Honour

The Ensemble Theatre revisits this 1995 Melbourne play under the banner of Australian Classic, and I can see why. It has played in London and New York and just about everywhere else. Author Joanna Murray-Smith has given an assured take on comfortable middle class marriage and its essential failure to deliver happiness to all concerned: wife, husband, daughter and interloper.

The wife here, Honor, is played by Lucy Bell. She was once considered a promising poet, but a successful marriage and a baby have pushed that away. Bearing no grudges, she has concentrated fulltime on the career of her husband George (Huw Higginson), a well-known journalist. He’s being interviewed for a book by a young woman, Claudia (Ayeesha Ash), who is immediately attracted by George’s intellect and standing.

Kappow! The devastating effect on Honor, so happy in her domesticity, is soon apparent, and on daughter Sophie (Poppy Lynch), who faces the loss of her father to a woman only slightly older that herself. ‘Who are we beneath what we appear to be?’ asks George, as the action of the play heats up.

Lucy Bell makes the most of a complex role. The dignified grace in which her character conducts herself is notable: that ends in her taking up her literary career with renewed energy. Huw Higginson attacks George’s dilemma with relish, making the most of his complete subjugation to Claudia, played by Ayeesha Ash as a take-me-or-leave-me feminist. Poppy Lynch gets the daughter exactly: not ever sure what’s really going on.

The play is well directed by Kate Champion on an interesting set by designer Simone Romaniuk that features an almighty, skyscraper bookcase and three tables – big, medium, small - that are endlessly shuffled and reshuffled by the company in the brief moments between scenes. The cast cope marvellously.

Frank Hatherley

Photographer: Prudence Upton

READ THE FIRST PAGES OF THE SCRIPT AND BUY IT HERE.