It is a tumultuous, difficult and unsettled time.
The Delta strain of COVID-19 has firmly taken hold right through NSW, with cases steadily rising: today above 600; on Monday this week Kabul fell to the Taliban; the Federal Liberal government here in Australia steadfastly refuses to support our citizens with a reasonable unemployment benefit, to address the on-going and increasing problem of homelessness within our society, to generously and charitably assist the many thousands of people who have legitimately sought asylum and refuge in our country, or to properly address the deep inequality, hurt and discrimination suffered by the First Nations peoples of this land; there are terrible bush fires in Europe and Africa; the 6th report on climate change has been handed down by the IPCC, which paints a very grim future for the planet; and Melbourne is now in the middle of another very strict lockdown, including a night-time curfew.
Last year, in 2020, we had two lockdowns, and in the second one we were locked down for a very long time. 112 days.
This year we have had four lockdowns. This one, lockdown 6, stretches on…I am aware, given all that is going on in the world, that I am extremely fortunate, but this year, right now, I’m finding it harder and bleaker, finding it more difficult to hope, to trust.
So what happened?
During lockdown last year I remained pretty productive: I narrated lots of talking books, I did a few creative developments of new scripts, I did some on-line performances, I did a lot of text analysis on ‘The Cane’, and I drafted a novella. In October, just after my birthday but before the anniversary of Mum’s death, I had an unusually vivid dream about her and the next day I found out the excellent news that I’d been cast as Jean Pascoe in The Newsreader. And pretty much from that moment on everything shifted gear from the quiet, reflective, self-directed time of lockdown to ultra-busy, multi-tasking, post-lockdown mayhem. It was great, and it was intense.
I began work on ‘The Newsreader’ in November, but the main block of work was in January, from about the 6th to the 26th. I had a really wonderful time on ‘The Newsreader.’ I loved the script written by Michael Lucas, the director, Emma Freeman, my character, Jean Pascoe (and her amazing outfits), the crew were fabulous and the rest of the cast were wonderful to work with. On account of COVID, the series was shot in ‘zones’ so that, for example, all the scenes for all of the six episodes which were set in the newsroom were shot in one block, or all of the scenes in the make-up room were shot in a block, etc, hence the intense three weeks in January. What was so great about this for me, was that it enabled all the actors playing the characters of the newsroom to work together day after day, and in so doing, we all became very familiar, we had lots of fun, and it was as if we did actually work there, together, in that fabulous set.
Then I went straight in to a week’s re-rehearsal of ‘Single Ladies’, that is, the actual next day after I finished ‘The Newsreader’ then straight on into production week, a few previews and then we opened in early March. ‘Single Ladies’ was great. In so many ways. It was a comedy. The audience needed a comedy after all that had happened in 2020. The audiences were enthusiastic, relieved, optimistic. Hearing them laugh, a lot, out loud, in front of us, in the theatre, was so uplifting. And again, I loved everything about the production: the script, director, cast, crew, and of course, the wonderful Lilike Kovacs. What a beautiful character to play.
‘Single Ladies’ had a five week run in the theatre, something that from this vantage point, August 2021, seems utterly miraculous. In week three of that run, I began rehearsing Red Stitch’s next play ‘The Cane’, which had also been programmed in 2020 but had to be rescheduled for 2021. So I was rehearsing in the day and performing at night. We had spent many productive hours in the 2020 lockdown analysing the script, so when we began rehearsing I felt ready, notwithstanding being a bit tired. And it was interesting. The world of ‘The Cane’ is a pretty grim world. There is a lot of anger and violence in the text, and it was as if these feelings crept into the rehearsal room, crept into us. It was still a rewarding experience, such a well-written play, and a great team, and the audiences were very appreciative and responsive, but I came out at the end of it feeling a raw, a bit depleted. And then came lockdowns 4, 5 and now 6.
Materially things are fine. There are bits and pieces of quite lovely work coming in, projects to provoke and delight. The challenge is to stay calm and to stay hopeful, to restore belief. Last night I watched ‘Faces Places’ a film by Agnès Varda. It helped a lot. It is beautiful, deceptively simple, an ode to mortality, connection and art. Believe and trust. In the self and the other. In the end, that’s all there is.
