Unquestionably both entertaining and on-point in its staging of urgent questions about race, class and gender in contemporary Australia, operating in an oscillating middle ground between realism and farce (but deliberately much smoother-edged than playwright Nakkiah Lui's excellent Blackie Blackie Brown, which was actually written after Black is the New White).
I enjoyed it but wasn't swept away, which I think was because I went in expecting it to function primarily as political text, whereas the better frame might have been one of social comedy in which case it hits its marks more directly. Some of the stagecraft wasn't what it could have been; the narrator in particular was an inelegant device, though not distractingly so for the most part. But I did think it was very good - lively, sharp-witted, direct and with plenty of subtleties. (My favourite jokes: the revelation about Sonny's family background and the final line about the characters' 'happily ever after', which brings into crystal clear focus one of the most important things that the play is 'about'.)
(w/ Erandathie and Cass)
I enjoyed it but wasn't swept away, which I think was because I went in expecting it to function primarily as political text, whereas the better frame might have been one of social comedy in which case it hits its marks more directly. Some of the stagecraft wasn't what it could have been; the narrator in particular was an inelegant device, though not distractingly so for the most part. But I did think it was very good - lively, sharp-witted, direct and with plenty of subtleties. (My favourite jokes: the revelation about Sonny's family background and the final line about the characters' 'happily ever after', which brings into crystal clear focus one of the most important things that the play is 'about'.)
(w/ Erandathie and Cass)
