Theatregoers are in for a genuine treat if they make their way across to the Seymour Centre to see EUROPE, Slip of the Tongue’s very fine production of Michael Gow’s poetic 1987 play.
EUROPE is a quite remarkable play. From a simple premise Gow has come up with a richly textured work, replete with meaning and thematic content.
The premise…. A young Aussie guy, Douglas, and European actress, Barbara, have a brief affair when Douglas meets Barbara in the foyer after seeing her show that she has brought to Oz.
Much time passes and Douglas has been unable to extricate Barbara from his mind.
In a wonderful opening scene, we see la grande actress returning to her dressing room after delivering one of her towering performances. She plants herself in front of her mirror to start the process of taking off her make-up and ‘coming down’. She turns around to see Douglas looking doe eyed at her. He has traveled to Europe to meet up with her in the hope that he can reignite the flame.
What follows is an an engrossing and always authentic ninety minutes as we watch this brash reunion play out.
Gow keeps the audience guessing throughout,- one moment Barbara is dismissively tearing apart Douglas’s note which had her address on it, telling him ‘Go home Douglas! Go back to your Kangaroos…the next moment she is cradling him to her bosom.
The two performances by two performances by Andrew Henry and Pippa Grandison were very believable,- Douglas as a regular sort of Aussie guy following his heart, Barbara as a rather arrogant, aloof highbrow European actress.
Both Douglas and Barbara are straight-shooters- very candid and articulate-and this makes it easy to relate to them.
Some classic lines come from both of them:-
Barbara: ‘I am sick of blowing my brains out on stage and tearing my heart out off stage’.
Douglas: ‘I will get the Southern Cross tattooed on my chest and marry a local girl from Wilcannia.’
One of the play’s many tangents is to explore the whole superiority/inferiority dynamic within European and Australian culture as embodied by the two characters.
Deft, implied staging enables the play’s several different locations-including a Catholic Church, an outdoor cafe- to be clearly incorporated on the tiny Reginald Theatre stage.
Highly recommended. Presented as part of the Reginald Season 2014, Slip of the Tongue’s production of Michael Gow’s EUROPE, well directed by James Beach, opened at the Seymour Centre’s Reginald Theatre on Saturday 13th September and is playing a two week season closing on Saturday 27th September.