Among the unlikely heroes of Tuesday night in Kirribilli is someone special who somehow assembled, at Ensemble Theatre, the absolute royal jelly of ‘80s Australian telly.
That blokes like Shane Porteous and Grant Dodwell were on hand to witness the world premiere of Melanie Tait’s How to Plot a Hit in Two Days nicely captures the immense warmth and generosity that help make this examination of ‘80s Australian telly something very special indeed.
Across 48 hours in the writers’ room of TV’s A Country Practice, Tait imagines how her five wonderfully vivid characters plan and literally execute Molly Jones, the show’s most adored character.
Born to kill
And Tait is undoubtedly the woman for the job. She’s been interviewing A Country Practice cast members, crew and writers on a regular basis for her A Country Podcast.
”After watching it at least 30 times,” Tait says, ”I think the episode, written by the screenwriter Judith Colquhoun, provides a blueprint for the perfect death.”
Equally guilty in sentimentality is director Lee Lewis, who, as a teenager in the windswept isolation of 1980s Goulburn, reveals that she wore funeral blacks to watch the episode:
“I lived my life through the television. It was an important window into other lives, growing up in the country. Molly was dying, and I was dressing in black for her funeral.”
Dragged out deliciously across fourteen inexorable episodes, Molly’s murder at the hands of her creators was a big deal to many Australians. By some strange process of emotional osmosis, actor Anne Tenney’s effortless take on Molly insinuated itself into the hearts of the TV-watching public.
She was emerging as the nation’s sweetheart; Tenney was becoming one of our biggest stars. And the national rupture which followed her cunningly wrought exit was like the Aussie version of whatever Orson Welles did to America in his panic-inducing adaptation of H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds.
When Molly finally cashes in her chips on a couch, in the fields of her Wanden Valley farm, more than half Australia’s population – over 8 million people – shared the trauma of good telly, well made.
Your intrepid investigator was not among them, but does concede that even sans context, the sequence has undeniable power… (See clip below.)
No viewing required
But part of the charm of this firecracker of a theatrical experience is that its appreciation does not hinge on the audience’s encyclopaedic knowledge of ‘80s Aussie telly. This is very good theatre, beautifully presented, finely acted and as much about the Australian condition as it is about ‘80s TV drama.
Simply as a snapshot of how we used to be, and as an explanation for how we are, there could not be a franker, more enjoyable portrayal of how a country’s sense of shared identity emerged from its shared unselfconsciousness.
The fact that this theatrical post-mortem of the ubiquity that was A Country Practice even exists, and moreover actually works, is surely Proof of Life that audacious theatrical courage is alive, well and still very much practised in this country.
The Commissioners’ Circle and The Tracey Trinder Playwright’s Award should both take a bow for identifying something of true value inside what must’ve looked like a weird pitch for an unnecessary project.
How to be Australian
The achievement shouldn’t be overwhelmed by the nostalgic enthusiasm for the play’s subject. Tait says the play is her tribute to (writer) Judith Colquhoun and (producer) James Davern. And the many creative Australians who made a beautiful show that helped teach her how to be a writer and a person.
And that’s where the play works. Not as a sentimental study of ‘80s retro. But in its commitment to truth bombing the better bits of us, as we knew them, some 40 years gone. Within the cauldron of the writers’ room, good people struggle with the enormity and the insignificance of what they do and who they are.
Former A Country Practice cast member and more-than-occasional avatar for everything an Australian can feel, Georgie Parker, leads a tight cast to near perfection in what is a highly original, utterly Australian theatrical landmark.
Tait’s dialogue fizzes with ‘80s ignorance, attitude and elan. And it’s some of the best comic writing this country’s produced since All Saints.
Appropriately, it’s the chemical kick of all the performances across the five-hand ensemble which makes the show sing and zip. That said, the power of Amy Ingram’s take on the ex-con, head-writer Sharon ensures that Australian drama has its next instant icon.
And considering the cross-media pollination at work in Tait and director Lewis’ dramaturgy, Ingram’s foil-mouthed dilettante with a penchant for Winnie Blues and straight shooting hilarity could easily live again in a sequel, a spin-off off or a character study on how the hell we got through 1985.
Certainly, How To Plot A Hit In Two Days is a play to make Australians proud that we did. Its affirmation of the small things that we share is likely to make us hungry for more.
How To Plot A Hit In Two Days runs to 11 October at Ensemble Theatre, 78 McDougall Street Kirribilli NSW 2061.
Tickets: https://www.ensemble.com.au/shows/how-to-plot-a-hit-in-two-days/
Website: https://www.ensemble.com.au/
Socials: https://www.instagram.com/ensembletheatre/
Photo credits: Brett Boardman
