Reviewed Tuesday 20th August 2013
Even a medical emergency, that stopped the performance and resulted in an unplanned interval being inserted into the first act, could not deter the audience. A lesser production might have found a few people becoming impatient and going home early but, after the break, every person returned, eager to get back to the story. The cast backed up a few lines, and carried on as though nothing had happened.
Babyteeth is the second play by Australian actor/writer, Rita Kalnejais. To begin at the beginning, Milla was dead, to begin with. Having been there at her off-stage death in the first scene, we go back a few months to see the lead-up to that event, looking in on her and those around her in a series of fragmentary episodes. Milla is fourteen, and is not going to live to be fifteen due to that insidious disease, cancer. We meet her waiting for a train, dressed in her school uniform and carrying a violin case, when she is approached by Moses, a very dodgy looking young man who engages her in conversation and tries to tap her for money. She does not want to go to her violin lesson and comes to an arrangement with Moses, which will see him receive $50. He cannot resist.
From here they develop an unlikely relationship, and she takes him home to meet her parents, Henry and Anna, after which he moves in, although apparently more attracted to her medication, than to her. Their reaction is not what one might expect from the parents of a fourteen year old girl who brings home a twenty five year old drug dealer and user. Then there are the pregnant neighbour, Toby, the violin teacher, Gidon, and the Vietnamese boy, who turns out to be a violin prodigy, Thuong.
Having presented the end of the play at the beginning, what happens next? In effect, nothing big or dramatic is presented but, rather, a string of mundane everyday events. Toby is looking for her dog who, unluckily for her neighbour, is also called Henry. She meets Henry, who offers to change a light bulb for her. Anna returns a violin bow to Gidon that Milla has taken by mistake. Gidon accosts Thoung, a small boy, and criticises the music that he is listening to on his headphones, taking him in and teaching him to play the violin. Henry and Anna have breakfast and he reveals that the pancakes, that she has often made him for breakfast over the last twenty years, are not his favourite food at all.
It is through all of these seemingly simple interactions and occurrences that we discover so much about these people, their relationships, and how they react to, and cope with the impending and inevitable death of Milla. We also learn much about Milla, the baby tooth and her age telling us that in many ways she is a child, but that her short time left is making her anxious to experience life and adulthood as much as she can, before it is too late. It is this dichotomy that leads to some unusual reactions from Anna and Henry when Milla brings Moses home to stay.
Chris Drummond has been responsible for directing a good many highly successful productions, and this is no exception. He has a knack of casting just the right people, and the actors in this production are ideally suited to their roles. He also has a very subtle approach to directing, creating productions that show little or nothing of the technical side of the craft that went into making them.
Wendy Todd's louvred/slatted set design and Geoff Cobham's lighting design are tightly integrated and, with minimal set changing, involving quickly moving a panel or two of the walls and a lighting change, all of the locations are distinctly marked. Composer, Hilary Kleinig, has written incidental music, some of which is quite disturbing, accenting what is happening in any particular scene, and also music played within the piece by the performers, all of whom actually play live on stage, which adds so much to the authenticity of the performance.
In the role of Milla, the central character and catalyst for everything happening within the play, is Danielle Catanzariti, who is perhaps most widely known for playing the title role in the film
Hey, Hey, It's Esther Blueburger. Catanzariti gives an incredible performance as she lives out the last few months of Milla's life, grabbing at any opportunity to experience as much as she can in the moments when she is relatively well, and struggling through those where her health is at its worst. Catanzariti is petite, which aids her in portraying a fourteen year old, and she also uses this to great advantage when Milla is near the end, bowing her head forward, dangling her arms loosely, and shuffling across the stage. Catanzariti's dying Milla is a tragic figure, stirring the sympathy of the audience and dampening eyes of quite a few.
Matt Crook is unrecognisable in the role of Moses, the normally clean cut actor completely subsumed by the scruffy, unwashed, often incoherent, drug addict with a bad haircut. Crook swings his character through times of lucidity and connection with those around him, and then to the other times, when Moses is high on drugs and is totally disconnected from the world. Crook gives a very convincing performance, even managing to look glassy eyed when Moses is in a drug fuelled haze.
Chris Pitman is Henry, a psychiatrist who helps his wife, Anna, played by Claire Jones, cope with the impending loss of their daughter, and only child, by prescribing sedatives. He also self medicates heroin as his way of coping. Henry and Anna appear to have a mutual pact that they will carry on normally, as though nothing is wrong. Pitman and Jones do a fine job of presenting this couple, trying hard to hold on to what they have, knowing that it will all soon change forever. The arrival of Moses changes things earlier than expected, and in a way that they could never have foreseen. They let us see the cracks appearing in their quasi-normal existence, cracks that widen and threaten to make the entire façade fall apart. They bring strong characterisations to their roles, allowing glimpses of the raging emotions beneath the surface, the grief, the anger, as well as the effect that it is having on their marriage.
Paul Blackwell is excellent as the Latvian music teacher, Gidon, a quirky character prone to angry outbursts. There is humour in this character but Blackwell plays it straight, making the laughter a genuine reaction to Gidon, nut weakened by trying to play for laughs. Alyssa Mason, as the pregnant next door neighbour, Toby, gives the rather ditzy young woman a similarly three dimensional portrayal, also letting the laughter come naturally from the performance. These two roles could so easily have been overplayed and become caricatures but the integrity of these two performers, and the guidance of Drummond, ensures that this does not happen.
Lawrence Mau (with James Min sharing the role) was the young Vietnamese boy, an almost silent role with the focus on his violin playing, and a very good job he did of interpreting Kleinig's score.
State Theatre has another success on its hands with this work and, no doubt, tickets will soon be selling out, so any delay in booking could be a bad move.
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