You go to the theatre to see a comedy festival show, only to find you’re in the audience of a sitcom. La Mama’s Carlton Courthouse theatre space becomes a TV studio for the first two episodes of a web series, Workspace, devised by Robert Reid and the cast. This in itself makes a for a novel experience – although the warm-up guy tells you what they’re all up to, there’s a moment where you think this is a play about making a web series. It takes a while to ‘read’ what’s happening here, that this is the actual filming of a web series going straight to You Tube. (ArtsHub asked Reid later how he wanted the show reviewed, just the filmed bits or the night overall? He said the night overall.)
Here’s how the sitcom goes: Bob (Reid), Eddy (Eliot Summers) and Vaughan (Verity Charlton) are three not-yet-winners at the game of life who find themselves working together, although they don’t know what each other’s doing, or quite what they’re doing themselves. Workspace is a satirical take on the vagueness that can answer the question ‘what do you do?’ It pokes fun at modern creatives doing things on the web, writing stuff and conceptualising. The show took a while to warm to, for the first few minutes you’re getting used to the subtlety and the sophistication of the humour, and also to the fact that the actors are playing to camera and not to the audience, making for an odd tension in a theatre space. Once you’ve recalibrated expectations, you’re in for a highly entertaining experience, especially watching the three characters build up to some satisfying argy-bargy. The story opens with Vaughan moving herself into the office space already uneasily shared by Eddy and Bob. Red Stitch veteran Charlton as Vaughan is just terrific, she’s present and her character is well-defined; it’s a treat to watch her. The men are both experienced performers and slowly the personalities of Eddy and Bob reveal themselves, although without the impact of Vaughan’s. The dialogue is detailed, well developed, clever and funny, and the characters are familiar without being clichéd. The originality of the whole thing feels like a new breeze.
Reid’s work for theatre is always entertaining, original, intelligent and highly respected. He was the founder of Theatre in Decay and has been a strong presence in the Melbourne independent theatre for many years. His most recent plays are The Joy of Text and On The Production of Monsters. Lately he has been Artistic Director of Pop Up Playground, an experience design company currently working at Fed Square in the Fresh Air Games Festival.
Workspace at this stage will comprise six episodes which will be available on DVD as well as on You Tube; It won’t be surprising to see the show gain a strong following.
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Workspace
La Mama Courthouse
Cast: Robert Reid, Elliot Summers, Verity Charlton
Co-devised by the cast and written by Robert Reid
2 – 12 April 2015
