The premise of award-winning playwright, director and actor Nicola Gunn’s latest work is strange but clear: it’s all about her not-so-secret fantasy of being a French actress. The only thing is, she really can’t be bothered actually learning to speak the language. No matter, she says, she’ll simply learn her lines phonetically.
The work, staged at Malthouse’s Beckett Theatre, begins with Gunn moving a series of speakers and mics across the stage, whilst talking to a French translator whose voice emanates from the various pieces of AV equipment. Gunn and the translator quip back and forth about the nature of language and translation, sharing stories, joking and often disagreeing.
Apologia is at its best when this pair are bantering, with Gunn asking “Do I look French?” before they bond over their shared hatred of Cate Blanchett. The carpeted set contains a dynamic moving portion which helps add a sense of action to the piece and two screens showing subtitles (sometimes accurate, sometimes not) are a clever inclusion.
However, when Gunn and the translator finish arguing over subtitle fonts and disappear in favour of a new pair (Yumi Umiumare and Taka Takiguchi) of Japanese tourists pondering Notre Dame, the path forward becomes less clear.
This work leans heavily on the abstract and the absurd to explore questions of language and communication across four distinct acts, however the latter portion dips into a state of confusion. To go into more detail would be to ruin the entire experience, so we’ll leave it here: those with a taste for the avant garde, this one’s for you.
Catch Apologia at Malthouse Theatre from August 6-18, with tickets on sale from $45. Get yours here.
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