Chronic

With Chronic, playwright Milton – no other name supplied - combines such elements or ideas as alien creatures, consumerism, sexuality, September 11 (an inside job?), a mad scientist in a wheelchair, Stanley Kubrick, the movie 2001 – A Space Odyssey, the (faked) moon landing, filial loyalty and a warning that ‘They are coming’ (this list may be incomplete) all in a swirling, farcical mishmash of a show. 

The cast of eight appear to enjoy themselves immensely, possibly more than the audience, given that they have been encouraged to ‘use their imaginations during the performance and not just in rehearsal’ in order to create characters ‘based on what the character wants rather than on what a character does’. 

I wouldn’t have thought that creating a character from what the character wants – and that want shaping and dictating what the character does – is not all that new a concept. Isn’t that the basis of all drama, including comedy?  But with this concept as the guiding principle, director David Sweeney presents a show ‘that is alive, real, always different and totally unblocked,’ as he says in his program note, supported by a book, Different Every Night – Freeing the Actor by Mike Alfreds.  

Personally, I tend to be uneasy when a director feels the need, as well, to make a speech explaining his concept to the audience before the show as Mr Sweeney does, suggesting that the approach will be risky but exciting and engaging – and inviting us to go along with it.  Is he preparing us, or asking our indulgence?  Shouldn’t the show, which is what we have come to see, speak for itself?

In this case, what we get to see on stage looks to be a bit of a made-it-up-as-it-goes-along sort of affair, bolstered by those elements and references listed above and straining too obviously to be shocking, absurd and funny in the same vein as the playwright’s silly program note.  The imaginative cast, left to their own devices, is of varying ability, most having problems of diction and projection, even in the small La Mama Courthouse space.  They need direction, it seems to me.

The stand-out exception is Ellen Grimshaw as Meaghan, a spikey, stalky, sexy powerhouse who practically chews what scenery there is and owns the stage every time she marches across it.  In so far as there is a ‘concept’, she gets it.  Unfortunately, there is no one to match her. 

No doubt I will seem small-minded or ‘old-fashioned’ at my failing to go along with it, but while I can see that Mr Sweeney’s and his cast’s approach may be good for them as artists, it is not so good for those of us who come to see the result, especially with this unfocussed, undisciplined text.

Michael Brindley

Image: Matthew Richard Walsh. Photo by Sarah Yeung.