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Photo by Brett Boardman
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EIGHT GIGABYTES OF HARDCORE PORNOGRAPHY is a new Australian play by Declan Greene. Mr Greene is a theatre maker from Melbourne and we have met his work before, through the productions of Sisters Grimm, and his co-artist Ash Flanders (he, who we will see, independently, as well, as the Belvoir's Hedda Gabler, in the months to come): LITTLE MERCY we saw at the STC, and SUMMERTIME IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN, which the Griffin Independent presented last year, at this same theatre, the SBW Theatre.
The characters have no names, they are anonymously, Female and Male. She's a nurse (Andrea Gibbs) in her forties, husband 'dangerous' and mostly absent, children, consequently, out-of-control, trapped in a loop of catastrophic credit card debt. He's in IT (Steve Rogers), also, in the middle of his age journey, living in a dysfunctional marriage and a distressing job - soon to be 'sacked' - and is trapped in a loop of porn-trawling to give some spark to his existence (he, it is, who downloads eight gigabytes of hardcore pornography, at work!!!) They, in the first beat of the play describe themselves as, "fat, stupid, boring and ugly: pathetic." They retreat, later in the scene from those verbal 'downers', and subsequently, find some positives about themselves, taking themselves to a place where they admit to what they are: "I know what I am. I know my limitations. I don't hold any illusions at all. I don't dream of a lot for myself" but, do yearn for "Just someone. Just someone. Just someone, please. Just someone. Someone to ... " These two meet on-line. They co-ordinate a meeting, and embark on a short adventure that, mostly, could be described as desperate.
EIGHT GIGABYTES OF HARDCORE PORNOGRAPHY is a bleak tale of contemporary societal disconnect. It tells us of the tragedy of the contemporary human condition where money and sex, facilitated, conveniently, by primitive artificial 'intelligences', can dominate our lives. (The movie, TRANSCENDENCE is a warning of what might evolve - I loved it). It refracts the knowledge that these people have no apparent connection to any moral or ethical protections. It is, for some, a devastating view of our times and condition. It is, sadly, not a surprise for most of us.
Mr Greene's observations are told through one of the contemporary modes of story telling, of which I have tired, mostly, direct conversation to the audience - written like a descriptive novel, and instead of it being in book form, where my imagination can take fuller flight, is embodied for us by the actors, who act out the narrative for us, much more prescriptively. The Director, Lee Lewis, last year directed a two-hander by Van Badham: THE BULL, THE MOON AND THE CORONET OF STARS, and this play is extremely similar in writing form and performance needs (although, the actors required then, were decidedly more on the 'fantasy' side of their physical representation than here!)
The two actors of EIGHT GIGABYTES OF HARDCORE PORNOGRAPHY, Ms Gibbs and Mr Rogers, give wonderful, winning performances. Ms Gibbs, an actor based, it seems, in Perth (this is the first time I have met her), is at ease with this material and has a whimsical, humorous point-of-view of her "nurse", and one watches her create some sense of 'hope' for better times for the life being led by her character, and when in the last lines of the play she asks us "Not to make fun of her.", one, truly, does not wish to - she has struck, summarily, an empathetic chord in all of us. Ms Gibbs has won us over, despite the bleak 'grunge' of her nurse's circumstances. Mr Rogers, always reliable and watchable, with this role reveals, leisurely, his mesmeric qualities of humanity, and from the tragic, desperate banalities of his "IT man", too, constructs a figure of empathetic tragedy - one cannot condemn him, or deride this "IT man", however criminal, or stupidly addicted, he is - such is the powerful warmth and intelligence of this actor.
The two actors, in a metaphoric stroke, after having revealed the characters so nakedly, psychologically to us, do so, physically, in the final scene of the play: "remove their clothes. Until they stand by the end, completely naked." This is no hardcore gesture of pornography but a theatrical demonstration of a recognisable picture of the fragility of all mankind: there, but for the grace of God, go I, perhaps! (I have removed all the mirrors in my house, bar the small one, above the shaving sink). These two actors, courageously, reveal all, for us, indeed. The 'music' between these two actors, and that they create with us, defies us not to be moved by their physical 'sacrifice' for Mr Greene's play, and Ms Lewis' production, in the cause of defying us to not have some 'hope', some desperate hope, for these characters, against all our better knowledgements.
Ms Lewis in her program notes tells us; "There have been a handful of plays which I have felt compelled to direct. This is one of them." Whatever that chord of compulsion was, it shows in all the loving details that she has, lavished on this work: the set design, by Marg Horwell, of dreary vertical white-slated blinds, which sometimes become a computer screen sending a message of 'ironic' "Happiness!"- complete with familiar sound cues - framed by soft plushy (if cheap) carpet that covers the stage floor, on which are two practical chairs, only; lit with warmth sensibility by Matthew Marshall, and subtly supported by the background score of Composer, Rachael Dease, which all conspire to ease us into the bleak lives and world of these characters, so as to not to judge them, but to seduce us into a state of understanding, if not admiration.
At a short length of only some 75 minutes or so, more or less, EIGHT GIGABYTES OF HARDCORE PORNOGRAPHY is a not too difficult a night in the theatre, despite, for some, that alarming title, and the "fame/infamy" of the writer's other work. Declan Greene is definitely a writer to support. Let us hope the Griffin have commissioned him further and that we get to see his next work sooner rather than later.
An enthusiastic audience member, a friend, was excited by the potential of this writer and was impressed with his perspicuity, and astonished that he had produced this work at the, relatively, youthful age of 29. I reminded her that Polly Stenham had written THAT FACE at the age of nineteen (she has written the same play, unfortunately, twice again, under other titles), and that Edward Albee, a better role model for what I perceive, Mr Greene's talents may be, had written THE ZOO STORY (1958) at the age of 30 , and is an enduring classic of timeless energy. Let us hope Mr Greene is a reader of other writer's work (I suspect, it is a rarity among a lot of our young playwrights), and has a reading list, so that he may take some inspiration from the present living Masters (of either sex) in the English language pantheon of the theatre (debatable, for sure).
When EIGHT GIGABYTES OF HARDCORE PORNOGRAPHY had finished, unusually, I sat in my seat for a little time, and thought, staring at the empty stage, wished, that a man and a woman and a goat called Sylvia had appeared to cauterise my soul, my life, or some sort of fiercer Greene equivalent had been there on the SBW stage. It didn't, and I wasn't cauterised. But, I thought, maybe Mr Greene does have that capacity, which is why, perhaps, I was still on my bench seat. Struck, temporarily paralysed, with hope. Then again Australia, generally, has such a small history of visionary, metaphysical writing. Mr Greene in all his work, that I have so far seen, writes from the point of a view of an attentive and sensitive 'outsider' to the dominant culture, much like Mr Albee (check out THE AMERICAN DREAM, or, even more relevantly, TINY ALICE, to see what I hope is here. If, only, I was a Tiresias, eh?) Reading Mr Greene's newspaper interviews in preparation for this production, and attending to him speak on the Griffin website, I was impressed with his sensibilities. Let us hope he has the right encouragement to expand into the realm of greater possibilities in the worlds of his future writing.
So:
Good writing (even if I am over the form!)
Content of the play? A little too boring, not provocative enough, or arresting enough, for me.
Very sure, good, direction and production supports.
Really, terrific acting.
Go.
The Griffin giving us JUMP FOR JORDAN and this work, toiling well for the Australian writer and audience, I think.
Be warned, if you expect acts of hardcore pornography, you may want to claim false advertising, and get your money back to get a new raincoat!
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