The second production from fledgling company Exhibit A: Theatre is taut and captivating, with the bonus of a star-making performance from Belinda Misevski.
Cowboy Mouth, written by Sam Shepard and Patti Smith, is the stuff of playwriting legend. The duo wrote the play over two nights while engaged in a passionate affair, passing the typewriter back and forth in the motel room they shared. Unsurprisingly, their art imitates life: Cowboy Mouth centres on Slim (Benjamin Rigby) and Cavale (Belinda Misevski), two misfits holed up in a single room. The inherently damaged Cavale appears to have kidnapped Slim at gunpoint with dreams of turning him into a modern god – part rockstar, part saviour – and Slim, for his part, seems mostly onboard.
Director Emily O’Brien Brown has done an excellent job of realising Shepard and Smith’s twisted, sometimes surreal script, and she has extracted excellent performances from Rigby and particularly Misevski. The dialogue-heavy play works well thanks to the chemistry between the two leads – even though they’d played romantic interests in Exhibit A’s previous play SubUrbia, they tap into something quite different here, and the performances don’t feel derivative in the slightest.
Misevski is outstanding as Cavale. There is passion, fury and desperation in her performance, as well as a beautiful dose of nuance; with any luck Misevski will be gracing stages in plenty of plays to come – she’s a true talent. Rigby is both charming and unsettling as the manic Slim, and Nick Kleindienst does well with the play’s oddest role, the Lobster Man – a surreal character who provides the characters with sustenance, and the play with its strangest scenes.
With Cowboy Mouth, Exhibit A is two for two. This is a strong, well-realised production that manages to be gritty and unnerving but never overblown. Here’s hoping that there’s plenty more to come from this new theatre company.
Rating: 4 stars out of 5
Cowboy Mouth
By Sam Shepard and Patti Smith
Directed by Emily O’Brien Brown
Production Design: Sarah Barrow
Cast: Belinda Misevski, Benjamin Rigby and Nick Kleindienst
Good Time Studios, Carlton
11 – 28 April
