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Sunshine

Remarkable in its structure, Tom Holloway’s play Sunshine demands you lean in, open your ears and concentrate intently.
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George Lingard, Ella Margaux, Phil Evans and Caroline Lee in Sunshine. Photograph via Red Stitch Actors Theatre.

A polyphonic work for four voices with splendid performances from guest actors Philip Hayden, Caroline Lee, George Lingard and Red Stitch stalwart and creative director Ella Caldwell, Sunshine directed by Kristen von Bibra, a director with a passionate interest in language and spoken word in the theatrical context. Sunshine is the ideal material for her to work with.

The four-threaded theatrical fugue is a cleverly spun compositional performance where voices interweave with startling structure and linguistic musicality. The four actors interplay through monologue, never addressing each other or interacting explicitly, but twirling and spinning and intertwining with each other through language. This choral-style theatre is an extension of the technique Holloway explored in his 2008 play Red Sky Morning, which earned six Green Room Award nominations.

Sunshine is the kind of play that would transform on multiple viewings – you could experience in completely different ways and track slightly different narratives should you see it multiple times. Holloway makes you earn your spot in the audience, and it is exhilarating.

As the play opens on Red Stitch’s trademark minimalist, super efficient stage design, four bodies and four strips of light are all we can make out in the grey darkness. Stephie the dog scuttles across the stage, eliciting a rustle of excitement in the audience, and we begin in a supermarket on a cold, dark, wet night in Melbourne, hotted up cars burn past, blasting Billy Joel. There are other spots of music that drop in along the way.

Award-winning Tasmanian playwright Tom Holloway has a remarkable ear for language, and it’s refreshing and connecting to hear your own style of language in a very personal piece of theatre like this. Holloway brings moments of laughter, of grief, of philosophy. The play is centred around one small moment in time. People act on impulse, cause emotional blows, suffer losses. Allusions are made to the original fall from the Garden of Eden, with reference to the serpent, the apple and the tree of knowledge, as one character stands before a display of impossibly perfect apples at the supermarket.

Like in a dream or a memory, fragments of thoughts and monologue fade in and out, creating connections and tugging plot lines into consciousness. Words and narratives tumble and wind around each other, drifting in and out of focus, demanding your concentration shifts between characters and storylines.

The second act is a complete change in tone and atmosphere, wrapping the narrative up in an unexpected way, with a surprise sense of humanity, connection and hope. This outstanding piece of abstract theatre makes you work for your gratification. It is well worth it. 

Rating: 4 ½ stars out of 5

Sunshine by Tom Holloway
With Ella Caldwell, Phil Hayden, Caroline Lee & George Lingard
Set & Lighting Design by Matthew Adey
Sound Design & Composition by Elizabeth Drake
Costume Design by Matilda Woodroofe
Directed by Kirsten von Bibra

Red Stitch Actors’ Theatre
11 October – 5 November 2016

 

Kate Kingsmill
About the Author
Kate is an illustrator, radio broadcaster and arts and music writer, with a big love of red wine and music bios.