★★★★★
Louise Fox’s adaptation of Daphne du Maurier’s The Birds, now playing at Belvoir St Theatre, is a thrillingly vivid experience that whacks awake the senses.
From the moment the lights go down, the theatre feels under attack. Ominous and eerie from the start, The Birds locks you in and holds you there, relentlessly.
Based on du Maurier’s 1952 gothic horror short story, which inspired the immortal Hitchcock film, Fox’s adaptation, under Matthew Lutton’s direction, brings the classic to the stage for a new age, with new anxieties.
Paula Arundell plays Tessa, a mother in a small coastal town where the weather has turned, and the birds have turned with it. She also plays the other characters, including Tessa’s husband Nat, the children, and the neighbours, with nothing but a bare stage to work with.
The birds are closing in, no one is coming to help, and there’s really no escape.
Birds are fascinating creatures, aren’t they? Just yesterday, I was having an innocent coffee at a cafe, only to be accosted by a very confident and slightly aggressive pigeon thwacking at my table.
It was a little alarming, but quite invigorating at the same time. I felt smacked awake, and Belvoir St Theatre’s production does just this, creating an unease that is far more terrifying.
The stage is set to create a sense of apprehension. Darkness, a cigarette lit up mid-stage as the only light source. Then I notice the birdhouses – 140 of them, apparently, hanging above the audience, a little creepy and doing their work to spark our imaginations.
Lutton’s direction works with simplicity and the hidden, letting the fear of the things we can’t see do the work. Similar to Jaws, he understands that the unseen threat, the tension of birds that can show up out of nowhere, right in your face, is far more powerful than any prop. No bird or bird-like props are used. The monster is emphasised through visual imagery created in our minds.
Fox’s script is storytelling in the best sense. Her words take us into a world that’s rich in vivid detail, sharp and alive in description. Together with Kat Chan’s staging, there’s an intimacy created, but also a feeling of aliveness that feels precarious.
Fox’s words, brilliantly awakened by the riveting Arundell, take hold of you, pulling you in, and shaking you about with intelligent, electric and bold imagery. The language asks the audience to participate through imagination, and our mind movies build and build until we’re overcome and there’s no escape, just like the masses of birds that swarm the town.
Paula Arundell gives a breathtaking, captivating performance. She plays the characters with an effortless energy that feels contained, but explosive at both ends. She lets the story unfold and unfurl from within her.
Her voice work is brilliant. She slips between Tessa and Nat and the children with an ever-so slight turn of the head, but a clear distinction in voices. Nat, her husband, feels like a totally distinct character — despite coming entirely from Arundell without costume changes or props or any crutches to lean on. We see him and sense him clearly.
I was fascinated by Arundell’s physicality, how she moves easily, defining place, areas of the home and relationships to character, with nothing but a bare stage and minimal props to work with.
The sound design by J. David Franzke is a real star. There is not a moment for distraction, as sharp, sudden sounds, like gunfire, jar you, snapping you into the moment. Sound, light and staging are seamlessly coordinated with Arundell’s movements. We’re kept in a constant state of apprehension.
The family, created so clearly through the language and Arundell’s characterisations, is where the stakes are pushed to an intense, relatable effect. This part of the story taps into our collective fears, heightened since COVID, and the world of uncertainty we now live in.
“The birds hate us, and I hate us too,” says Tessa.
It gets us thinking about our impact on the planet, and what this might mean going forward. Our mindless hubris is our undoing, yet we keep charging on, scrolling and hiding, consuming and complaining — til we’re brought to our knees by something as seemingly innocuous as a bird.
I want to go back. To be confronted, to huddle and fight and protect, along with Tessa again.
The Birds is produced Malthouse Theatre and runs at Belvoir St Theatre to 7 June. Upstairs Theatre, Belvoir Street, Surry Hills NSW 2010.
Tickets: https://my.belvoir.com.au/overview/14650
Website: https://belvoir.com.au/productions/the-birds/
Socials: https://www.instagram.com/belvoirst/
Photo credits: Brett Boardman
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