While hosting the Golden Globes, Tina Fey quipped that ‘there are still great parts in Hollywood for Meryl Streeps over 60’. Roles for women that aren’t bursting the seams of their skin-tight superhero costumes are few and productions about older women, even fewer. The stage may be somewhat more representative but not much, especially at the higher profile end of the spectrum. Despite this, Evelyn Krape stars in this one-woman-show about female identity that offers a refreshing change to this tired formula. She has spent much of her long and decorated career in Australian theatre and as she steps onto stage in More Female Parts, it’s easy to see why. She performs with boundless vivacity, class and a healthy dose of self-deprecating humour.
Knape also shows great versatility in assuming the different characters in each of the three monologue that comprise the play. She begins as Julie, a divorcee trying to re-enter the workforce, and while her children are grown, family commitments and the gaps they create in a person’s working life still loom large as challenges. You can’t help but empathise with Julie and laugh with her at the absurdity of the experience, all the more so when as a 60-something year old, she is basically having to go through what we all went through to get our first jobs. The feelings of powerlessness, vulnerability and inferiority at having to put yourself through the ringer like a trained animal just to gain the most basic self-respect that employment has come to imply. It’s a feeling that anybody having to start again in life can identify with and one Krape captures magnificently with irreverence and cheek.
This first monologue, ‘Can’t Sleep, Can’t Sleep’ was by far the strongest with the second and third not quite delivering on the heart and substance that made the first such a pleasure to watch. Set in the future, monologue two, ‘Penthouse Woman 2044’ includes all the classic criticisms of modernity – alienation, consumerism, superficiality, patriarchy, fearmongering – but its exploration of them is mostly descriptive; it doesn’t evoke the feeling of discomfort or offer the kind of satirical dissection of the first monologue.
The very adult fairy tale of monologue three, entitled ‘Hip Op’, offers a stinging rebuke to the stubborn resilience of the so-called glass ceiling but with tongue very firmly in cheek. It’s a clever parody but it misses one key aspect of a metaphor: it doesn’t tell you anything new. Like ‘Penthouse Woman 2044’, it’s mainly descriptive, and while it tells the story of sexism in the workplace well, it doesn’t create the sort of new or revealing point of view that one hopes for.
Through it all Knape is tireless. The stage can barely contain the energy she exudes in a trademark physical performance. Her ability to fuse pathos and humour together allows her to tackle difficult issues with a deft touch, bringing the audience along with her like an old friend.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
More Female Parts
By Sara Hardy
Director & dramaturg: Lois Ellis
Set & costume design: Rainbow Sweeney
Lighting designer: Emma Valente
Performed by Evelyn Krape
Fairfax Studio, Arts Centre Melbourne
www.artscentremelbourne.com.au
30 June – 4 July
