I Swear (British Film Festival Media Preview) Rating
★★★★★
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Many people still think that Tourette Syndrome is all about swearing, not understanding the deeper complexity and impact of the condition. With education comes acceptance. That is the message at the heart of I Swear, a biopic about John Davidson, the Scottish activist who helped raise awareness of the syndrome after developing symptoms as a teenager. Written and directed by Kirk Jones, the film is a compassionate, beautifully told story that is both heart-warming and heart-wrenching, often at the same time.
While the plot was safe and highly predictable, it was the stunning performances that grabbed my attention and didn’t let go. Robert Aramayo, from Rings of Power, plays an adult John so beautifully that all the physical ticks and outbursts feel natural and authentic. There’s such a warm humanity to John, and his rejections and setbacks are truly heart-breaking. The swearing, while tragic in their origin, are also timed and delivered so well you can’t help but laugh, despite the dramatic consequences. Some lines are absolute classics, with John yelling at the police he has drugs on him, or the judge that he’s a ‘see you en tea’. Aramayo is supported by fantastic cast including Peter Mullan, Maxine Peake, and Shirley Henderson. There isn’t a weak link in the chain.
The story begins when John first notices uncontrollable ticks when he’s only 13. Scott Ellis Watson is brilliant as the young John, convincingly playing a confused and scared young boy as the condition destroys what looks like a promising football career and leads to the break-up of his parent’s marriage. With the condition unrecognised and unaccepted, John is considered a trouble-maker, bullied and outcast not only by other school children but the broader community. It’s devastating.
When John grows up, he lives with his mother who struggles to cope with his behaviour and insists that medication is the solution. When John meets Dottie, the mother of an old school friend, his life begins to change. By showing compassion and understanding, Dottie makes John feel accepted and safe. She tells him never to apologise for something that can’t be helped. This acceptance empowers John to build a normal life for himself, eventually helping others with the condition and educating the community about Tourette Syndrome. There were a few moments where the drama became a little too forced, but I gave the authenticity the benefit of the doubt. It might actually have happened that way.
I Swear is not only moving and inspirational, but educational, turning misunderstanding into revelation. The entire theatre came out raving to each other about the power of the story. I can’t recommend it enough.
I Swear is showing as part of the British Film Festival at Palace Cinemas Moore Park from November 5 to December 7, with a program full of the best of British Cinema.
The Appleton ladies potato race is Australiana at its very best! Set in a country town, that puts on an annual potato race, awash with old prejudices and an unwillingness to break tradition sets the scene. Penny the town’s doctor played by Courtney Farrow is fighting for equal prize money for the women’s race. And so the battle begins on breaking decade’s long traditions and the towns set in stone ideologies.
The all female cast led by the two matriarchs of the show Christine Greenough who plays Bev and Kate Mannix who plays Barb stole the show. Christine’s portrayal of Bev was nuanced and had emotional depth. Bev is a real salt of the earth type character and you will be laughing at some of the choice Australian profanity she uses. Kate Mannix’s Barb portrayal bounced off Bev so well that you believed that they were lifelong friends.
Ultimately this show has a lot of heart. Perfect for young and old, it’s a show that reminds you to fight for what you believe in. The set is simple but It doesn’t need to be elaborate as the relationships in the show are what matter.
Sharni Ludowyk plays Nikki who is the town’s hairdresser and mum of four boys. The tension between Nikki and Penny the doctor create a great battle of wills and will make you question whose side you are on. Moja Band plays Rania who is a refugee brings soul to the show, and really highlights the themes of fitting in and still fighting for what you believe in.
Melanie Tait’s expertly written Appleton ladies potato race is filled with Australian language and relatable characters. The dialogue flows very easily and has themes of struggle, past burdens and humour sprinkled throughout. Alexandra Pelvin is the shows director, and honestly everything worked. A thoroughly enjoyable show.
The Zenith theatre is a great auditorium style theatre, its intimate and with the seats at different heights you will never not be able to see the action. Located in Chatswood and close to eateries you can make a night of it, grab some dinner and watch a show that will have you laughing and leave you with a smile as you walk out the door.
Mmmmmm… conceptual. Such was the tagline of Tommy Misa’s seventy-five minute exploration into grief and culture, Working Class Clown. And yet, what was immediately impressive about the piece, is that it wasn’t. Not really. The show, although tackling conceptual ideas, used Samoan clowning and a deep and grounded connection to the mundanity of life to traverse those ideas with an empathetic intelligence and humour that made sure it never flew too unreachably high into cerebralism. In the towering industrial theatres of Carriageworks, a stage set with what upon first glance looks like nothing more than a pile of leaves and towering poles is nestled. Against the concrete backdrop, they seem almost out of place as natural objects, which, in many ways, becomes the point.
