Brilliant Traces

Cindy Lou Johnson’s Brilliant Traces is a poetic piece about two lost characters – and it will stay with you long after the one-act play has ended. That is many due, in this production by Brisbane’s indie Ad Astra, to two well-crafted performances by Vanessa Moltzen (as Rosannah) and Kyle McCallion (as Henry). Most society fringe-dwellers end up at a beach, soaking up the sun: not Rosannah and Henry – they are somehow punishing themselves by gravitating to a very cold and unwelcoming landscape and suddenly find themselves thrown together – whether by fate or accident – in a cabin in whiteout conditions in the snowed-out wilderness of Alaska.

It's hard not to give too much of the story away, but suffice to say that Rosannah has driven a long way and her car has broken down. The play starts with her knocking desperately at the door of Henry’s humble cabin. Don’t question the situation’s reality – despite the cabin’s accoutrements of axes and crab nets, there is no hint at either of these characters being crazed serial killers. In this play, the set is a place for the collision of damaged souls and the structure purely poetic. The cabin design (consultant Bill Haycock) was designed and built by Fiona and Dan Kennedy and the Ad Astra team was suitable claustrophobic. The lighting by B’Elanna Hill and sound design by Theo Bourgoin helped to bring the frozen Alaskan location to life. They did a great job, considering that the blustering wind could have been a major distraction.

In such a quirky drama, the temptation would have been to boldly go over the top, but director Fiona Kennedy and her cast have kept tight on the reins of this situation surreal piece. From her opening monologue, Vanessa Moltzen is delightfully ditzy as Rosannah, but captures perfectly the “pain in her DNA” and her desperation not to become just another “indistinguishable person” in the landscape of life. Kyle McCallion’s Henry has the right amount of humour, and a clever calm that keeps our interest. We like both these characters immediately, which is essential in the short piece. These characters have been hurt and both actors show finesse at holding back their performances as the layers are slowly revealed – the ‘brilliant traces’ of their lives, the evidence of their existence, is the damage done and the scars that are left. Despite a few hairline flaws in the play itself, it’s a moving piece and a terrific showcase for these two talented Brisbane-based performers.

Beth Keehn