REVIEW: EDWARD ALBEE'S THE GOAT OR, WHO IS SYLVIA? Looses Something In The Barrage Of Yelling

Saturday 4th March 2023, 7:30pm, Roslyn Packer Theater Walsh Bay Sydney

Edward Albee'S THE GOAT OR, WHO IS SYLVIA? (NOTES TOWARD A DEFINITION OF TRAGEDY) is the latest co-pro between State Theater Company South Australia and Sydney Theater Company. Director Mitchell Butel seeks to prove that this work, written in 2000, continues to challenge the notions of taboos and how society reacts to them in a world that has become even more accepting but still has its limits.

The premise of this four hander is that the seemingly happily married couple of Martin Gray(Nathan Page) and Stevie (Claudia Karvan) are faced with a challenge that goes beyond the 'socially acceptable' and is set to destroy their 'perfect' life and the curated image that they, particularly Stevie, have presented to the world. When Martin's secret threatens to shatter the marriage and the image that Stevie has worked to contrive the focus on stage is on the detail of the deviation from the socially acceptable but the underlying message sits with the challenge of how we classify things as acceptable or not, and how we react. Martin fails to see that his relationship with a farmyard animal which he claims to love as well as have relations with is hard for others to understand while he himself passes judgment on his 17 year old son Billy's (Yazeed Daher) recently disclosed homosexuality. On the periphery of the family meltdown is Martin and Stevie's supposed best friend, journalist Ross Tuttle (Mark Saturno) who is the catalyst for the truth to be exposed and ultimately seems more concerned with preserving Martin's public image than discovering his friend's emotional and psychological state.

The work takes place in the Gray's home with an expression of the living space of the mid-century modern concrete house designed by Set Designer Jeremy Allen. Presented to convey that the 50 year old Martin is an acclaimed architect, about to received the Prtizker Architecture Prize, an accolade that will put him alongside the elite of his industry, the space has high ceilings, and tall windows looking out onto a garden, but hemmed in by the fence in close proximity. The interior design is sleek, somewhat stark and looks uncomfortable, from the large ottoman that no one seems to know how to sit on, the marble and glass coffee table and lethal objet d'art. The throw rug placed over the arm of the sofa is the only indication that there could be any 'warmth' and humanity within the space that is further contrived to present a certain public image with the vase of ranunculi that Stevie positions in preparation for the video interview Ross is due to film.

This work was first presented in Adelaide at the 398 seat Dunstan Playhouse and has transferred to the 896 seat Roslyn Packer Theater. The shift in space and the performers, particularly Karvan and Daher's better familiarity with television and movie work than stage, Karvan last stage performance listed as being in 1998, may have contributed to the work starting at a 'loud' shouty level, leaving the performers nowhere to go in terms of adding texture to their dialogue with the whole work remaining at a relatively consistent high level to the point of uncomfortable. Butel's decision to retain the American accent of Albee's original setting also may have contributed to the tone of the work as all the performers seemed to struggle with capturing the 'voice' without starting at the same 'note'. Given the plot never mentions a town and the only American reference is to the Gray's political affiliation, which could easily be converted to an Australian reference, it feels unnecessary to retain the accent, particularly given the ones adopted don't connect the characters to any particular region, with Karvan adopting a Hallmark Movie generic sound and Page utilizing an deep tone that at first sounded like he was suffering from a cold or worse, vocal damage. The only reason for the work to remain in the American accent could be that it is written into a requirement for anyone wanting the rights to produce the work.

Oddly for a work directed by Butel, who is a master of the intuitive expression in his own acting, there is also a high degree of contrived performance with Karvan particularly struggling with presenting Stevie with any sense of instinctive action even though, as mentioned, this work has already had an Adelaide season. With the presentation of a 'happy home' Stevie is presented as overblown and fake leading to a character that is hard to like, leaving the viewer unsympathetic to her unrelenting hysteria even when confronted by the challenging nature of Martin's secret. Stevie proceeds to destroy the home, echoing the destruction of the marriage that Martin's revelation has caused but instead of feeling like actions of passion and anger, they feel like you can almost hear Butel's stage directions.

The only saving grace of the work is that, even though Nathan Page still presents the work with a relatively uniformly 'loud' tone, he does manage to infuse some degree of light and shade into Martin's pleading for understanding as he seeks to explain his actions and attractions. His more extensive stage experience shows as he also knows to trust silence, letting pauses hang to let the weight of the words and the emotion sink in. He also trusts that nuanced and intuitive physicality will get noticed in the larger theater as he infuses a subtlety and honesty in expressing Martin's initial underlying stress of holding in a secret and later confusion as to why his family and friends have such trouble accepting his revelations. There is naturalness in his facial expressions that convey that Martin honestly can't see the problem with his actions yet had a disgust with Billy's now socially acceptable life.

Hopefully the performers will settle into the size of the Roslyn Packer theater and trust the acoustics of the space so that they can present the work with more texture and tonal difference. As a story, the work is an interesting study on how society decides what it will and wont accept, with the idea of relations with the goat as remaining unacceptable in a similar way that in prior decades, and even currently in some countries, homosexuality was once taboo.

The Goat or, Who is Sylvia? - Sydney Theatre Company

Photos: Prudence Upton

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