Medea

‘Medea’ is a totally new play based on the Euripides’ classic. Written with passion, and superb observation, by the playwrights Kate Mulvany and Anne-Louise Sarks, this magnificent innovative play is being presented by Belvoir is association with Australian Theatre for Young People at the Belvoir Downstairs, 18 Belvoir Street, Surry Hills until late October.

Performances – because of the very young actors – are at 5.00 pm.

The 100-seat theatre has a stage, about 6 metres by 3, which goes right up the audience’s feet; it is surrounded on three sides by the tiered bench seating.

This contemporary play focuses upon the two sons of Medea (Blazey Best). One boy, small and freckled-faced Jasper (Rory Potter – aged 12) is about ten years old and his bigger brother is 13 years old Leon (Joseph Kelly – aged 13), they happily share their bedroom and their life together, but have now been locked in their bedroom by their parents.

         We join the boys in their brightly decorated, blue room (design and costumes, Mel Page). There are toys strewn everywhere and the boys are lying on the floor. The audience must enter, weave and gingerly step over the children to reach their seats.

        Young Jasper wakes up and sees his brother still asleep on the floor. He prods, shouts, pokes various areas of his nose and face and threatens to do other dastardly deeds to Leon should he not awake. Is Leon dead or playing possum?

       Just as panic-stricken Jasper goes to lie on his bed, Leon awakes and starts firing foam rubber bullets at his younger sibling. The two start fun fighting and discussing various styles of death, from being shot by a Red Indian’s arrow, to being choked by ‘gas’. 

       They keep checking the bedroom door. Has the key been turned and can they escape? Sadly, it has not. Jasper asks why they are locked in their room. “Because Mum and Dad are sorting things out,” explains Leon “ it is marriage and love things”. 

       Jasper tells Leon his favourite story of how their father, Jason, sailed in search of a sheep’s fleece made of gold. Their Mum comes into the room to announce that their father is going to live with his girlfriend in a large mansion with a swimming pool and that he wants his sons to live with him.

       How will the boys react? How will their Mum cope?

The director (Anne-Louise Sarks, assisted by Laura Turner) has totally ignored the warnings of never work with children or animals, and has handled these two youngsters brilliantly. For a full 90 minutes, the two boys are on stage, 80 of these minutes alone. They play games, chat and fight. Their whole chemistry is of two real brothers who love each other, completely engaging. Whilst Rory is cute and possibly has some of the more interesting lines, Joe very subtly controlled the events and oversaw the progress of the play.

Beguiling Rory performed a ukulele solo of the Beatles’ ‘An Octopus’s Garden’ – for which he received a wild burst of applause, and yet his expression never changed, no smile of self-satisfaction, he was totally focused on his part.  The boys had half a dozen of their school friends in the front row, once again absolute concentration.

Blazey had the part of a mother that desperately loved her children with every cell of her being. It was devastating to see her breaking down at the realisation of her children going to live with her husband and his new girlfriend. The final scene was one of the most touching that I have seen in the theatre. How often have we seen this happen nowadays with tragic consequences?

This play is bound to win major awards for its writers and cast.