★★★☆
Darlinghurst Theatre Company closes out its season with a gentle love letter to the theatre; a delight that stokes the passion of those who consider the stage their home while reminding us of their strange existential position and the prospect of going forever unappreciated.
John (Akos Armont) and Robert (John Gaden) are at opposite ends of their acting careers, but inexorably bound by a cycle of plays performed together. For John, Robert is a source of inspiration and frustration; for Robert, his young companion offers a potential heir to his performative legacy.
As a David Mamet play, A Life In The Theatre is replete with every Mamet-ism you’ve come to know and love – misogyny, repetition and swearing (though fortunately the first is in short supply). His texts have a dictatorial level of pacing written in, frustrating the possibility for adaptation and interpretation.
Should one continue to be surprised at Sydney’s constant restaging of bygone ages, purely for the subscriber base? This is not to say that director Helen Dallimore and her team have not done an admirable job, but to question the contemporary value of staging so dated (and American) a play. Still, relevance is found in the intergenerational relationship between Armont and Gaden, who wonderfully capture the shifting dynamics in their professional and personal relationship. Dallimore’s staging invites the audience backstage to watch her actors preen, posture and (in Gaden’s case) ponder their life choices.
Gaden is a delight, capturing the pomposity and fragility of an aged and vulnerable performer, simultaneously proud and desirous of appreciation for his many years of service. Armont is more halting in delivery, but shines given the opportunity to hurl himself into the play’s delirious, disastrous performances.
This is where the production company really has some fun – as John and Robert stumble through one cringeworthy public blunder after another, the team goes all-out in treating every amateurish element of semi-professional as a slapstick weapon. Assistant stage manager Sunil Chandra may as well be listed as a cast member, given his charming and constant presence onstage, though his fellow SMs are invisibly working overtime.
Despite their efforts, however, there are simply too many elements onstage. The production is an embarrassment of riches, with not quite as many costumes as New Theatre’s gauche production of The Women, but nearing it. The decision to have the actors change in low-light transitions robs the comedy of much valuable pacing, as their costumes are full replicas where elements would have sufficed.
Though an odd choice of play, A Life In The Theatre is an entertaining and touching insight into the world behind the curtain, told with great candour and warmth by a team that is sure to remember it fondly as part of its own legacy in the theatre.
Photo: Helen White
A Life In The Theatreis now playing at Eternity Playhouse until Sunday December 4.
