From musicals to dramas, mainstages to indie gems, check out our picks for the best theatre to catch this month.
What is it about horror that leaves it so ripe for camp excess? Whether it’s the mores of Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula or dark comedy that kills you with laughter, like Wes Craven’s Scream, the genre is on a knife's edge with delirium. It’s a question that intrigues Play School presenter and enthusiastic board-treader Matthew Backer (Chimerica, Switzerland). He’ll portray mad scientist Frederick, grandson of you know who in Young Frankenstein. The Mel Brooks musical, based on his wildly successful movie spoof, is about to reanimate the Hayes Theatre after a long dormancy.
“You’re talking to the biggest horror buff there is, probably in Sydney,” Backer says, his face lighting up, not unlike the spark of electricity that courses through Frankenstein’s monster. “And the joy of horror is knowing the rules. Whether it’s a slasher or a ghost film, you know what’s coming and how to subvert it. So Young Frankenstein the film took the legend, then completely slapped you across the face, taking it in a different direction. And that’s the fun, the audience knows the tropes and feels smart by going, ‘Oh, I see what they did there’.”
Co-star Shannon Dooley plays Frederick’s fiancée, Elizabeth, a role she says has been greatly expanded for this new take by director Alexander Berlage. Dooley says Berlage totally gets how Brooks mainlines mirth from the macabre, constructing the show from the bones of many monster hits.
Because Mel Brooks is so well-versed with the form of musical theatre, each song reminds you of another musical, knowingly.
“It pays homage to the debauchery of The Rocky Horror Show [also turned into a successful movie], to Nosferatu and the history of science fiction,” she says. “And because Mel Brooks is so well-versed with the form of musical theatre, each song reminds you of another musical, knowingly. There’s a bit of Little Shop of Horrors and Guys and Dolls in there. The more you get to know the music, and fall in love with it, you really feel as though you’re seeing ten musicals in one.”
Brooks also penned the screenplays for Western-subverting Blazing Saddles and Star Wars riff Spaceballs. His daggy brand of humour transcends through snappy jokes that land with a wink. “The show has lots of breaking the fourth wall, and elements of pantomime,” Dooley says.
Berlage previously ushered Cry Baby into joyous life at the Hayes and will soon helm fellow musical-from-movie American Psycho at the Opera House. As Time Out reviewer Cassie Tongue said of Berlage’s Cry Baby, “his innate understanding of camp, colour and space lifts the show to new heights”. Backer is sure Berlage has worked camp magic once more. “The largest gift is that you can take shows that didn’t necessarily work onstage because they were taken too seriously, and add that element of camp, because it is satire. And so what we’re doing is taking it very seriously, but not seriously as well, which is a beautiful relationship with the audience. We’re all in on the joke of the show.”
We’re creating a completely different beast with Berlage. You always want to give it your own stamp while still acknowledging the iconic moments.
If the energy arcing between Backer and Dooley is anything to judge by, then audiences are in for the thrilling shock of the new when they take to the stage. “We’re creating a completely different beast with Berlage,” Backer says. “You always want to give it your own stamp while still acknowledging the iconic moments… and after the dumpster fire of last year, we all need a belly laugh.”
They’re having the best time rehearsing, Dooley says. She hopes that energy shines through when the curtain rises (and that they can keep from corpsing, aka giggling, on stage). “I think this is the perfect musical for audiences to start 2021 because it’s pure escapism. For two and a half hours people are transported to Transylvania, and they won’t be thinking about any of the other things going on in their life. Laughter is the best medicine.”
The Hayes’ extended lockdown also meant that the Young Frankenstein cast and crew have enjoyed the rare luxury of rehearsing in the theatre with the actual sets, allowing them to get their timing spot on. “The sets are becoming like a part of our body,” Dooley says. “We know exactly how many steps we need to take and how much time we have before we have to disappear and reappear.”
The design team – including Isabel Hudson on sets, Mason Browne on costumes, Trent Suidgeest on lighting and Nick Walker handling sound – have taken this opportunity and used it to push the cast to their limits, as has choreographer Yvette Lee. Dooley says it’s been a case of, “Let’s get them to do all this stuff that’s usually, probably, impossible. So that’s really exciting for the audience. They’re gonna be like, ‘how did that happen?’ And we’re getting fitter by the day.”
