BUSTOWN
Sun Herald
Sunday September 27, 2009
CRITIC'S RATING 6/10AUSTRALIAN THEATRE FOR YOUNG PEOPLE, THE WHARFUNTIL OCTOBER 4TICKETS $10-$20BOOKINGS (02) 9251 3900IN A world that's part Mad Max and part Magic Pudding, the people of Bustown are in a post-apocalyptic setting waiting for something ... anything ... to happen.Written by Griffin Award-winning playwright Lachlan Philpott, this Australian Theatre for Young People production is the latest from its Young Artists Program.Bustown is literally a bus town where a community has gathered, isolated from the rest of the world, waiting for the coming of a bus driver who will save them. With a host of eccentric characters who have gone crazy from the sand and isolation, they are trying to remember, collectively, what the real world is like.Axel (Peter Jamieson) and his sister, Cortina (Emily Morrison), stand for hours at the Last Post to look out into what they call the "otherness", waiting for the promised return of the bus driver. A host of crows constantly looks on while the matriarch of the community, Sylvia Steering (Stefanie Smith), keeps a secret in a drawer full of photos.A big ensemble piece performed by 16 young people, this is a chance to see the next generation of actors cutting their teeth at the studio space nestled somewhere between the Sydney Theatre Company headquarters and the Sydney Dance Company.Along with companies such as Shopfront and Marian Street Theatre, ATYP is a training ground that creates theatre full of imagination.With director Amy Hardingham and designer Tobhiyah Feller, they have created a shanty town full of tyres, bits and bobs from old cars and where the clothes people wear are an assortment of rubbish.Philpott is not your run-of-the-mill playwright and, as he explains in the production's promotional material, he is interested in making theatre that moves away from naturalism and makes the audience put their imagination and sense of play to work.In Bustown he creates a simplified language that is always in the present tense and removes signifier words. It gets a little annoying once the novelty wears off and it distracts the performers from finding the motivations of their characters.There are some strong ideas in the play and the direction is imaginative but it is the young performers who are the real stars. With zeal, they tackle the material with an energy that's refreshing and where every entrance is bursting with colour.
© 2009 Sun Herald
