Theatre
Live from the foreshore
by Natasha Hay
THE BACH, by Stephen Sinclair; directed by Sarah Peirce, presented by the Auckland Theatre Company, Herald Theatre, Auckland, until August 8.
A family bach in the Coromandel is the backdrop for a blistering exposé of middle-class angst as two fortysomething brothers hook up there for the first time in years. Think Roger Hall, but with a malevolent edge.
The Bach is the success story of ATC’s literary unit, having gone through an extensive workshop and polishing process, then tested last year in front of an audience. The result is terrific entertainment that’s intellectually daring and darkly funny. It confirms Stephen Sinclair as a very fine local playwright who reflects who we are.
Michael (Phillip Gordon) is a hard-living embittered journalist back home from London, and older brother Simon (Peter Elliott) is a moderately successful lawyer, whose passion for life and marriage have both evaporated. His ruthlessly ambitious wife Sally (Jennifer Ward-Lealand) works in PR but wants to make films. Added to the mix is Hana (Miriama McDowell), Sally’s young Maori colleague who wants to write “my iwi’s stories”. Plus, like an elephant in the living-room, there’s the public toilet that has been erected next door.
Over a night of booze and dope, the proverbial hits the fan and caustic-tongued Michael is the catalyst for unleashing a torrent of fury that builds to a breathtaking climax of liberal rage and vicious home truths, followed by a poignant morning-after coda.
Sinclair has clearly had fun writing this as the sarcastic barbs ricochet thrillingly around the walls of the iconic bach (evoked with nostalgic affection by John Parker) – acute observations that cover the gamut from Pakeha identity, political correctness, the foreshore debate to career disappointment, failed relationships and sibling rivalry. Even Hall (“the Cobb & Co of New Zealand theatre”) is not immune.
Director Sarah Peirce milks the ironic tone for all it’s worth, but sometimes the lampooning turns to shallow farce – the writing scene between the two women, for instance. Also, on opening night, some lines were fluffed – Gordon, particularly, when reading poetry – and the comic timing wasn’t sharp enough.
Gordon has a gift of a role as Michael and showed flashes of brilliance with his sneering, self-pitying brutality. Elliott is perfectly emasculated and spineless, busying himself with a raft of DIY duties – difficult to pull off convincingly – from sawing wood to gutting fish to cooking and serving a meal. (Wonderful cooking smells waft into the auditorium.) Simon and Michael may not be likeable males, but Sinclair lets us understand why they are the way they are. Less so the women, who are not so sympathetically drawn but great comic fare. Ward-Lealand has impeccable timing as Sally, the chilly, controlled ballbreaker and McDowell fleshes out the least complex role, with a mix of ambition and naivety.
Unsurprisingly, the Auckland season is nearly sold out. Look out, Roger Hall.
