An Evening at the Opera House

Last evening, I got very excited about visiting the famous Sydney Opera House to watch Sydney Theatre Company’s production of No Mans Land.

My first piece of Australian theatre, a classic Harold Pinter, difficult play indeed.

It was a terribly disappointing evening. Pinter has always been tough on an audience but No Mans Land is particularly hard. I started to wonder if they only chose the play due to some passing references to Australia.

The actors were all so busy performing that no one connected with each other. There was a total lack of a commitment to landing anything on the other actor.

Pinter is often about miscommunication but when you act his characters, they do still have intention, which means they carry out those intentions in their actions, using tactics. And we as actors must find those behavioural possibilities and use them.

None of this was present. Just four ‘performers’ giving interesting enough renditions of the lines to keep us watching.

But ten minutes in, their lack of engagement with each other had turned the audience off entirely. A fascinating and difficult play, a lovely set, clearly skilled actors, but zero interaction.

Still, the champagne that we borrowed from a corporate event going on at the Opera House after the show, really eased the pain.