Review: The Consequences Of A War Fought From Half A World Away Becomes Clear As The Blue Makes Way For The Grey In GROUNDED

BWW REVIEW: The Consequences Of A War Fought From Half A World Away Becomes Clear As The Blue Makes Way For The Grey In GROUNDED

Saturday 16th March 2019, 7:45pm, Lennox Theatre Riverside Theatres

George Brant's award winning one woman play GROUNDED is given a new treatment by Dom Mercer (Director) for National Theatre of Parramatta. Following on from a sell out season of BROWN SKIN GIRL, Emily Havea steps into the flight suit to share the observations and emotions of a fighter pilot relegated to the world of drone warfare.

GROUNDED sees a gutsy Fighter Pilot explains the shift in circumstances that forced her to give up a life in "the blue", 80,000 ft above the earth's surface in her beloved F16 plane "Tiger", in favor of a windowless trailer in Nevada commanding MQ-9 Reaper drones 12 times zones away in Afghanistan. She becomes a casualty of technological advancement but comes to see that the new style of warfare has its advantages. Unlike the old days, she knows when she sets off across the desert to the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Battlelab at Chreech Air Force Base, her tour of duty will only last 12 hours before she is homeward bound to husband Eric and daughter Sam. The downside, as well as not being able to be up in "the blue", is that whilst she and Tiger used to dive in for a strike then speed off before she could see the aftermath, the new Reapers don't need to leave the scene, instead able to stay and confirm that the target has been hit. Her new putty colored world of the Reaper's Eye of God thermographic camera images allow for the satisfaction of a strike but also have the 'chairforce' pilot reconsidering the gravity of her job.

Evoking the image of the earth meeting the endless blue sky as seen from the cockpit of a plane, Set and costume designer Jonathan Hindmarsh has worked closely with lighting designer Alexander Berlage. The blues of the pilot's memories of the vast skies make way for yellows and oranges of the Wyoming prairies and the Nevada desert whilst flashing lights take the story in to Las Vegas's famous Strip. The utilitarian grey tiles link the set to the Pilot's new grey world whilst hiding their own secrets. Bright beams of light to help focus scenes, from the road to Chreech to confined space of the trailer control room. The pilot wears her flight suit throughout with minor adjustments to reflect her pride in her job and the times when she is off duty or disconnected with her position in the US Airforce.

Emily Havea delivers an incredibly strong performance, capturing the god-complex common to pilots along with a dominating personality one would expect from a woman who has managed to rise in a male dominated world. With a confident American accent, she ensures that the audience know that the pilot is one of the boys, more at home knocking back beers in the Pilot's bar with her colleagues than shopping or gossiping with girlfriends. She does however ensure that in contrast to this masculinity, the pilot still exhibits maternal and caring instincts as she talks of her child and husband. The shift from confidence at conducting her job, eliminating "the guilty" to examining the effects of her actions presents a gradual development of a post traumatic stress disorder that the general public may not consider given that it develops over 7,000 miles away from the war zone.

GROUNDED is a wonderful display of a strong female character who is outside of societies stereotypes of the roles women play. This is a different look at modern warfare with a focus on facing the consequences, in all its forms of 'sending' people to fight. Even if you've seen earlier incarnations of GROUNDED, Emily Havea's interpretation definitely makes it worth seeing the story again.

https://riversideparramatta.com.au/show/grounded/

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