Mental health is a rising topic, not only in our own artistic community but also in a number of sports and ethnic communities. In the past five years more and more industries are beginning to look at pastoral care as our embattled and fading health system fails and the government passively aggressively forces outside organisations to pick up the slack.  

This Is What It Looks Like is presented as part of the incredible Kia Mau festival and opens a korero around what it feels like from the inside. Neenah Dekkers-Reihana’s show is based on her own experiences. She is writer, director and actor, and greets us as we enter the BATS Theatre Heyday Dome. After a quick welcome chat and a karakia we are into the play. Two stories are presented side by side.

One is the story of Di, a young woman who has shut herself in her room. Her only connection to the outside world is her phone. The mess around her cocooned bed is a trash heap of shoes, food, clothes, bedding, empty takeaway containers and the general detritus of early flatting life. She and it are colourless – a beige costume surrounded by white and beige; all colour of the world has been drained and left looking like a dried-up used tea bag. A bare light above the bed and her table lamp are all she has in what feels like a windowless room; there is no natural light to reach her.

Her peeps reach out to her via the phone, even calling on her, but to no avail as she hides in the bed and avoids interaction. Even showering is difficult and when she is unable to cope with this mundane task it adds to the growing and sometimes invisible mountain of failure which is part of the downward spiral. Even worse, she is very aware of us. Perhaps we are the audience, perhaps we are the expectation on her to ‘just get over it’. She apologises to us, explains to us, entertains us at her own expense.

Interspersed with this is the story of Eliza, a child who is looking for her uncle who keeps staring into the forest. There is a storybook feel to this narrative which nicely gives relief to the feel of the other story. Here the set, also comprising various-sized hooped columns of muslin, are the trees that Eliza is stumbling around. She also speaks somewhat directly to us, revealing but not quite understanding her uncle’s pain. When she speaks of a mythological voice that calls, can’t be ignored and that only some can hear, I know there are many in the opening night’s audience who have heard that voice.

Dekkers-Reihana’s choice of a child allows her to put forward the case without prejudice. When Eliza overhears her student uncle talking with the school principal, the darker overtones and lack of understanding by the principal fall directly to us as we understand that the principal will not (or may not be equipped to) tolerate the reason for the uncle’s absences.

Dekkers-Reihana is one of the most watchable actors in Wellington at the moment and her vulnerability is paramount here, not only because it is based on her own experiences but also because these subjects require empathy. Unlike Circa’s recent Hand to God, this show and Shot Bro – Confessions of a Depressed Bullet – Rob Mokoraka and Erina Daniels’ production which was similarly presented at this festival last year – are present because of their immediacy and honesty.

Would someone who doesn’t know depression or Dekkers-Reihana come away with the same feelings? I think so. 

There are simple and effective choices in this production. Sylvie McCreanor’s set combines the two stories ingeniously. The multi-sized muslin trunks hold glorious colour from Michael Trigg’s lighting design for party scenes, as well as the almost cubist flecks of light through the absent leaves for the Forest Story. These leaves are most notable on the ground in the Modern Story: all beige they are beyond the interesting colours possible in autumn and become a soul-less winter mess accumulating in the cold bedroom.

The set also allows a nice surprise involving co-performer and Sound Designer Finn Johansson. Johansson’s design allows the Modern world to have several voices, and to colour them to great and often humorous effect, balancing out the subject matter. 

This is a gentle play and I come away with a positive outlook on what is a daunting subject. How the stories end provide us with a squeak of light at the end of the tunnel without cheaply ending the play.

I cannot help compare this (as odious as that usually is) with Shot Bro – Confessions of a Depressed Bullet. Both are personal expressions of dealing (and not) with Mental Health. Shot Bro gives insight into the mind and soul of what was occurring to Rob Mokoraka. I can recognise and begin to understand his process/spiral. With Dekkers-Reihana we are given more what the title explicitly states: This Is What It Looks Like. There is less opening up as to what may have started the depressive episode or how it progressed.

Is this about experience and age? Does Mokoraka have more world and theatre-practitioner experience? Yes, but the more and more I think about it, this is what makes these two differing productions relevant and why they stand proudly side by side. Dekkers-Reihana is younger and it’s very important we see this story told, given our appalling youth suicide rate. 

Given Dekkers-Reihana’s ingenuity and instincts, I think she provides us with two incredible things. One – her own story, which it takes courage to put on stage; and Two – how what she shows us can come from nowhere: simple things you ‘normally’ do can become full of weight, these small things can add up to a huge sluggishness which robs the mind/ soul/ body of any impetus or worth. And this may be its most valuable message: depression doesn’t always need a huge, earth shattering event to come into your life.

For a seemingly simple production this play is big. 

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Neenah Dekkers-Reihana tells it like it is in her 2016 NZ Fringe offering.  Firstly, she asks, “Why did you come to this?  It’s a Friday night”. Next, she points out, “This is a play about depression.  You’re not going to have any fun.”  Well, I’d like to say I’d gladly give up a Friday night for this show, and despite the heavy themes, I did have fun. Neenah, as director and solo performer, uses some clever tactics to make sure the hour-long performance is neither too dark, nor makes light of the subject matter.

This is What it Looks Like follows two story lines; that of Eliza (looking for her missing uncle, wishes she was a flower) and Di (crippled by depression/wishes she wasn’t).  Neenah slips between the two characters, as well as characters within each story line, with great ease and honesty.  As Eliza, she’s sweet, innocent.  Within Eliza’s story she plays her uncle and mum with near-perfect timing and pace.  As Di, she’s self-effacing and brutally honest, and plays a concerned friend and a roomful of party-goers with all the conviction of a woman possessed.

Though Eliza’s story is intriguing and offers a visual break, it’s Di’s story that really draws the audience in.  It’s her bittersweet delivery of all the characteristics of depression; the uncontrollable crying, the melancholy, the despair, the compulsion to hit “reject” on all in-coming calls.  Neenah’s acting is to be highly commended and more than one audience member nodded discreetly in recognition: “Yes, that’s exactly what it looks like”.

Also to be commended is the introduction of “Finn” (Finn Johansson- sound, music, ringtone, and super-obvious narrator.)  His unassuming face popping up behind the set certainly gave rise to a few giggles and lifted the tone just enough to offer the audience cognitive respite from some very dark moments in Di’s story.  When he’s not part of the action on stage, he’s playing music or sound behind the set, which gives the show’s score a pleasing fullness since it comes straight at the audience, rather than through speakers above or to the sides.  Kate Burian does well on the lighting desk with very limited equipment; sometimes down to a single desk lamp angled on downstage.  The set is low-budget and needs a bit of strengthening but serves well visually. The only two moments I question are the short dance interludes.  In such an intimately cramped set, the broad movement seems misplaced (perhaps smaller, gestural movement would have served better), but I do recognise their place in the arch of the show.

As is usual for the Fringe, this show has a short season- just tonight and tomorrow- 27 & 28 February.  If you miss it, keep an eye on future works by Neenah Dekkers-Reihana. She’s already won Chapman Tripp and Fringe Awards, so her work is a pretty safe bet for a good theatre experience. Or perhaps a return season will follow with wider exposure, as This is What it Looks Like ticks a broad range of boxes (you’ll get this pun when you see the set); it’s both timeless and topical, the themes are immensely relatable to a wide audience, plus, it’s just damn good theatre.

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