Perspective Arts Theatre Company is a relatively new Adelaide theatre company and a sister to PitchWhite Productions. Both companies have been founded and managed by Lochie Daniel, whose energy and commitment seem boundless. Perspective’s latest offering – Blue Remembered Hills, written by Dennis Potter and directed by Geoff Brittain – is an excellent testimony to Daniel’s vision of presenting challenging and novel theatre to local audiences.
Blue Remembered Hills was written in 1979 and follows the activities of seven English children on a summer afternoon during World War II. Crucially, the children are played by adults, and we see them fight and compete with each other, bluff and play tricks, struggle for ascendancy, display innocent affection, fantasise, be caring and, more significantly, be cruel to each other. In short, we see the seeds of adult behaviour taking form, but we don’t ‘see’ the adults – we see children instead. Or at least that is the hope and intention of the director and cast alike, and they are largely successful.
The title Blue Remembered Hills is taken from A. E. Housman’s 1896 poem A Shropshire Lad, in which the “blue remembered hills” represent a romanticised past that is lost to the speaker. The play concludes with a voice-over of the poem and subtly suggests to the audience that our adult memories of childhood are highly selective and filtered, and that many of our childhood experiences are the progenitors of flawed adult behaviour and attitudes.
Having adults play children is not new, and there are a number of notable theatrical works that use this device. Comedy is often exploited in such works, with adult actors donning children’s clothing, adopting childish voices and mannerisms, and speaking disarmingly about all manner of things that many adults, as adults, steer clear of. The danger, of course, is that the device itself can become the performance: actors can overplay the childishness and turn the characters into caricatures. Geoff Brittain has avoided that trap by assembling a splendid cast of mixed experience who work together with notable cohesion. As an ensemble, they are almost immediately believable as children, not because they exaggerate childish behaviour, but because they are so tightly attuned to one another.
The script is both comedic and serious at the same time, traversing increasingly disturbing themes before culminating in tragedy. The cast – Liam James, Scott Battersby, Nicole Rutty, Sam Wiseman, Anita Zamberlan Canala, Lochie Daniel and Kim Clark – create believable characters, each with individual and carefully observed idiosyncrasies. More importantly, they function exceptionally well as a group. There is a convincing sense that these seven children have known each other for years, with their relationships, alliances and rivalries constantly shifting beneath the dialogue. The cast never try to overdo child-like mannerisms or play for deliberate laughs, which would have been self-defeating. Instead, their physicality, vocal inflections and facial expressions are used with restraint and precision.
The ‘pecking order’ within the group of children is immediately apparent, and under Brittain’s careful direction the actors reinforce it at every turn. Even small exchanges and reactions contribute to the hierarchy and changing dynamics of the group. It is risky to single out individual actors for special mention in such a tightly integrated ensemble, but Wiseman, Clark and Rutty excel. They were likely horrible children in their day! On the other hand, Canala, James, Daniel and Battersby were almost certainly nicer! There were moments when some of the dialogue seemed slightly faltering, where one might have expected children to talk over each other more freely, but this was a relatively minor reservation in an otherwise convincing ensemble performance.
The stage in Star Theatre 2 is small, but every last centimetre is used effectively with a clever and stylised set design (not explicitly credited in the program) that reinforces the notion that the entire world is a child’s playground. Costuming by Sandy Faithful and Gillian Cordell shows exquisite attention to detail: each actor inhabits their costume, which adds significantly to their characterisation and to the establishment of time and place. Richard Parkhill’s lighting design is close to perfect within the limitations of the theatre, and the conflagration scene is both evocative and frightening. It’s a theatrical highpoint of the production. Ray Trowbridge’s sound design reinforces the overall mood of the production but, pleasingly, never takes over.
Blue Remembered Hills only has a short run, and ought to be seen. This is a creditable production for Perspective Arts, beautifully directed by Brittain, and distinguished particularly by the discipline, chemistry and cohesiveness of its ensemble cast.
