During a recent panel discussion at Melbourne Theatre Company, titled Radical Then, Radical Now – held in conjunction with MTC's new production of David Williamson’s The Removalists, a groundbreaking play for its time, writer Alison Croggon suggested that theatre might not be suited to writing about the present moment.
In a world
where artists take time to create and theatre companies sometimes get caught in
a loop of development and re-writing, any new work that was topical
when the theatremakers first approached it could feel dated when it’s finally
produced.
La Mama Artistic Director Caitlin Dullard pushed back on this a bit. Mainstage theatre companies might be hamstrung by the nature of commissioning and workshops, but independent theatre can be a platform for writers to present urgent work in a short space of time. La Mama is proof of that.
Branden
Jacobs-Jenkins’ play The Comeuppance is set in 2022 and premiered at the
Signature Theatre in New York in 2023. And it speaks to the present-ish moment,
as it grapples with the nightmares and struggles of millennials on the brink of
middle-age in an era that is pitted and scarred by unprecedented events. It’s
alive with current conversation, reflecting today’s trauma even without being
right up-to-date.
Five school
friends come together on the front porch of the house Ursula grew up in and
where she still lives. Not all of them are ready to go to the actual school
reunion, happening close by in the ballroom of a two-star hotel. Caitlin has
organised a limo to pick them up; Emilio objects – they didn’t have a limo at
their prom, why the pretence now?
Emilio has
been living in Berlin for fifteen years, escaping America not long after
Kristina’s wedding, to pursue the life of a visual artist and get away from the people he grew up with. Meanwhile, Kristina’s cousin Paco – who was
Caitlin’s high school boyfriend, has also seen bits of the world; deployed to
the Middle East during the war without end. He also worked on some film sets in
California, but could never live in a state with a “fire season”.
Throughout
the play, the characters and the audience are confronted with truths about the
past and they reckon with the present, but Jenkins’ work feels a world away
from reunion stories like The Big Chill or Peter’s Friends – even
if they all centre around ageing, change and the spectre of death.
For a
start, it’s the characters’ twenty-year school reunion – none of them are forty
yet, even if they are feeling the disappointment of missed opportunities or struggling with fewer choices as the years tick away. As heavy as all
this sounds – and The Comeuppance is steeped in darkness, strangled by
futures pinched closed – the play is very, very funny. In a way, it’s overwhelmingly
funny as the friends try to recapture their youth or make fun of how their
lives have changed. Even when they are being rude or cutting, there’s a sharp levity
to it.
Director Gary
Abrahams allows glorious chaos to carry the show, knowing there are moments
that will hit hard in the brief interludes where the action stops and dread seeps
in. This show is tricky in its tone and Abrahams guides the production
beautifully.
Ella Butler’s
set is striking in its realism in a theatre known more for its intimation of a space
than a concrete realisation of one. The corner of a house clad in weatherboard.
Fallen leaves. The gnarled branches and trunks of trees to frame the playing area. It
feels lived in and it grounds the show. We are here with the characters, even
between the moments of direct audience address.
Joe
Paradise Lui’s lighting flips between comforting and stark and his sound design weaves comfort with discomfort, ratcheting up the tension and then releasing
a valve to save us and the characters with pop-song catharsis.
Khisraw Jones-Shukoor has a lot of heavy-lifting to do as Emilio, the character who has travelled the furthest to come, but may be the most stuck in his beliefs about high school and the way it shaped them. He is charming and vicious in equal measure, as Emilio’s façade crumbles. Jones-Shukoor is remarkable.
AYA gives us an Ursula who is finally finding their groove in life, just after
the character loses sight in one eye. AYA goes comically big because Ursula has big
feelings, while still living in the house where Ursula was raised. Being host of
the pre-reunion pre-game ("Jungle juuuuice!") makes the character feel the most exposed, and AYA does so much with small gestures between large gesticulations.
Julia Grace
crafts a Caitlin who we feel deeply sorry for. Tess Masters’ Kristina talks
at a million miles an hour, because she thinks fast and is frightened to
stop. And Kevin Hofbauer’s Paco is a compelling mix of vulnerable and frighteningly
ready-to-pop.
The
Comeuppance is a
post-pandemic play which deals with a generation that has been failed by
society over and over again. These characters were kids in high school when
Columbine and 9/11 happened. They graduated college just as the Global
Financial Crisis reared its ugly head and they’ve never known a time when the
United States wasn’t at war. They’ve lived through a pandemic and their future
is so murky, they are not sure it’s worth dreaming of a better future.
There are
moments in the script that pick apart the experience of lockdown that are
honest and raw, reminding us of how good people were to each other during that
time. And it speaks to lives forever changed by the experience, altered to the
point where these characters feel like their younger selves – even five years
before – are completely different people.
The Comeuppance is hilarious, but Jenkins knows the American dream is built on a lie and there’s so much wrong baked in to these characters’ lives, that the play doesn’t need to touch on the tragedies of 2025 to feel potent and cutting edge. Red Stitch's production is excellent. I'm so glad this company has brought this contemporary American work to us here and now.
Late in the play, as the characters decide if they will go to the reunion or disperse, they are confronted with the narrative we’re all fed about how life will go. And as they look around, trying to find someone or something to blame, the truth might be as simple as there is no cause and effect. And the comeuppance may never come.
- Keith Gow, Theatre First
The Comeuppance is playing at Red Stitch until May 25.
Photos: Cameron Grant - Parenthesy
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