http://www.artshub.com.au/au/news-article/reviews/performing-arts/never-did-me-any-harm-187137
The first show for 2012 as part of the Sydney Theatre Company season and also a Sydney Festival event, this is a confronting, challenging and thought provoking work that looks at that eternal hot potato: parenting. It will lead to lots of heated discussion, even if you're not a parent.
Using Christos Tsiolkas' The Slap as well as the idea of 'helicopter parents' as a springboard, to prepare for this extraordinary dance/theatre work, director and choreographer Kate Champion (Not In A Million Years, The Age I'm In) and her company interviewed a wide sample of people from all ages and backgrounds to establish a cross section of views on parenting.
In a typically messy, rather dry Australian backyard – with shed for Dad, bicycles, plastic buckets, a rubber tyre as a swing, assorted chairs etc – the amazing cast of six play various young children, angsty teenagers and worried, harassed parents, using the verbatim text that was collected from the interviews and turned into an ironic, biting, searching script. In one of the voiceovers we hear a young man almost scarily brag how he can get anything he wants.
It's all done in a cinematic, multi-layered series of vignettes. Fluid, free-flowing monologues are interwoven with fabulous dance passages. Using live monologues, voiceovers and movement, it raises and discusses numerous issues of parenting: is it really rewarding?; do all parents love their children?; at what age should breast feeding stop?; the safety of children linked with over control (where a mother takes over and wrecks a throwing game, for example); and the huge responsibility of parenting. In contrast, Heather Mitchell has a splendid monologue by the pool as a middle-aged childless woman who could never see herself as a mother.
In this production, the dance element is rather overwhelmed by the script. Choreographically, there are some wonderful wrapping/enfolding moments in short duets or trios, but most of it is everyday movement heightened and extended. In one section there is a fabulous exhausted (also possibly sleepy and bored) duet with various words running down the tree and the dancers’ bodies (“Grow up”, “Can't go back” etc). In another section there’s a trio where the family – mum, dad and unhappy kid – pose for photos at what seems to be a birthday party and the child keeps on trying to escape their control.
Joshua Mu as the young, troubled, possibly autistic child whose mother loves him to distraction is terrific; he has a very exciting solo with his shadow, emphasising his sense of 'otherness'. Kirstie McCracken, with her shaved head, gives a brilliant performance as an aggressive pre-teen. And Alan Flower, one of the non dancers, is tremendous when portraying a little kid tricked into a daredevil 'game' in the backyard.
On the production side, Max Lyandvert's throbbing soundtrack is powerful, haunting and hypnotic. And Geoff Cobham's splendid lighting reminded me somewhat of the style of Chunky Move performances, with the use of computer grids that ripple, move and look like ECG graphs or tiles – here used to express the frustration, rage or trapped helplessness of the various characters.
The show ends on a poignantly hopeful note, with heavily pregnant Sarah Jayne Howard communing with her unborn baby and staring into the future.
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Sydney Theatre Company/Force Majeure present
Never Did Me Any Harm
Director: Kate Champion
Set and Lighting: Geoff Cobham
Composer/Sound Design: Max Lyandvert
Dramaturg: Andrew Upton
Cast: Christina Chan, Vincent Crowley, Marta Dusseldorp, Alan Flower, Sarah Jayne Howard, Kirstie McCracken, Heather Mitchell, Joshua Mu
Wharf 1 and 2, Sydney Theatre Company, Walsh Bay
January 11–February 12, 2012
Bookings: http://www.sydneytheatre.com.au/2012/never-did-me-any-harm
Using Christos Tsiolkas' The Slap as well as the idea of 'helicopter parents' as a springboard, to prepare for this extraordinary dance/theatre work, director and choreographer Kate Champion (Not In A Million Years, The Age I'm In) and her company interviewed a wide sample of people from all ages and backgrounds to establish a cross section of views on parenting.
In a typically messy, rather dry Australian backyard – with shed for Dad, bicycles, plastic buckets, a rubber tyre as a swing, assorted chairs etc – the amazing cast of six play various young children, angsty teenagers and worried, harassed parents, using the verbatim text that was collected from the interviews and turned into an ironic, biting, searching script. In one of the voiceovers we hear a young man almost scarily brag how he can get anything he wants.
It's all done in a cinematic, multi-layered series of vignettes. Fluid, free-flowing monologues are interwoven with fabulous dance passages. Using live monologues, voiceovers and movement, it raises and discusses numerous issues of parenting: is it really rewarding?; do all parents love their children?; at what age should breast feeding stop?; the safety of children linked with over control (where a mother takes over and wrecks a throwing game, for example); and the huge responsibility of parenting. In contrast, Heather Mitchell has a splendid monologue by the pool as a middle-aged childless woman who could never see herself as a mother.
In this production, the dance element is rather overwhelmed by the script. Choreographically, there are some wonderful wrapping/enfolding moments in short duets or trios, but most of it is everyday movement heightened and extended. In one section there is a fabulous exhausted (also possibly sleepy and bored) duet with various words running down the tree and the dancers’ bodies (“Grow up”, “Can't go back” etc). In another section there’s a trio where the family – mum, dad and unhappy kid – pose for photos at what seems to be a birthday party and the child keeps on trying to escape their control.
Joshua Mu as the young, troubled, possibly autistic child whose mother loves him to distraction is terrific; he has a very exciting solo with his shadow, emphasising his sense of 'otherness'. Kirstie McCracken, with her shaved head, gives a brilliant performance as an aggressive pre-teen. And Alan Flower, one of the non dancers, is tremendous when portraying a little kid tricked into a daredevil 'game' in the backyard.
On the production side, Max Lyandvert's throbbing soundtrack is powerful, haunting and hypnotic. And Geoff Cobham's splendid lighting reminded me somewhat of the style of Chunky Move performances, with the use of computer grids that ripple, move and look like ECG graphs or tiles – here used to express the frustration, rage or trapped helplessness of the various characters.
The show ends on a poignantly hopeful note, with heavily pregnant Sarah Jayne Howard communing with her unborn baby and staring into the future.
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Sydney Theatre Company/Force Majeure present
Never Did Me Any Harm
Director: Kate Champion
Set and Lighting: Geoff Cobham
Composer/Sound Design: Max Lyandvert
Dramaturg: Andrew Upton
Cast: Christina Chan, Vincent Crowley, Marta Dusseldorp, Alan Flower, Sarah Jayne Howard, Kirstie McCracken, Heather Mitchell, Joshua Mu
Wharf 1 and 2, Sydney Theatre Company, Walsh Bay
January 11–February 12, 2012
Bookings: http://www.sydneytheatre.com.au/2012/never-did-me-any-harm
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