Review: Anne Being Frank at the Playhouse, Sydney Opera House

Review by Scott Whitmont

Anne Frank was just 15 when she died 80 years ago. Her Diary of a Young Girl has now been translated into over 70 languages. But what if Anne had lived to rewrite her diary? What if a more mature Anne had been able to instead provide a “Diary of a Young Woman”? These questions are brilliantly explored by playwright Ron Elisha in his new one woman play, Anne Being Frank.

An established solo performer, Alexis Fishman is simply mesmerising, delivering what is surely this season’s most awe inspiring, tour de force performance. Just as Heather Mitchell as RBG and Justine Clarke as Julia Gillard held their audiences in their hands and adeptly commanded the stage, so Fishman equally demonstrates supreme artistry as she moved smoothly between the three worlds and time periods, cleverly created on stage by Visual and Set Designer, Jacob Battista. 

Centre stage is Anne’s Bergen-Belsen camp bed where she languishes with the typhoid fever that ultimately kills her, imagining the life she might live with her diary published post-War. Then there is the secret annex where Anne spent her years in hiding with her parents, her sister Margot and the Van Pels family. Lastly, there is the New York office of Anne’s publisher and editor, “Bow-Tie” who pushes Anne in the imagined future to remove the more horrific portions of her diary, which he deems the reader would find unappetising. For in Anne’s rewritten version, her emerging sexuality is fully explored, the Diary thus losing its familiar innocence.

In addition to Anne, Fishman adeptly takes on four other roles, each with its own distinct accent. There is the supercilious Bow-Tie; Anne’s childhood friend Hannali whom she re-meets in the camp; a fellow-prisoner midwife and the terrifying Nazi guard, only referred to as “Pimples”.

With clear command of the demanding script and subtle directing from Amanda Brooke Lerner, Fishman presents each with raw emotion. She runs the gamut of anger, terror, horror, and hope, still asking “Why is it that we never stop hoping?”

At a time when the world is plagued by conflict, Elisha’s rumination on the cruelties and inhumanity that we can inflict on each other is certainly timely. The audience is left to ponder Anne’s optimistic line, “Despite everything, I still believe that everyone is good at heart”.

A production not to be missed.

Image Supplied