Rainbow's End
Rainbow’s End Lennox Theatre, Parramatta Riverside Theatres; August 28-Septeber 12, www.riversideparramatta.com.au. Images by Branco Gaica.
JANE HARRISON first wrote Rainbow’s End as a speedy commission for Ilbijerri Theatre Company and has since worked extensively on the text with this production’s director Craig Ilott. The result is a play about three generations of women that captivated the co-ed teenage audience in the Lennox theatre.
Led by the ebullient and larger than life Lillian Crombie as Nan and a really fine performance from Christine Anu as her daughter Gladys, Rainbow’s End tells a sadly familiar story of disenfranchisement, discrimination and most of the other indignities of Indigenous life in rural Australia in the middle of last century. Familiar, yes, but overly so? No.
To an audience of adolescent girls and boys, all in their school uniforms and on best behaviour, the other part of the story clearly resonates as Gladys’s daughter Dolly (Chenoa Deemal) pouts around in her school uniform, trying to complete school assignments, stay in her Nan’s good books and also mind her Ps and Qs for her mother – who is ambitious for her daughter to do what she has not.
For youngsters experiencing theatre as part of school life as well as entertainment, it is obviously a powerful thing to be able to identify so easily with a character and her story while at the same time see, with stark clarity, the differences between their lives and aspirations. For complicated reasons Gladys is illiterate although clever and quietly courageous; Nan is a feisty old buzzard who isn’t keen on new fangled stuff and is happy and independent in her humpy on the banks of the Murray, dirt floors and all. Young Dolly has dreams, however, she wants to be a nurse, despite discrimination that would have her scrub floors and know her place.
Diffidently breaking in the day-to-day rhythm of their life, up pops Errol Fisher (Timothy Walter) a travelling salesman for Encyclopedia Britannica. Gladys is entranced by the idea of this sumptuous repository of knowledge and learning and her meager savings begin to be squirreled away for each installment. And, naturally enough, Errol takes the opportunity of each visit to attempt to impress Dolly with his prospects (they could get married and go to Melbourne and get a flat, he says).
Rainbow’s End pulls no punches in depicting the reality of life for Aboriginal women and prospects are not glossed over, but nor do they become either a diatribe or dirge. Indeed, there’s a strong streak of romance running through it that goes from Gladys’s innocent delight at the Queen’s visit in 1954, through to Errol’s guileless belief that he and Dolly can take on the world and racism will not bother them.
As it is, the rocky journeys of the four are gently teased out along a path of hope and redemption. It is neither trite nor Pollyanna-ish but is a bittersweet picture of an Australia of Pick-a-Box, rock’n’roll, Bex powders and where a naive young city bloke can be taunted by being called a “gin jockey” and say to his Aboriginal girlfriend “But I don’t drink gin.”
Craig Ilott has crafted a satisfying, no-sags, honest-to-god, 90 minutes entertainment with bite and point. As well as an excellent cast, of whom mention has to be made of Timothy Walter’s ability to slip in and out of various seedy male characters as well as good man Errol: another WAAPA star in the making. Christine Anu – so well known for her musical theatre and singing career – also provokes tears from some in the audience for her portrayal of the heartrendingly optimistic Gladys.
Set designer Jacob Nash evokes a poor but homely country backyard and home with a delicious selection of props and furniture, sympathetically and imaginatively lit by Matthew Marshall. And Rita Carmody has added to the atmosphere and visual pleasure with 50s-style costumes that don’t shriek retro, but rather, reality. And the soundscape and music that underscore the production are masterly and the creation of Steve Francis and Jeremy Silver.
Schools and adult audiences who make the trip to Riverside for this play will be richly rewarded. It’s a great pity, however, that the flatfooted drones at Regional Arts Australia have not seen fit to ensure it tours to the scores of venues that wanted it in the coming year. Let’s hope Riverside can keep together the gorgeous cast and get it going in 2011.
Check out the opening night audience’s reaction to Rainbow’s End http://www.youtube.com/watch?
