Review: Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again. at Bluestone Church Arts Space

Review by Greg Gorton

Alice Birch's Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again. is a masterpiece of feminist theatre, and Wit Incorporated has produced an inspired piece of creativity with its new production of the challenging play. Under the direction of Emily O’Brien-Brown, four talented actors tackle its confronting material with great skill.

The night starts with a naturalistic, quite comedic scene about a couple trying to navigate the language around sex. It's funny and touching and not too challenging. As each new story unfolds, the night becomes more serious, and towards the end of the brisk one-hour play even the narratives start to devolve.

It's not an easy task for the actors. AYA, Lansy Feng, Madeleine Magee-Carr, and Jack Twelvetree must play a variety of roles together, and be just as adept at comedy as tragedy. This production relies heavily on each actor being able to develop chemistry with the others, and ultimately have a large amount of trust in their fellow cast. This is easily recognised throughout the night, especially during some of the more confronting scenes.

This presentation of the play also asks a lot of the actors physically, switching between scenes with no transition, often running back and forth between stages and, as it reaches the critical final moments, giving us every last amount of energy available. This selfless giving of sweat is welcomed - the play means so much to this group of creatives that you cannot take that meaning for granted.

While all four give admirable performances, I'd like to single out Feng for her incredible sense of timing and ability to elevate the performances of others. There are some difficult moments in which both comedy and tragedy exist within the same line of text, and Feng nails every one of them.

The real draw of Revolt, however, is in the unique design choices that offer directorial and acting opportunities not available in other scenarios. In the open room that is the Bluestone Church Art Space, three stages are placed to form a misshapen triangle, with each side of that triangle being a small group of chairs. It's a carefully designed space that allows for near perfect sight lines for all audiences, but needs the physical movement of turning the head. This push to require active engagement by the audience wrests our mind and causes us to focus more intently on the action wherever it be, while also adding a greater level of dynamic movement through the acting space.

While such staging would cause lesser lighting designers to rip out their hair, the work here is difficult to criticise. No unintentional shadows are found in the night, and the use of colour and spots provide new ways to affect the overall tone of the show.

The sound design by STOZ  is equally impressive. Without pretension or unnecessary flourish, the compositions punctuate both the humour and the key statement of Birch's script, and the soundscapes used in the final moments amplifies the frenetic energy found in the visuals.

Even the costume design, often taken for granted by companies, has its own unique statements. Silvia Shao (who also designed the set) has found ways to place the actors in different roles with minimum fuss, but to make real and impactful statements about those characters. The supermarket scene in particular showed just how the creatives were all on the same page, with the unusually costumed victim of a “dressing down” becoming a powerful visual metaphor for the very things soon to be uttered in her monologue.

I try not to offer too much detail in these moments because the power really is in the experiencing for the first time. This production shows that complete maturity in creative decision making that I wish I could experience more often in theatre. Rarely do all elements come together with such unity.

Wit Incorporated’s production of Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again. will hopefully be remembered for uniquely offering a feminist perspective that is hopeful in the face of trauma, while being completely unforgiving of the patriarchy society that encourages such pain.

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