“The price of admission might still be worth it though, purely for Maggie McKenna’s performance.“
“With all its faults, it showcases many young performers, some in their first show, some fresh out of training institutions and many who are looking like they are set to become extraordinary talents…And for the seasoned performers, including Tim Draxl and Natalie Bassingthwaite who as consummate professionals, performed with whatever strength and truth the script would allow.”
Suzanne Mackay
2.5 /5 stars
Jagged Little Pill should be great, when you look at the quality of the ingredients individually, it’s hard to understand why the soufflé falls so flat. Alanis Morrissette’s 1995 album was an astounding debut, an explosion of emotion, a guttural cry that resonated with a generation of women. Diablo Cody’s voice with it’s sarcasm and edgy wit also cut through to the bones of what it means to be female, different, to be a person who doesn’t conform to what’s expected. So why does the musical version of Jagged Little Pill feel like it was written by an algorithm based on a fourteen year old upper middle class white girl’s search history?
The show opens with Mary Jane Healy (Natalie Bassingthwaite) reciting the annual family Christmas email and the tropes start from the first scene, starting with the veneer of the perfect suburban mother, revealing her thoughts on the year gone by without any true insight into her family’s real lives. The tenuously bisexual adopted daughter Frankie (Emily Nkomo) frustrated by a mother who ‘doesn’t see colour’, the workaholic husband Steve’s (Tim Draxl) insistent cries of ‘I do it to support the family’ and the golden son Nick (Liam Head) feeling the pressure of perfection, round out the family at the centre of the story. Along with these issues there are subplots aplenty, like Frankie’s shifting affections, gender identity and sexuality, teenage sex and relationships, marriage, monogamy, addiction, sexual violence, manhood, women’s role in the world, parenthood, middle age and the list goes on. Perhaps it’s this web, wound too tight and with too many tendrils which prevents the piece from breathing, and with so much going on there’s no depth or darkness allowed.
The performances themselves are strong, considering what they have to work with. Natalie Bassingthwaite’s Mary Jane is as realistic as the script allows, her comedic timing is spot on and there’s just enough bite in her comebacks to stop her from falling into Pollyanna territory, but the script barely allows for a second dimension. There are moments of genuine engagement such as the close of Act 1 where Mary Jane, in a church sings Forgiven, Nick singing Perfect with a beautiful quiet desperation or the comedy in the definition of Ironic as it’s sung in a classroom. The songs are soulful and can work even without Morrissette’s vocal depth but it’s hard to feel them because there is such a profound lack of character development in the script. The cliches run thick and fast, there is exposition not only in the characters voicing their every thought but in choreography in which the cast point to their heart when they sing heart and to their temple when they sing mind. Dancers interrupt intimate moments with a mash up of styles that can’t decide if they’re contemporary or hip hop and end up falling somewhere in a Never Never Land in between, the costumes range from 90s grunge to modern preppie and all this compounds the feeling that we’re watching four shows squished into one. I’m struggling to see how the book won a Tony.
The price of admission might still be worth it though, purely for Maggie McKenna’s performance. As Jo, Frankie’s initial love interest, they shine from the moment they step on stage. Jo is the most genuine and real of all the characters and even with the worn out trope of gender divergent child with conservative religious parent, they are able to find many moments of truth, even in the cliched dialogue. Their performance of You Outta Know literally stopped the show and for a brief moment, all the elements which had been so disjointed, worked together. Maggie’s voice, movement, the choreography, costumes, set and lights came together to produce a number so full of soul and depth that the audience had no choice but to stand and applaud. This young performer has the shortest of bios but looks likely to have the longest of careers, if there’s any justice in the entertainment industry.
And this is why it’s important to see this show. With all its faults, it showcases many young performers, some in their first show, some fresh out of training institutions and many who are looking like they are set to become extraordinary talents. It’s worth supporting them now in the hope that the Australian theatre scene lifts its game and gives a cast like this more to work with in the future. And for the seasoned performers, including Tim Draxl and Natalie Bassingthwaite who as consummate professionals, performed with whatever strength and truth the script would allow. By continuing to support Australian theatre, hopefully it will soon begin to support us.
Suzanne Mackay, Theatre Now
Photo credit Daniel Boud.
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