THE ALIENS
THE ALIENS, Outhouse Theatre Co at the Old Fitz, 27 August-19 September 2015. Photography by Rupert Reid, above: Jeremy Waters, James Bell and Ben Wood; right: James Bell.
At just 34 Annie Baker is one of those rarities in American (and world) theatre: a rapidly rising and successful female playwright. First produced in the US in 2014, The Aliens is her sixth play in six years and she has already won Drama Desk and Obie awards. In short, she can write for the stage. And she has a quirky sense of humour that’s fed by a sharp ear for language, both everyday and high flown.
Jasper (Jeremy Waters) and his friend KJ (Ben Wood) have taken over the grotty backyard of a cafe somewhere in small town Maine. Jasper, a thirty-something loser who makes smoking a cigarette an act of barely suppressed violence, says little – and actually says nothing very loudly and for an extremely long time in the emotionally incendiary opening sequence. However, when he insists on reading aloud from his half-written novel it is surprisingly and genuinely eloquent.
KJ is ostensibly more laid back as he quietly sings snatches of hilariously pretentious songs, an aggressive act in itself in its mellow passivity. He and Jasper were once in a band whose name was never settled on – except The Aliens sort of stuck – but the songs and an implied absence of musical ability were clearly the reason why the band went absolutely nowhere.
They are nevertheless specimens of that subspecies of supremely confident D-grade wannbe alpha male that effects a magnetic pull on younger, less cocksure men. One of these is Evan (James Bell) the cafe’s high school kid waiter-factotum whose desperate efforts to appear cool are evident in his response to virtually everything: “Yeah, cool.”
Evan first encounters the two men when he struggles out of the back door to heave a bag of garbage into the dumpster. The backyard is only for employees, he nervously tells Jasper and KJ; naturally they ignore him. In his naive eyes this makes them … really cool.
There is much sly irony in Baker’s play as the audience struggles to maintain its cool in the face of the kinds of long pauses and pathologically aimless characters that can either be fascinating or drive one beresk. It’s to the credit of the actors that fascination remains the predominant feeling throughout the two acts.
-c750x442.jpg)
Once again the depth of talent in Sydney’s independent theatre sector is made blindingly obvious by the nuanced and intelligent performances from Bell, Wood and Waters. Baker is apparently keen on Chekhov and she certainly knows how to make nothing much happening as gripping as a Bruce Willis epic.
Putting a flame to a sparkler and watching it fizz and crackle on the Fourth of July is as overtly dramatic as it gets, but that would be to under-estimate the real fizz and crackle – of the script and the actors. Director Craig Baldwin has done a lovely job with the three very different men but it will could be even better when the somewhat religious adherence to the instruction to be silent is balanced by the smoother running of a well oiled show.
The Aliens works well in the OldFitz’s ratty intimacy with a set by Hugh O’Connor that gives the actors a remarkable amount of space while clearly conjuring the garbage-stinky, summer heat of the yard, with peeling Coke sign on the wall, milk crates in a corner and enough urban grottiness to shudder my bourgeois sensibilities.
At the same time, Ben Brockman’s lighting undercuts the cunningly malodorous naturalism to remind us that we are in a theatre and not to get too comfortable with our discomfort and superiority. It’s a clever play and it’s been given a fine staging here. It would be really good to see more of Annie Baker’s work, meanwhile – enjoy this one.
