Stormy Guise

Sun Herald

Sunday October 8, 2006

JASON BLAKE

CONSTANCE DRINKWATER AND THE FINAL DAYS OF SOMERSET

SBW Stables Theatre, Kings Cross. Until October 28. Tickets $22-$29. Bookings 1300 306 776.

Critic's rating: 7/10

CREEPY children, a haunted house and lots of thunder and lightning make for a dark and stormy night in the theatre as playwright Stephen Carlton mingles the supernatural chills of something like Henry James's The Turn Of The Screw, with the murkiest undercurrents of the contemporary immigration debate.

A violent storm, far north Queensland, circa 1899. Father Angelico (David Callan) arrives at Somerset, home to Lady Drinkwater (Susan Prior), with two shipwreck survivors - eccentric scientist Cornelius Crabbe (Christopher Tomkinson) and Chinese businessman Hop Lee (Jason Chong). It's here, trapped by curiosity and inclement weather, that they witness the death throes of a troubled family and the last gasps of a nutty scheme to create an independent state with Somerset as its capital.

Constance Drinkwater probes deep-seated national anxieties about invasion and contamination in the guise of a Grand Guignol pot-boiler. Director Leland Kean combines credible drama and laughable excess. Some of the more hysterical scenes only just hang together, but this ambitious, well-designed, slightly-too-long production is steadfastly gripping. JB

© 2006 Sun Herald

Back to News Index | Back to Home