Reviews

This is the last of Angus Cerini’s loose trilogy of dark Gothic plays about violent and insecure men or defiant women out on the land grappling with Australian nature.

Farmer Ray is near cracking with anxieties as the drought digs in. The rains – and elation – do finally arrive but, as is the Australian way, they bring a catastrophe of flooding. His farm is destitute, the cattle swallowed by mud or shot dead, and Ray’s anguish is seeping through his stoic, blokey reticence.  

It speaks volumes when a community theatre fosters - and even discovers - new writing talent. Even at its most frugal, the budget for mounting a full-length play puts considerable strain on the company. And yet, without these productions, how is new talent ever going to be nurtured? Spotlight knows this and, for the sake of future theatre, gives new talent every chance it needs to grow.

Director Anne Blythe-Cooper and the Hobart Repertory Theatre bring us the musical Anne and Gilbert, sequel to their successful production of Anne of Green Gables last year. Many principle and ensemble performers reprise their 2023 roles, alongside a few new faces and the very welcome addition of a live band (replacing last year’s prerecorded accompaniment). As a sequel, written around 40 years later, the plot is self-contained, however, the musical (like the first) is unashamedly written for those who already know and love LM Montgomery’s original novels.

The director Gavin Roach has chosen an approach which caricatures the zoo personel (Perri Cummings, Rupert Bevan) and the PR company’s two workers (Dax Carnay, Asher Griffith-Jones). There is sudden, incomprehensible shouting, hardly believable motivations and an awful lot of overt sexualised behaviour which would lead to instant stand downs in any workplace. Unfortunately, while being somewhat funny, and perhaps wanting to draw a parallel to animals, this approach undercuts the very real issues being addressed.