The Lewis Trilogy

Image (above): Summer of the Aliens

After being scalped in a brutal boyhood accident, Louis Nowra could barely read until he was seventeen – his first book was Lolita – which is remarkable for one now surely Australia’s most prolific writer given his body of work across all forms.   

Image: Summer of the Aliens

To mark its impending closure for an extensive renovation, Griffin Theatre is staging three of Nowra’s most autobiographical plays, forged into a true trilogy and abbreviated down to 90 minutes each, in part by the playwright himself.

Image: Summer of the Aliens

Summer of the Aliens is about young “Lewis”, reared in the Housing Commission paddocks outside Melbourne obsessed with finding extra-terrestrial life (any life!) during the Cuban Missile Crisis.  In Cosi, which also premiered in 1992 before becoming a classic of our theatre and film, an older Lewis directs the inmates of a local mental asylum in a rousing version of Mozart’s opera. 

Image: Cosi

And in This Much is True, a now aging Lewis sits in his favourite Woolloomooloo front bar fondly observing the gritty stories of locals living on the edge. It premiered seven years ago in Sydney’s Old Fitz pub theatre, while Nowra sat drinking upstairs in that same front bar, presumably with those same characters.  If This Much is True!

Nowra’s love for outsiders and the dispossessed link all the plays into the trilogy’s powerful theme, a focus not so much on an underbelly world but one running parallel to but disregarded by the mainstream.  They’re eccentric characters, hilarious and vulnerable, and here brought truly alive by director Declan Greene’s ensemble of eight which happens to be notably diverse in colour, sexuality, disability and transgender. Most are excellent playing a range of roles, and all applauded by the end as though we were saying goodbye to old friends.

Image: Cosi

Philip Lynch is perfectly wide-eyed and incredulous as young Lewis, with a compass of truth helping to counter overacting from others, while William Zappa brings gravitas as the narrator, a very 70s social worker and later the older Lewis.  Paul Capsis however is a mad delight as the Mozart devotee who knows more than the director, and hits truth as the driven meth chemist from the front bar;  while Darius Williams is a physical triumph as the sex obsessed teenager in the first play, reborn in the second as the sexually driven pyromaniac.

Image: Cosi

Masego Pitso tugs hearts as Lewis’ mate in the Housing Commission, the sadly damaged Dulcie, and later as the cool, former drug addict in Cosi; and Ursula Yovich is outstanding as Lewis’ grumpy granny and later as the male, failed debt collector at the bar. Thomas Campbell charms as Lewis’ hopeless Dad and is impressive as a community-minded Cass in the front bar; while Nikki Viveca plays Lewis’ aggrieved Mum but doesn’t quite convince as the pub’s other moral muse, the drag queen Venus.

Image: This Much is True

Nowra’s plays lose some emotional impact from being shrunk to this trilogy, especially in the powerful melancholic reveal behind the humour of his characters. This Much is True was the least successful; the full play demands to be seen elsewhere. But throughout, the warmth and humanity remains, and quick humour and loud characterisations are arguably appropriate in a trilogy. 

Image: This Much is True

And shortened, it’s totally immersive theatre which easily calls you back for the next 90 minutes of play.  Daniel Herten’s moody sound and songs are threaded beautifully; and Melanie Liertz’ costumes are true to period and as unique as those who wear them, all expressively lit by Kelsey Lee. 

Image: This Much is True

Set designer Jeremy Allen has stripped back just some of the layers of paint accumulated over 50 years of theatre-making on these walls enclosing this famous pocket stage. An old proscenium arch, missing most of its globes, is common to all plays – it works well, just as the distressed walls also speak to the long history of Griffin as the theatre starts making itself anew. 

Martin Portus

BUY THE LEWIS TRILOGY HERE.

Photographer: Brett Boardman