Small and Tired
Belvoir presents
Small and Tired Writer & Director KIT BROOKMAN This production of Small and Tired opened at Belvoir St Theatre on Saturday 28 September 2013. Set & Costume Designer MEL PAGE Lighting Designer VERITY HAMPSON Composer & Sound Designer TOM HOGAN Dramaturg ANTHEA WILLIAMS Stage Manager EDWINA GUINNESS With Pylades TOM CONROY Jim PAUL GLEESON Clytaemnestra SANDY GORE Orestes LUKE MULLINS Electra SUSAN PRIOR Small and Tired was written with the support of PlayWriting Australia.
PHOTOGRAPHY Brett Boardman DESIGN Alphabet Studio
Writer & Director’s Note Kit Brookman This play began as a conversation between two unnamed people. I had no sense at first of where the conversation was going as I wrote it. Initially I thought it was a conversation between two strangers. Then it became clear that no, they weren’t strangers at all, they were a brother and sister. Then it became clear that despite being brother and sister, yes, these two anonymous conversationalists were strangers to one another. Time and circumstance had slipped between them and formed a gap that they now struggled to breach. Much has changed since that first scribbling grew into this play, but the essential tension of this first impulse lingers. How to reconcile the past and the present, the person who you were and the person you are now? How to carry most gracefully the expectations we have of one another, of family? How best to love each other? In the way that Ancient Greek drama renders the world, and particularly the myth of Orestes and the House of Atreus, there is a linear track of cause and effect. Fate is meted out by the deliberate actions of gods, and each successive tragedy has its seeds in the tragedy that came before. The family in this play does not live in that world of fate; they are not subject to the imperatives of a particular societal view of justice. They do not experience events as a logical, inevitable progression of cause and effect that they are bound to perpetuate. The line is broken. Reasons are diffuse,
worn down, and action has grown almost inseparable from habit. For Orestes and his family, so far removed from the causes of their grief, so far removed from a structure to make sense of it, there is no certain, forgivable course of action, only fractured, stumbling guesswork, driven by that restless human desire for home, for family. For love. Every play is the child of many parents. I’d like to thank the cast, crew and design team of this production for bringing this play into the world. A cast’s involvement in the creation of a new work extends so far beyond realising a largely immutable, established text. In working on a new play, the cast inevitably help create the text itself. This play simply would not be what it is without their insight, instinct and craft, and I thank them deeply for it. Deep thanks also to those actors who read and discussed early drafts of the play, whose contributions were also invaluable. Thank you to the entire team at Belvoir for supporting the production; to Ralph and Brenna for a big vote of confidence and steady, unfussy support. Particular thanks to Eamon Flack, Verity Laughton, Luke Mullins, Mel Page and Anthea Williams for crucial dramaturgical assistance, and for important conversations about the play at various points throughout its development and rehearsal. A big thank you also to Tahni Froudist for the above and for pulling so many delicate strands of this production together.
Kit Brookman
Biographies KIT BROOKMAN Writer & Director Kit was an associate playwright at Belvoir in 2012. For Belvoir, he was assistant director on Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Private Lives and Babyteeth. Kit wrote and directed Heaven (seasons at The Old 505 Theatre and La Mama). Other plays include night maybe (Stuck Pigs Squealing) which recently premiered in Melbourne. Close was shortlisted for the 2010 Griffin Award and the 2011 Patrick White Playwright’s Award, and was presented at the 2013 National Play Festival in Perth. Small and Tired was also shortlisted for the 2012 Griffin Award. Kit was the winner of the 2012 Philip Parson’s Young Playwright’s Award and is currently a member of the Griffin Studio. TOM CONROY Pylades Tom graduated from VCA in 2009. He has appeared in Spring Awakening (Sydney Theatre Company); Romeo and Juliet (State Theatre Company of South Australia); Romeo and Juliet (Bell Shakespeare); Delectable Shelter (The Hayloft Project); Moth (Arena Theatre Company/Malthouse); Land and Sea (Brink Productions); and The Share (five. point.one). Tom has previously performed in other plays by Kit Brookman including Heaven and night maybe (Stuck Pigs Squealing). Tom’s performance in Something Natural But Very Childish (La Mama) garnered him a Green Room Award for Best Male Actor in Independent Theatre.
