An evening of theatrical entertainment

Wednesday 7^th May

Another day of brilliant sunshine! I could really get used to this! With two theatre performances to attend in the evening the day passed by pretty uneventfully, aside from the helpless feeling you get from being grounded in an predominantly glass fronted office whist the weather outside seems to be getting hotter by the second!

The first play of the evening was a one man production entitled Fear of Projection, written and performed by a chap named Drew Davies. Soap fans amongst you may recall Drew from his days in New Zealand’s longest running soap, Shortland Street. The story goes that Edward, an assistant lecturer with floored public speaking skills, is forced to take over projector duty following the death of his genius mentor. Some rather interesting emotional issues begin to surface and Edward slowly comes apart at the seams as he strives to be a successful and respected lecturer in order to impress his girl, Rosemary. The projector on the other hand, has very different ideas. Ed finds himself forging a questionable and strangely amorous relationship with the projector as it starts to communicate with him. This beautifully imaginative storyline explores our obsession with technology and at one point Drew depicts perfectly our crazy mobile phone culture. Drew portrays Ed as an accidental comic, nervously bumbling his way through life in a constant emotional battle. Despite some technical difficulties (spot the irony!) on the night, the play was uniquely compelling and a prime example of what makes the Fringe Festival so special. This one’s a true gem.

I was lucky enough to catch the premier of Power Lunch, a play written by Alan Ball of American Beauty fame. The choice of venue was the Open House pub in Springfield Road, not to be confused with the many artists’ open houses during the festival! Essentially the play is about sexual attraction and the various methods used by both sexes to gain one-upmanship. It is set in a restaurant which gradually transforms into a psychological battle ground as the main characters begin a game of flirt and resist. Both the man and the woman are successful career minded types who take lunch in a restaurant only to find themselves enthralled in an emotional tug of war fuelled by bravado and the failure by both parties to back down. During this clever rollercoaster journey their obvious sexual attraction is represented by hilarious courtship dances that had onlookers in stitches. Alan Ball’s superbly written play neatly observes both male and female tendencies in a dramatic and comical fashion. It is brought to life by Nick Warnford (Scorch Theatre) who directs as well as stars in Power Lunch. His fantastic chemistry with Australian co-star, Jett Tatttersall injects a high dose of realism which leaves you questioning your own relationships! Wonderfully impressive and brilliantly acted out.