Presented by The CRAM Collective
Reviewed 3rd June, 2022
In a shed in the narrow streets of Bowden, a world première took place tonight. Written by award-winning Australian playwright Anna Barnes, Something Big ignites a crackling cascade of ideas, language and situations in a honed text which plays like good jazz. This is the first main-stage production from newly-minted CRAM Collective, an enterprising quartet of Flinders theatre-skills graduates whose focus towards working at a professional level includes the admirable tenet of paying crew and creatives.
The play is divided into sections, the titles of which are projected on the back wall of the set: ‘Prelude’; ‘Welcome’; ‘The beginning’; ‘The middle bit’; ‘The end’; ‘Coda’. Barnes wants us to hear the musical structure of her writing. Set in a Brunswick (Melbourne) share house, stories fold in on themselves as calamities are recounted. Three characters, after a ritual set-piece Prelude, promptly smash the fourth wall, cheerily promising us that they will stage a re-enactment of a past event. They call it ‘the night when all the world changed forever’. Patient, attentive listening yields tiny clues throughout the show, so that we only come to understand the precise nature of their personal disaster by the end of the performance.
This three-hander is a triumph; the actors play together the way good musicians do. Melissa Pullinger plays Julia, a no-nonsense Brunswick-black-clad restaurant worker, brisk and decisive. Thomas, played by gangly Aarod Vawser, is all easy-going arms and legs, smart throwaway lines and sharp observation. He’s fascinated with physics and numbers. Ren Williams’ character, Pia, is an old friend of Julia’s. Pia is still trying to get a job since arriving back from living in Europe. Traces of defiant blue hair dye still remain. She’s by turns diffident and defensive, a character in transition between worlds. All three actors work at full physical and emotional stretch throughout the show; the performance hums with kinetic energy.
With Barnes’ text and Connor Reidy’s deft direction, these three become intensely believable protagonists in a forensic dissection of individual and collective remembrance, what matters most to us as humans, and how we choose to grieve. And there’s also the matter of blame, and how we like to apportion it. Reidy’s direction is so unassuming and craft-driven that it deserves high praise indeed. He lets the play do the work, releasing the actors into the stream of the show.
Tom Kitney’s management of lighting, sound and video is first-class. Design, in the hands of Kathryn Sproul, is a high point of this production, giving the actors creative, practical space. At first glance, the lounge/dining-room set looks as inoffensive as a Ray Cooney farce interior. However, the rectangular playing area has been elevated and cleverly rotated through 45°, forming a triangular thrust. Wall lights on the set look domestic but do sneaky double duty. Wall surface is perfect. This is textbook theatre design; it consistently enables.
The Rumpus space, in this configuration, seats 80. (Remember the Bakehouse?) True, the Rumpus ceiling is nowhere near high enough to consider raked seating, but sightlines are good and the theatre viewing space works well.
Thoughtful people who seek to understand today’s Australia, its values and its taboos, will gain much from this piece of excellent writing, presented with energy and respect by a vital new independent theatre company.
Review by Pat. H. Wilson
Rating out of 5: 4.5
Venue: Rumpus
Season: 2nd – 12th June, 2022
Duration: 1 hour
Tickets: $27:00 (no concessions)
Bookings: trybooking.com
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