‘White Rabbit, Red Rabbit’ is currently playing at the Theatre Underground at the State Theatre Centre, and there is very little we can tell you about it.
Perth Theatre Company have continued their commitment to delivering some of the most innovative new theatre with their presentation of Nassim Soleimanpour’s play for a single actor.Â
Each night a new actor takes to the stage with no knowledge of the script they are about to perform. The script is sealed inside an envelope, they rip it open, begin reading, and performing.
On the opening night Sam Longley gave an admirable performance. His improvisational skills served him well in the production that flies without a safety net.
The beauty of Soleimanpur’s work is it does things that only theatre can do. Longely performance can only happen once, if you weren’t there on the opening night, you missed it. He can never perform the work again, because he’s now read the script. The next night Alicia Osyka took to the stage to rip open the envelope.
Tonight, an non-actor Senator Scott Ludlum is performing the piece, and lined up for the next week is Alison Van Reeken, Sean Walsh, Monica Main, Kymba Cahill and Mark Storen. Check out one of their performances, you won’t see what we saw, you’ll see something else, but we’ll have lots to talk about afterwards.
So without giving anything away to any future audiences, or performers. The show is inspiring, it made us think, it had some pretty cool mental concepts to wrap your brain around and it is one of those shows that has the potential to take you on a journey long after you leave the theatre, and bravo to Sam Longley for jumping in first.
Graeme Watson
