Jumpy

David Tredinnick and Jane Turner in the MTC’s production of Jumpy. Photo by Jeff Busby.

Hilary (Jane Turner) has just turned 50 and is suffering through all the anxieties such a landmark birthday can bring. Clinging to youthful memories of anti-nuclear protests at London’s Greenham Common and to her failing marriage with Mark (David Tredinnick) she is also struggling to stay friends with her hostile teenage daughter, Tilly (Brenna Harding).

Her strained relationship with Tilly increasingly reflects Hilary’s unhappy relationship with her own mother, and despite the best attempts of her sexually confident best friend Frances (Marina Pryor) to console her – as well as frequently consoling herself with large glasses of white wine – Hilary’s life slowly spins out of control.

Slowly is one of the key words for this production – the pacing of Jumpy feels off and over-extended, rendering what should be a brisk comedy, underscored by moments of serious drama, somewhat leaden and far from satisfying.

In this, the production is not helped by Turner in the lead role. Her comic timing is impeccable, but she lacks the dramatic heft to convince in more challenging scenes. Consequently, moments which should be emotionally intense – such as a showdown with Roland (John Lloyd Fillingham) and Bea (Caroline Brazier), the parents of  Josh (Laurence Boxhall), the boy to whom Tilly has fallen pregnant; or the moment where an irate Hilary screams ‘You disgust me!’ at her daughter – feel forced or fall flat. And without an emotional core to the work, the remaining actors sometimes struggle to ground their performances.

The direction too, is notably weak; Pamela Rabe fails to draw out the play’s deeper elements, while her blocking feels rote, leaving actors placed awkwardly about the stage. In addition, the casting of African-Australian actor Tariro Mavondo as Tilly’s relatively well-adjusted, pregnant best friend Lyndsey feels problematic: the script does not specify an actor of colour for the role, but by casting Mavondo – who gives an excellent performance – as an unmarried, pregnant teenager, the production consequently reinforces certain negative stereotypes, even though the colour-blind casting of the role was no doubt well intentioned.

The contemporary nature of the play – such as its evocation of the awkwardness of overhearing your teenage child having sex – is certainly a selling point, albeit one clearly targeting the MTC’s older subscriber base. Michael Hankin’s set design is effective both visually and thematically, making full use of The Sumner Theatre’s revolving stage to demonstrate the way that life is leaving Hilary behind; and in his few short scenes, Dylan Watson impresses with a charismatic performance.

In stronger hands, Jumpy could be a far more engaging and amusing play, despite its tendency to portray older women’s lives as a prison of age-induced body-horror, the sexuality of younger women as something to be policed and controlled, and its portrait of a sexually confident older woman as a fool.

No doubt the pace of Jumpy will tighten as its season progresses, as will the majority of the cast’s grip on their inconsistent accents. Other aspects of this flawed production will be much harder to improve

Rating: 2½ stars out of 5

Southbank Theatre, The Sumner
31 January – 14 March
www.mtc.com.au

Sydney Opera House, Drama Theatre
26 March – 16 May
www.stc.com.au