As the piece opened, Misa’s performance strengths became immediately obvious. Misa moved like a dancer, each micro-adjustment fluid and controlled; a charismatic performer with an easy sensuality that spoke to the argument of the piece. Every emotion, confusion, grief, excitement, happiness, sat firmly in his body as the narrator took us through one of the early Samoan myths of creation. As he joined us in the modern day, we were gifted with the stunningly effective costume design of Katie-Louise and Lilian Nicol-Ford, an oversized blue linen shirt and pants that effortlessly elevated Misa’s physical work on stage. This was accentuated once more by Amber Silk’s lighting design, done so well and concentrating each moment so deliciously that I am officially converted against the lights-up lights-down shows I once championed.
As we moved into the modern day, the piece took on its more grounded, honest edge. We joined Misa in line for Centrelink, and felt both their boredom and desperation as the system once again ignored them. Both we, the audience, and Tommy, the performer, coped with this ignoring of our needs through laughter. In front of our eyes, Tommy became the disinterested government worker, the eastern suburb white friend who can never truly understand what poverty feels like, and the teachers who turned their nose up instead of reaching out with understanding.
Each moment, when scratched just beyond the surface of humour relays a tragic institutional truth about our society, and yet, when faced with the reality of what little those of us who are ignored by the system can do about it, our only choice is to laugh. Laughter, in a sense, was the thesis of the piece. Can we decolonize ourselves through laughter? Can we use it to move through grief? Can we use it to heal?
Another significant throughline of the piece was language. Like many, growing up in primary and high school in Sydney, I was told that most indigenous languages in Australia and the Pacific were either dead, or mostly dead. The hidden underlying message of that wording being, there’s no use bothering to try and save them. Working Class Clown disproved this with a grin and audience participation. As the sole performer on stage, the audience, in many ways, became the secondary character, and our interaction was done almost entirely within the framework of the Samoan language. Through the comedy of the text, and the mass of people learning at the same time, one thought came immediately to my mind: this isn’t that hard. And so I return to comedy as a tool of decolonization.
Perhaps the tragedy of high school and university history classes had told me that imperialism was simply too great a power to ever contend with, but here, in this room of strangers, imperialism showed its delicate white underbelly and revealed to us its weakness of empathy. This also connected us intimately to the culture being explored on stage, and allowed us to almost grieve as a collective, and in turn, provide Misa with the safe space to be as vulnerable as he was.
As a performer, Misa continued to impress. His vocal work was deliberate, and controlled right down to the breath work, which we heard perhaps too much of at the level his mic was set at. Their comedic timing and character work remained a highlight of the show experience, and his subtle shifts into the emotional lowpoints of the script once again proved to me the power of the double-sided coin of comedy and tragedy. Further, the piece sat very culturally inside Sydney, which was a welcome change from the more conceptual shows on the market which are set more inside an “idea” than a place. Towards Misa’s more emotional moments, he did briefly fall into rhythmic traps which leaned more demonstrative than legitimately emotive, however with the content being discussed, I couldn’t truly fault them. It also didn’t stop every emotional moment from giving me full body goosebumps, as we watched legitimate emotions sit just behind the emotional guard of performing.
Lighting also continued to show off, both with moments of individual spotlight, and particularly memorable moments of the lights coming up on us as the audience, forcing us to participate. Another highlight was the voice-message from Gussy, played by Imbi, which was performed beautifully, and gave Misa the break they needed to create the emotional high that would carry them for the rest of the show. However, I must admit my favourite moment, one that brought me fully to tears, was Misa’s retelling of a family in line for housing – which they don’t get – and the gifting of a dandelion from the family’s oldest son to his exhausted mother.
A one-man show is a challenge, it gives you no one to rely on but yourself, and it was here that one of the only two true weaknesses of the show appeared. At a smattering of points throughout the show, Misa began to say something and then rapidly changed direction, which left the sentence not quite making sense. This came to a head as a line drop, which although is not a crime in and of itself, did manifest as a drop in confidence which affected the later half of the show. This, however, I am empathetic about. It is difficult enough to learn a part in an ensemble piece, where there are people on stage that can bail you out. A one-man show is an entirely different beast, and this show was almost half an hour longer than the others I’ve seen this year.
