Review: The Comeuppance - Red Stitch Actors’ Theatre

Review by Susanne Dahn

Some of us delight at the idea of the school reunion, some of us run a mile.

What if you were an outsider at school, felt different, felt rejected ? What if you were American and believed in the American dream - that famed but misguided pursuit of happiness ?

What if it were your 20th high school reunion at the end of your youth and that dream remained out of reach ? What if you grew up or lived in Washington DC and were there in January 2021 when your capital building was attacked by a violent armed mob of Trump supporters ?

Independent theatre can be a platform for writers to bring fresh work to audiences more quickly than the larger companies. Branden Jacobs-Jenkins is a young, prolific, American playwright, two time Pulitzer finalist, who has set The Comeuppance in 2022 after the storming of the US Capitol, after the Covid pandemic, and focused on the generation that grew up with rifle clubs at school, drills in the Junior Reserve Officers Training Corps, a nation endlessly at war abroad and witness to endless school shootings at home, its population deeply damaged by food and drugs, that watched the Twin Towers collapse and that endured the near collapse of the Wall Street financial system.

Five former gifted nerdy school students who befriended each other around common rejection, gather in Washington on Ursula’s front porch as they pre-drink ahead of tonight’s reunion. Caitlin has booked the limo, Emilio thinks a limo is pretentious, Ursula isn’t going anyway and cousins Kristina and Paco are yet to turn up. Simon isn’t coming at all.

Ella Butler’s stage design at the compact Red Stitch Actors Theatre is a brilliant aging weatherboard front porch. If it hasn’t already been done there’s a PhD in the analysis of the significance of the front porch in American literature as the place just before the secret core of the home and the place from which outside life is seen going by. This porch and yard is complete with sagging trees, a basic bench and a couple of crooked yard chairs. Shout out to Ella too for the pitch perfect costume design especially Caitlin’s just one-size-too-small dress.

Caitlin, the school high achiever with such high potential, is in an unhappy marriage with one of the US Capitol rioters with whom she neither shares politics nor biological children possibly due to reproductive damage she sustained as a teenager. The strong machine of will - her body - fails her again and again. Caitlin is played by Julia Grace with yearning, regret, melancholy and strained stoicism. Her comic timing is finely turned but it’s the deep sadness of dreams unfulfilled that define Julia Grace’s performance.

AYA as Ursula, the host of the pre-reunion get together, is magnificent in rendering the only self-accepting, at-peace-with-themselves friend despite her loss of sight. What Ursula can’t see she can hear very well and she feels a great deal more. Unlike the others, those feelings are for more than herself and her generosity towards the others is crafted throughout the character that AYA brings to life - it’s the holding back, the pauses and the small gestures that make Ursula so likable. Ursula has told everyone that making her way back to the porch in the dark is very hard for her. It is deeply meaningful to see who is there to help her at the end of the night.

Khisraw Jones-Shukoor as Emilio, the artist who left America to work in Berlin and also plays the sub-role of Death, delivers a memorable, explosively complex performance blending sentimentality about the past and his friends and the ability to see the truth about the American dream (nightmare) by virtue of gaining sufficient distance. Jones-Shukoor is a powerhouse of energy that takes the varnish of the niceties and seeks out the vicious truth. All is not as it seems and genuine Ursula can dive deeper and see better as Emilio stays long enough to disassemble the careful facade he has built.

Kevin Hofbauer delivers an equally energetic performance as Paco who has a frightening case of PTSD after five tours of duty. Hofbauer brings full volcanic charge to Paco with impending eruption always there.

Finally Tess Masters brings to Kristina, the mother of five army doctor, a ready to explode tension that manifests in streams of dialogue that she can’t seem to control. She’s so stressed and overworked that she can only self medicate with alcohol. She doesn’t even know how she got to where she is. And she has no idea how to change anything.

Gary Abrahams has taken the Jacobs-Jenkins script and deftly employed the fine art of loose tight directing. Allowing the actors their share of chaos and creativity but reining in many of the excesses that a work like this might permit. The play’s polish reflects this masterful approach.

The direct addresses to the audience work well though the voice distortions could have been subtler, the script for Australian audiences could have been shorter, but we do know Americans like to talk a lot.

Reunions prompt life evaluation questions - did we actually ever really know each other ? did I really know anything at all ? what happened to my life ? is this what life is ?

Jacobs-Jenkins’ best line remains “I’m sorry you were tricked.” All our characters were tricked by believing in the American dream - believing in families and motherhood, believing in falling in love, believing in being rescued, believing in serving the country, believing in working till they drop - and as daily life quickly resumes, they’re all still likely to continue to believe.

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