PAUL GLEESON Jim Paul’s stage credits include Circle Mirror Transformation, Rainman, All My Sons, Stella by Starlight (Ensemble Theatre); Beach Blanket Tempest (Q Theatre); and Magpies Nest (Elizabethan Theatre Trust). His TV credits include Rake, Spirited, Blackjack, Two Twisted, Love My Way, Devil’s Dust and the telemovie Hawke. In 2013 Paul will appear in Love Child and Power Games, and in Camp for NBC in the USA. Other US credits include Virtual Nightmare, The Lost World, Nightmares and Dreamscapes and Starter Wife. Paul’s feature films include The Thin Red Line, Somersault, The Bet, Komodo, Solo, Idiot Box, September and Men’s Group. SANDY GORE Clytaemnestra Sandy is a graduate of NIDA. Her extensive stage credits include Under Milkwood, Uncle Vanya, Love Lies Bleeding, Scenes from a Separation, Morning Sacrifice, Amy’s View, Medea, Les Parents Terrible, Gift of the Gorgon, Antony and Cleopatra (STC); As You Like it, The Rivals, Electra, The Alchemist, Summer of the Seventeenth Doll (MTC); The Taming of the Shrew (Bell Shakespeare); Wit, Retreat from Moscow and Becky Shaw (Ensemble). Sandy originated roles in classic Australian works including Jugglers Three, Sons of Cain, Kid Stakes, Other Times, Makassar Reef, Rooted, Big River, Daylight Saving and Chasing the Dragon. Sandy also has
numerous TV and film credits. Most recently Sandy was associate director for Love, Loss and What I Wore (Sydney Opera House/RMI/Wayne Harrison Productions). EDWINA GUINNESS Stage Manager Edwina graduated from VCA in 2006. She has stage managed Persona (Belvoir); Beautiful One Day (Belvoir/ILBIJERRI Theatre Company/version 1.0); Dreams in White, The Boys (Griffin Theatre Company) and been assistant stage manager on Conversation Piece, The Business, The Power of Yes (Belvoir); One Man Two Guvnors, Under Milk Wood, Bloodland, The Mysteries Genesis, Elling, The War of the Roses, Convicts Opera, Riflemind (Sydney Theatre Company); Tis Pity She’s a Whore (Malthouse Theatre); Faustus, Just Macbeth, Othello (Bell Shakespeare); Optimism (Sydney Theatre Company/ Malthouse Theatre); The Grenade (Sydney Theatre Company/Melbourne Theatre Company); Poppea, Orphee et Eurydice (Victorian Opera); and La Cenerontola (Opera Australia).