A truly mammoth amount of content for a singular performer. The piece’s second, and truly I believe only other flaw, was that although it made interesting points, the connective tissue between those points was often weak. This problem was much less noticeable in the first half of the piece, but towards the end, as the script tried to fit more and more ideas into itself in dwindling time, the jumps became more and more distinct – which caused confusing pivots between emotional states that didn’t quite make sense. However, each individual idea on its own was well fleshed out and conceptually impressive, even as the larger cohesiveness of the argument began to warp.
Easily the most impressive portion of the show was watching Misa, and then Misa and some brave volunteers from the audience who weren’t wearing wobbly heels like I was, build the world in front of us. This began with Misa building a puppet in real time out of paper, which was used beautifully to represent his child self. However, the second, and more impressive example, was the building of the home. The section began with one of the rawest displays of vulnerability I’ve ever seen on stage, as the lights came up on all of us whilst Misa honestly asked for help to lift the roof onto the poles he’d placed down.
As the home came together, the emotion hidden behind those guardrails of performance crept to the surface, and as the sunset behind the home was created, both Misa and their audience were left in a choked awe (and admittedly misty-eyed). Indeed, it became never-more clear than in that moment that we weren’t just watching a character work through something, but Misa himself process his grief in front of us.
Working Class Clown functions spectacularly as an exploration of grief through comedy and culture, and although it trips on minor faults of performance and argument, as a cohesive experience, it was an incredibly impressive piece of theatre. Each element was well considered and equally well executed, and I left with both a true sense of emotional catharsis, and a deeper understanding of a culture that I hadn’t had the chance to learn much about.
I’ll take the chicken, but I have ZERO beef with Fly Girl!
Inspired by the true story of Deborah Lawrie, Australia’s first female commercial airline pilot, Fly Girl hits new heights as a clever, heartfelt and joyously funny but important retelling of one woman’s fight to get off the ground in an era when airlines thought “the fairer sex” should serve the nuts, not fly the planes.
The Ensemble Theatre’s intimate setting is the perfect launchpad. The set bursts with 70s orange, jet-age charm and a black flight tracker hanging centre stage. We’re greeted by flight attendants in high-waisted orange trousers, pinstriped shirts and iconic caps who usher us to our seats with perfect period poise and playful improvisation. The energy before take-off is pure fun; bright, bustling, and buzzing with anticipation.
Writers and performers Genevieve Hegney and Catherine Moore open the evening by announcing we can expect 40 characters, 5 actors and “not one stage crew.” They aren’t kidding. The entire cast (including Cleo Meinck as Deb, Emma Palmer, Alex Kirwan, and the writers themselves) morph seamlessly between roles, each transformation part of the fabric of the storytelling. Props shift and scenes change in full view, yet it never breaks the rhythm. If anything, it adds to the show’s theatrical charm, blending quick wit and creative ingenuity into narrative flow.
We meet Deb as a determined teen, inspired by her dad’s love of flying. By her early twenties, she’s applying to Ansett, only to discover that no amount of skill will outweigh a hiring policy drenched in sexism. Reg Ansett, rendered here with delicious absurdity, dismisses women as “unsuitable” for flying due to supposedly unpredictable “female issues.” Deb persists, taking on Ansett with a David and Goliath style battle, helped along by the sisterhood collectively engaging in the “Girlcott” of 1979.
The jokes hit hard and fast, weaponising humour to expose the absurdity of systemic discrimination. Real headlines are seen on the prop newspapers including “Pregnancy! Is it a disease?”, echoing the playground logic of the airline’s defence. Amid the laughter, the truth stings. For all its sparkle and comic verve, Fly Girl packs emotional punch.
The cast’s chemistry is electric, their comic timing impeccable, and their energy infectious. The audience was audibly along for the ride, laughter giving way to silent tears as history reasserted its gravity. I overheard someone in the bathroom talking about remembering the whole situation as it was happening and what an amazing experience it was to now watch the show. The hardest emotional landing comes when Lawrie herself joins the cast onstage for curtain call with her solicitor from the landmark anti-discrimination case; a moment that reduced already standing ovation to more applause and greater sobs.
Director Janine Watson keeps the tone perfectly balanced; funny yet furious, heartfelt and powerful. Fly Girl is theatre that entertains first, then quietly takes flight as something greater: a tribute to resilience, equality, and one woman’s fight that changed the course of Australian history.
