Grey’s Lobotomy: A New Australian Musical Comedy

Grey’s Lobotomy, a new musical comedy about the Australian health system by Xavier Brouwer, opens at the Alex Theatre, St Kilda on Wednesday 8 July, playing until Sunday 26 July 2015.

Australia’s medical health system is in a precarious position, and this biting satire explores hospital care and its administration while also examining public health campaigns.

Violet Grey is a registered nurse working in an Australian public hospital. She battles a numbers-focussed hospital administrator, Miss Black, whose sole focus in life is meeting performance targets rather than ensuring good patient outcomes, the recalcitrant Norm from Life. Be in It, who has a heart attack and refuses to listen to Violet and his nagging sister Libby when it comes to improving his health, and a two-timing boyfriend Richard who is part of a marketing group that comes up with some rather dubious public health campaigns.

Xavier Brouwer spoke to Stage Whispers about the musical.

SW: Is Grey’s Lobotomy a musical with blood and guts?

XB: It shows the gutsy nurse Violet Grey dealing with the bloody machinations of a misbehaving boyfriend :)

SW: Will it challenge someone who is  squeamish?

XB: Only if they have had a colonoscopy recently.

SW: How much of it is based on true life?

XB: When I did off-the-record interviews with a number of health unions to find out what was lacking in the health system, they told me what they said could be on-the-record and to tell the government it came from them!

SW: An example please?

XB: One of the characters, Bluey, is a paramedic ramped at the hospital trying to get rid of his patient, but unable to as all the hospital beds are full! This has been a major issue over the past few years.

SW: Is it natural to break out into song on a hospital ward?

XB: A patient, Norm, from Life.Be In It, asks himself that question at one point in the show!

SW: Is it natural to break out into song anytime?

XB: Totally! It's been proven that singing is great for one's mental health - unless it's a tone-deaf kid singing that song from Frozen of course...

SW: What are the challenges of writing and producing a new Australian musical?

XB: There is little government funding and private investor support, however we get great support from the audience who love to see their own Australian stories played out on stage! We've had doctors, nurses and ambos come up to us after the show saying how accurate it is and what a great stress relief it was to be able to have a laugh at the somewhat dysfunctional system they work in!

SW: You have written a number of musicals, what keeps you going back to writing more?

XB: Musical theatre is exciting as it brings every art form together: music, drama/comedy, dance, visual design (lighting/sets), graphic design (marketing) and fashion (costumes). This also makes it hard, and I enjoy a good challenge :).

Featuring 14 original songs, Grey’s Lobotomy stars Chris Asimos, Ollie Bell, Kirsty Gayther, Penny Larkins, Morgan Phillips and Laura Raiti (who is a final year medical student).  It is directed by Xavier Brouwer, who also is the musical director. 

Xavier Brouwer studied composition at Dr Hoch's Konservatorium in Frankfurt, Germany, and then returned to Australia where he studied opera. Whilst back in Melbourne, Xavier deepened his performing arts experience by producing, directing, lighting and performing in a variety of musicals, choirs, plays, modern dance pieces and theatre-in-education touring shows, including at the performing arts incubator of the Union House Theatre at Melbourne University.

Xavier's musicals include MacKillop (2008) and Dive (2014).  He also recently completed a song cycle based on the poems of Adam Lindsay Gordon called Sighs of Sorrow (2013) and has obtained the rights to do a musical based on Alan Marshall's I Can Jump Puddles.

Grey’s Lobotomy by Xavier Brouwer plays at the Alex Theatre, 135 Fitzroy Street, St Kilda from Wednesday 8 July until Sunday 26 July 2015, Wednesday to Saturday, 8pm; Saturday & Sunday matinee 2pm.  Tickets:  $45 / $38.00.  Bookings:  ticketek.com.au 8534 0300.