious. There were moments that got there, but overall, it felt a bit flat. Sure, everything supported the premise that “As a dominant form of communication, theatre has become absurd”, but sometimes the absurdity seemed to be there because it was fun for the cast and it didn’t resonate beyond their mates in the audience.

Nonetheless, my favourite moment was the ridiculous, unexpected, but oh-so-welcome appearance of the bi-polar bear from the recent Malthouse production of Kitten. I don’t think there was any deep or metaphorical reason for the bear’s cameo. In fact, I suspect he just wandered into the Tower and the Black Lungers offered him a large blue-flavoured slushy if he’d join the cast. I also think the bear should just hang out at random shows and wander on whenever the audience seem a bit bored.

There’s room for Avast to go to a deeper, darker, more violent and more shocking level, which I think would give it the kick-in-the-guts impact it seems to be striving for.  Avast II – The Welshman Cometh is also running, so perhaps they need to be seen together to get the full picture.

This review appeared on AussieTheatre.com