VERITY HAMPSON Lighting Designer Verity graduated from NIDA in 2005. Before NIDA she specialised in corporate theatre design and technical management. Since then Verity has worked as a lighting designer with a number of different directors and companies including Belvoir, Sydney Theatre Company and Griffin Theatre Company. She also teaches lighting design at a number of local institutions and schools including NIDA. For Belvoir Verity has designed The Business, That Face and The Gates of Egypt. Verity was a lighting director for the ABC’s Live at the Basement. She is a recipient of the 2012 Mike Walsh Fellowship, travelling to New York to work with 59 Productions on Big Fish (a Broadway musical) and Two Boys for The Metropolitan Opera. TOM HOGAN Composer & Sound Designer Tom is a composer and sound artist. His most recent credits as a composer include Return to Earth and The Sea Project (Arthur Productions/Griffin Independent); The Dissolving Self (NIDA/ Brink Productions); The Great Northern by video artist Tarryn Gill, and dance film Avernus by Pilar Mata Dupont. His 2013 installation Side A, Side B with Eleanor Jackson was featured at the Queensland Poetry Festival and the Brisbane Fringe Festival. His interactive sound installation
Monolith was featured as part of Tiny Stadiums Festival, and Firstdraft Gallery, Sydney. He moonlights as performance poet Scott Sandwich, recently presenting his solo show The Epic at the Queensland Poetry Festival. His short film The Kalevala (According To Scott Sandwich) has toured and been featured in galleries internationally. LUKE MULLINS Orestes Luke trained at VCA. For Belvoir he has appeared in Angels in America, Death of a Salesman, The Power of Yes, and in Thom Pain (based on nothing) for B Sharp/Arts Radar. Other theatre credits include Little Mercy, The War of the Roses, Gallipoli, The Season at Sarsaparilla, The Serpents Teeth, Tales from the Vienna Woods (STC); Long Day’s Journey into Night (STC/Artists Repertory, Portland); The Duel (STC/Thin Ice); The Eisteddfod, 4xBeckett, Agoraphobe, Lally Katz and the Terrible Mysteries of the Volcano, Untitled Intentional Exercise, Nine Days Falling, The Apocalypse Bear Trilogy (Stuck Pigs Squealing); Cloud Nine, The History Boys, Oedipus (MTC); and Autobiography of Red (Malthouse). Luke recently directed Kit Brookman’s night maybe for Stuck Pigs Squealing in Melbourne. Luke has also appeared on TV and in film; and his awards include a Green Room Award and the George Fairfax Memorial Award for Excellence in Theatre Practice.
MEL PAGE Set & Costume Designer Mel is a VCA graduate. For Belvoir Mel has designed costumes for Hamlet, Angels in America, Strange Interlude, As You Like It and The Promise, and designed set and costumes for Medea and Old Man. Other costume credits include The Suicide, The Only Child, Spring Awakening (B Sharp/The Hayloft Project); Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Pygmalion (STC); Pompeii LA (Malthouse); Baal (Malthouse /STC); Vs. Macbeth (STC /The Border Project); The Nest (The Hayloft Project). Mel has also designed set and costumes for night maybe (Stuck Pigs Squealing); The Apocalypse Bear Trilogy (Stuck Pigs Squealing/MTC) and sets for Noye’s Fludde (Victorian Opera). Mel was nominated for a 2012 Sydney Theatre Award for Best Costume Design for Les Liaisons Dangereuses. SUSAN PRIOR Electra Susan is a graduate of NIDA. Her theatre credits include Riflemind, King Lear, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Love For Love, The Jungle, A Violent Act and Our Town (STC); King Lear (Bell Shakespeare); Venus and Adonis (Bell Shakespeare/ Malthouse). Susan has also appeared in productions for Griffin, Malthouse, Black Swan, Brink, Tamarama Rocksurfers, Burning House Company, Naked Theatre, Sport For Jove and Ensemble. Susan’s feature film credits include The Rover,
Careless Love, Not Suitable for Children, Animal Kingdom, A Cold Summer, Suburban Mayhem, Idiot Box, Heaven’s Burning, A Wreck A Tangle and View from Greenhaven Drive. Susan’s TV credits include Puberty Blues, Rake, All Saints and Home & Away. She has received AACTA, Critics’ Circle and Helpmann Award nominations. ANTHEA WILLIAMS Dramaturg Anthea is Belvoir’s Literary Manager. She trained at VCA and UNSW. For Belvoir she has directed Forget Me Not and Old Man. Prior to joining Belvoir in 2011, Anthea was Associate Director bushfutures at London’s Bush Theatre, where her directing credits include Two Cigarettes, 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover, 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover at Christmas, Turf, suddenlossofdignity. com and the musical The Great British Country Fete. Anthea’s work toured Britain extensively. Other directing credits include A Question (nabokov); The Real You (SmackBang); and Quiet (Fontanel). Prior to working at the Bush Theatre, Anthea was the co-Artistic Director of SmackBang Theatre Company and the producer of Massive Company, both in Auckland, New Zealand.
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I think I want to walk home... Walk backwards through my life.
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