Blue Love - The Studio, Sydney Opera House - 04/08/05

Ethan Switch - Friday, August 5, 2005 - Print Version

Barely a foot over the threshold into the Foyer, just outside both the Playhouse and The Studio, an usher directs all on a path toward the cloaking area. With not even a pause for a breath or to negotiate a waffle cone over the tongue and down the throat, the hustle is over and potential bombs safely put away. Collection tags still reek of a system in disorder with speed of retrieval on gestures from patrons.

Popcorn crams a mighty load into the nostrils as the audience locate their seats. A smooth and ambient jazz click tripping the soundtrack of a disquiet air. Popping out from The Bedroom, clearly marked on the white wall stage door, hosts Glenn (Shaun Parker) and Rhonda Flune (Veronica Neave) greet the guests. Offering cans of VB to the many, one finds herself holding a bowl of popcorn, salted beyond taste.

Quick are the Flunes in setting up their environment and relationship of woes. Bare and naked, the set is a white land of blocks that exist solely as the backdrop of the mind that doesn't care. Details are in the making of their conversations and glances toward each other. Burning bright within their eyes, the couple are at times searing with hate and burning with love for one another.

Blue Love skewers and examines the angles of perception and meaning of love and relationship with a three act structure that plays out in very different means. Three acts to blind men standing beside an elephant as opposed to bites of a cheese and spinach triangle drowning in oil.

Act one speaks with a art-house tongue, in all its glorious misdirection almost there clarity. The very nature begs serious questions as to what exactly is a natural progression of emotion and connection. Parallels run rampant with the art-house shorts thrown large up on the back wall and the uncertain intimacies of knowing what love really is all about. There is no easy answer, no clear written manual. For this there is but perception and all that it may or may not even be.

Dancing about with fleet feet, the second act translates a connection in physical means. The performances here are nothing short of spectacular. From ballet to ballroom, various styles and forms of dance make a delightful appearance. Even with one partner dead to the world, the symbiotic gel that holds the pair together is strong. Breaking out the metaphors, one point has Glenn so self-absorbed in his own actions and his own life that nothing short of death can spin the spiral to a stop.

Closing out the night, with an intense fury and hard love, the all too familiar act of citing song lyrics. Breaking up the run, they attack each repetition with an edge that can only come from knowing each delivery bares a different soul. If conversations can never truly happen more than once, what then of the attempt? What does it say to say it over and over again?

Nothing is really left to waste between the two. The scathing jibes and almost violent quips fighting a constant battle against the sheer physicality and wonder of their performances. Stunning and mesmerising ones at that. Shattering any allusion to truth, beauty and the pursuit of a continued and shared happiness, laughter is a constant companion holding hands with this underlying sadness wrought throughout the performance.

Shaun Parker looks very much like Guy Pearce and possesses a hypnotising singing voice. Especially one in a French ballad. Veronica Neave on the other hand is a feisty performer who holds much of the ribbing. Together these two are only undone by a calculated presence of mind. The Actress (Jo Stone). Fleeting.

Blue Love is intensely interesting theatre that entertains inside a tight corset of love's many conventions and apparent meanings.