Jekyll and Hyde

Jekyll and Hyde is a musical written to reflect the duality of the human condition, and I was thrilled when I found out that Triple Threat Theatre Company in Mackay was taking it on for their first big performance in the Mackay Entertainment Convention Centre. Triple Threat have been making a name for themselves over the past few years hosting smaller productions, and in a town this size it’s brave to see a smaller company tackling such a large show and venue.

Dr Jekyll is a man so distracted by his father’s comatose state that he ends up putting everything else that matters in his life on the back burner in the name of curing his father’s psychiatric condition. His concern for his father is touching, but his ill-fated experimentation ends with him suffering from split personalities; one tries to go about living his life, the other- destroying it.

The title role was played by Mackay’s own Petar Grulovic, who has proven time and time again that he’s one of Mackay’s go-to leading men for a damned good reason. I have never seen a production of Jekyll and Hyde before, but as soon as I understood how much of the show that particular character carries, I knew that Petar was the best choice for the part. Proving me right, Petar performed beautifully, drawing on the darkness and intensity he used playing Sweeney Todd for the MMCP in 2016 as Hyde, then flipping it in a very tortured, dignified fashion when reverting to Jekyll. His song list was quite the marathon but it was executed well with some lovely big moments when they counted the most, and I only wish that the set had been shifted more downstage so that the audience would have had a better chance to see the leading man’s face more clearly because I know that a lot of what Mr Grulovic did with the part was somewhat muted by the lights and distance.

Flanking Jekyll were the characters Emma Carew, played by professional actress Kaela Raku, and Lucy, played by Jess Grulovic. Both women are incredible to watch onstage, beautiful and pitch perfect, and I felt truly felt the genuine love and support that both characters offered the doomed object of their affection from my seat, as I did with Sir Danvers who was incredibly convincing as a concerned father. In the same vein, Anthony Edwards was so authentic in his part as Jekyll’s best friend and lawyer Utterson that I found myself moved to tears by his genuine concern. Anthony Edwards is often typecast as the funny sidekick but he proved that he can do a lot more than make the audience giggle last night and it shows that the director, Vicky Bobeldyk had a very keen eye and open mind when it came to casting the show.

A lot of people might have been shocked by the fact that Mrs Bobeldyk cast fifteen-year-old Ethan McCarthy as Spider, the lecherous pimp, but young Ethan actually made my skin crawl in the very best way and didn’t seem even slightly out of place in a line-up of such seasoned actors, so he is definitely a young talent to keep an eye on. Belinda Patroni, who portrayed the head Red Rat girl, and Greg Webb as Bishop were also very convincing as morally bankrupt characters, and I don’t think there was a person in the room who wasn’t relieved when the Bishop was slain, which was a credit to him. That would be a very difficult part to play, but Mr Webb clearly gave one hundred percent of himself to the role, and it showed.

The ensemble cast was a strong one, but I do feel as though they could have been utilized a lot more, especially in the number ‘Bring On The Men’, which was vocally sound but missing the edge that should sate hardcore fans of the song while creating new ones. I would have liked to see a lot more raw, punchy choreography in that particular scene to really drive up the energy, perhaps offered up with a lot of stomping and whirling to make sure that the performance remained appropriate given the amount of teenagers that were playing the Red Rats. There were a lot of amazing dancers in the ensemble that shone as brightly as they always do with what they had, but I do feel as though the choreographer missed a few opportunities to truly wow the audience.

That being said, most of the ensemble cast did a perfect job of creating a living, breathing background without stealing focus, and some of their harmony lines were hauntingly beautiful. They worked beautifully with the band too, whose performance was so seamless that for the first seventy-five percent of the show, I actually thought it was a soundtrack playing. In fact, the only visual or audible flaw that I found distracting during the entire performance was the acrylic wigs that were used on a couple of characters. Some wore them well but others were a bit of an eyesore and weren't very cohesive with the rest of the costuming and sets, which had a gritty, steampunk vibe that suited the mood of the production perfectly.

The second act of the show was written to be a lot more high-impact than the first, and the audience responded to Hyde’s murderous antics eagerly, giving the entire cast the energy to feed off to really bring it all home, which made up for the fact that the first act of the production is a rather long, uneventful one.

Though I really do believe that this is a show that would have a higher impact with a larger cast or in a more intimate setting with a small one so that the finer details would be showcased more clearly, I do not doubt that Triple Threat Theatre Company has only just begun to show us what they can do, and I eagerly look forward to attending the shows that they have lined up for the 2018 season.

Samantha Munt

Image: Keeara and Reece Photography