Photo credit: Dana Weeks
Adriana Xenides. The leggy, crop-haired blonde whose name (and sparkle) is synonymous with Australia’s most popular TV game-show of the 1970s, 80 and 90s. She was the veritable queen of the Wheel of Fortune screen.
Her outer appearance oozed perfection… but her inner world? Ironically, during her lifetime this remained largely hidden from view.
Sure, there were stories. The Women’s gossip mags documented her various marriages; divorces; eating disorders and drug-fuelled driving mishaps. But Adriana was more a TV icon than a real person.
In our era of #MeToo and insta-selfie-fame, these themes provide interesting territory for a new theatre work to chart, and for her first self-devised work as Artistic Director for Black Swan State Theatre Company, Clare Watson has chosen Adriana’s story as a fitting reflection of our times.
Co-created with Watson’s all-female cast – actors Adriane Daff, Katherine Tonkin and Laila Bano Rind, with opera singer Harriet Marshall – the director has used details of Xenides’ life as a kind of mirror for these four women to reflect on their own lives, and to explore how being a women in today’s society (particularly in the arts and entertainment industries) affects their identity.
Watson has also included a strong musical element in this work, gathering an all-female band to provide live music throughout.
The resulting experience is a mix of musical theatre, witty confessionals and thoughful social critique.
It’s a surprising and clever approach. While Watson could have taken us on a tabloid-busting-behind-the-curtain extravaganza of ‘saga Adriana’, what we get is a more understated journey of unmasking. Unfortunately, it’s this balancing act that exposes the shows’ strengths and weaknesses overall.
From the start, we witness the actors in ensemble scenes playing ‘themselves’. Each are clad in glitzy red-dress outfits, wearing identical Xenides-style wigs. They talk to each other, and to us, about their lives, personalities and memories of Adriana.
A dazzling Adriane Daff recalls countless afternoons in front of the telly with her sister watching the show; Katherine Tonkin jokes about a close encounter with the star as a high schooler in Adelaide (yes, Adriana did do school-drop-off and pick-ups for her step-son in the 90s).
But these funny, and at times insightful vignettes lack a consistent thread to convincingly tie the work together as a whole. What is more consistent however, is the musician’s contribution to the work. The band (positioned stage left for the show’s entirety), perform their numbers energetically, and their presence lifts the onstage energy as needed.
Musicians Xani Kolac, Djuna Lee and Holly Norman are a talented trio. As the back-up singers for the cast, they harmonise beautifully in the ballad-style pieces, and bring impressive gusto to the pop hit-inspired singles. Much of the show’s music is composed by band member Xani Kolac, whose work in creating a soundtrack to Adriana’s life certainly proves her musical smarts.
And while the music offers some terrifically light-hearted scenes complete with sugary dance-moves (choreographed nicely by Laura Boynes), Xenides also offers some serious moments. Part way through the journey on the Adriana-express, we pause as the cast reflects on Xenides’ childhood in Argentina. They chew over what it must have been like for Xenides’ parents amid the political dangers in the country at that time. Luckily for Adriana, her family got out. But as Harriet Marshall tells us in a heart-felt monologue, there were some “washed up women” who weren’t as fortunate.
Overall, it appears the four actors have given themselves generously to this script. Their revelations and unmasking of themselves is admirable. It’s just unfortunate the work doesn’t allow their musings to arrive at a place where the show’s premise – being an exploration of these women’s roles in today’s Australia – can pack a more whole-hearted punch.
3 stars: ★★★
Xenides
Black Swan State Theatre Company
By Clare Watson and collaborators
Director: Clare Watson
Musical Director & Composer: Xani Kolac
Musician: Djuna Lee
Musician: Holly Norman
Set Designer: Zoe Atkinson
Costume Designer: Sarah Duyvestyn
Choreographer: Laura Boynes
Lighting Designer: Richard Vabre
Lighting Design Associate: Chloe Ogilvie
Assistant Director: Katt Osborne
Collaborators include Virginia Gay, Sophie Ross
Cast: Adriane Daff, Harriet Marshall, Laila Bano Rind and Katherine Tonkin
Studio Underground, State Theatre Centre of WA
25 October – 11 November 2018
