All the world's a stage

Westcourt Street Theatre announces Summer Season
Review by Beverley Mitchell

With the departure of former co-artistic directors Drug Dealing Granny and Her Drug F#%ked Son in February of this year, the Far North Queensland arts community has been wondering who could possibly take over the helm at Westcourt Street Theatre after such directional stewardship.

Last week the company finally answered that question with the launch of its Summer Season 2012-13 program.

With the bold move of an unconventional performance time of 6:30am Monday, the season launched with what at first appeared to be a run-of-the-mill production of the classic work Who Can Yell F#%k Off The Loudest. The three man cast was capable, though not ground-breaking, despite fine support from a small female chorus. Then, five minutes in, the magic happened. Without warning, newcomer to the company Partied A Bit Too Hard Over The Weekend scaled a creek-side paperbark and wedged himself high in a fork of the tree, flatly refusing to come down and asserting the new Absurdist direction the company has chosen to take. In a stellar ensemble performance the rest of the cast implored him to come down until interrupted by a commuter vehicle attempting to pass by. On cue, the ensemble slipped off stage leaving the actor alone in the tree, arms flailing weakly, calling out hoarsely. Not since last year's guest appearance by Female Domestic Violence Perpetrator Across The Road, with her masterful rendition of You're F#%kin' Useless, Darren ... Wait, Where Are You Going? (sob), has an actor managed to so perfectly capture the pathos and solitary existentialism of the individual in the midst of the hubbub of modern life. A true star is born.

With such a promising start to the performance program the residents of Westcourt are no doubt eagerly looking forward to the Build Up and the Festive Season, as they warmly welcome their home grown talent back to the stage after eight months of touring and rehearsals.

Westcourt Street Theatre, Boland St, Westcourt, QLD
Tickets: Free, no bookings taken

***

Seriously folks, I am not making this stuff up. What I have come to affectionately call Westcourt Street Theatre is a highly amusing (if somewhat sleep depriving during the late shows) feature of living in my dear ole' suburb of Westcourt, Cairns. I have seen or heard some world-class performances, covering the whole range of heightened human emotion, sometimes artificially enhanced, sometimes not. I have laughed my head off, made notes of the time of incident, and called the police - sometimes all in the course of the one performance. Mostly I have just heard the word 'f#%k' a lot.