Reviews

Things I Know to be True is a play about a family. An ordinary Australian family. It’s set in a suburb of Adelaide – but it could be in any suburb in any Australian city. Playwright Andrew Bovell understands ‘family’ – as did the actors with whom he worked as the idea for this play grew and flourished. They understood  about parents. How they work hard to support their kids, how they want them to succeed. They also knew about kids. How they try to be what their parents want; how they need to be true to themselves as well. They knew about secrets.

Three very talented, focused young performers seamlessly play multiple characters and make SLAP. BANG. KISS an edge-of-the-seat rollercoaster ride.  Text and direction mesh perfectly as three distinct storylines interweave across three time frames and multiple locations.  Playwright Don Giovannoni’s choice of detail to evoke emotion, place, and action is finely precise.  He reckoned that the best way to hear the characters’ stories is for them to tell us directly – and so they do, as well as interacting with others.

I’ll Be Back Before Midnight has been described by the Toronto Globe & Mail as the most widely produced stage play in Canadian history!  It has been produced in 30 countries, broken numerous box office records and has been made into a Hollywood feature film starring Heather Locklear, Ned Beatty, Robert Carradine, and Susannah York.  

Originally staged in 1985, it still sets an audience thinking, though with the advent of blockbuster movies and CGI some of the gruesome moments have lost their ability to terrify.

British historians often skipped over the so-called Interregnum decade, between the beheading of Charles I in 1649 and the restoration of merry Charles II.  Cromwell’s period seemed more a puritan aberration than what it was – a brief spark of British liberty and revolutionary equality, before the property-holders brought it all down.

And so the monarchy was restored with more powers and resources than before the Civil War. (And my fervent Welsh ancestor was one of the first to be executed for signing the royal death warrant).