BROKEN is probably the best radio play you’ll see this year.
Three actors, three microphones, palettes of practical sound effects on the floor, against a backdrop of frosted glass panels.
The space is spare, but the writing and the performances fill it up, big time.
The crisp, poetic script by Mary Anne Butler sets up a relay of inner monologue, the baton of narrative passed from each performer in a consummate synchronisation, building rich and detailed stories with each pass.
Reminiscent of another great Australian play, Andrew Bovell’s When the Rain Stops Falling, the starting block for BROKEN has biologist Ash (Rarriwuy Hick) rolling her vehicle dead of night in the Dead Centre. She should be dead, but a passing motorist, Ham (Ivan Donato) renders assistance till the ambos arrive, basically talking her back to life, and by so doing, become inextricably bonded.
Like her namesake, Ash rises, Phoenix like, instilling in Ham a sense of renewal, a new sense of purpose, but creating dilemma.
Ham has a wife, Mia (Sarah Enright), waiting at home, awash in whiskey, a relationship-wreck broken on the shores of domestic disappointment.
Paring the play back to a basic presentation of voices takes us back to the oral tradition of storytelling, of listening in the dark around a camp-fire.
Director Shannon Murphy has decided to build on the aural nature too, amplifying the voices through microphone, and engaging composer and sound designer, James Brown, to create an exquisite auditory atmosphere.
Each of the actors have excellent microphone technique and a clarity of focus and character. Although the production is pitched orally and aurally, their physical presence is never undervalued.
Already the recipient of a swag of literary awards, BROKEN has recently been nominated for an AWGIE, in competitive company with Angus Cerini’s, The Bleeding Tree.
A Darlinghurst Theatre Company production, Mary Anne Butler’s play BROKEN, directed by Shannon Murphy, is playing the Eternity Playhouse, 39 Burton Street, Darlinghurst until August 28.
