ADRIFT
17/10/2012 - 20/10/2012
Production Details
New Zealanders have a spiritual relationship with the sea.
We are surrounded by the ocean, never more than a few hours drive from a slice of our coastline. Each of us has a story to share about our time spent on the beach; first loves, treasure hunts, shipwrecks, lives lost.
Since Wellington Harbour’s discovery by the explorer Kupe, its beauty and mystique have drawn people into the relative safety of its waters. But the waters surrounding our city hold a violent past – it is a little known fact that in the last one hundred and sixty years there have been over one hundred and fifty recorded shipwrecks in the Cook Strait.
Under the direction of Kerryn Palmer (director of 2004 Chapman Tripp award winning piece Sniper), Victoria University’s Theatre 323 students have explored the tragic past of our waters through a process of research, story-telling and improvisation, and have created Adrift, an original and whimsical spectacle that weaves playful tales with harsh reality in an attempt to understand the nature of the ocean that gives and takes so much.
The term site-specific theatre refers to a staging and performance conceived on the basis of a place in the real world (ergo outside the established theatre). A large part of the work has to do with researching a place that is imbued with history or permeated with atmosphere…. (Patrice Pavis)
Adrift is an interlacing of stories inspired by the moody nature of New Zealand’s waters and performed live at the site of one of the most infamous maritime disasters in recent history. Spilling out onto the rough sands of Seatoun, the audience will be greeted by a warm fire and blankets to keep away the Wellington winds. They will then be guided along Seatoun beach to watch as the stories and songs of our harbour unfold. This innovative piece of site specific theatre will take you on a journey, discovering the stories of the sea, the people who love it and those who are forever changed by its ferocious beauty.
“Adrift is a true piece of site-specific theatre. After researching and exploring several interesting sites throughout Wellington, we finally decided on Seatoun Beach. For us it was the beauty of the beach and the incredible stories it tells that appealed to us. The more we researched, the more stories we discovered. We have spent many hours at the beach exploring, thinking and creating and are excited to share our discoveries.” – Kerryn Palmer.
7pm, Wed 17th October – Sat 20th October 2012
Seatoun Beach, Seatoun, Wellington
Bookings essential Further details on location will be provided upon booking. Bookings: theatre@vuw.ac.nz / 04 463 5359 $8 Unwaged / $15 Waged
1hr 10mins
Purposeful gathering of what was adrift becomes profoundly moving
Review by John Smythe 19th Oct 2012
We got the marshmallows anyway, even though it was initially too windy last night to light the fire in the drum at Seatoun Beach (the Churchill Park end). Cushions circle the drum, a fiddler fiddles, people gather, a neighbour asks when I last spent time at the sea … And stories begin to be told.
The pre-Kupe history of Te Whanganui-a-Tara / Port Nicholson / Wellington Harbour is fascinating: once a fresh water lake? I didn’t know that. Then there’s the myth of the two taniwha brothers, which explains the topography … And the startling fact that the Wahine disaster of 1968, which claimed 51 lives within living memory, was preceded by 173 other wrecks in the region.
The mariner married to his ship with the sea as his fickle mistress is surely doomed … Audrey, separated from her William by sea, is a poignant figure … The beauty of a white-flecked sea in driving rain (recalled, not experienced, this night) exemplifies the poetry of tragedy … The first of many songs, ‘Don’t Fight The Sea’, is as rousing as it is cautionary … But enough of sitting around: the sisters who – we will discover – have been to visit their granddad and will miss the boat if they don’t hurry …
Thus a range of sea-themed stories are floated to interweave and overlap, Adrift in the tide of timeless tales. We leave the security of the ‘fire’ to follow them.
Young Janey is innocently inquisitive about the contents of suitcases strewn on the shore, to the perturbation of her older sister. We observe distant figures in circumstances congruent with what we have heard so far. We witness brief scenes close at hand. We are treated to many a sea shanty and to tall tales of women with tails …
There is a romance to much of it, cushioned by the passage of time, until a concentration of more modern jetsam including a lifebuoy stamped ‘Wahine’ brings it closer to remembered time for those of an age; closer to first-hand stories told by those who were there or knew someone who was …
I won’t detail the final phase of the story. Suffice to say it’s visceral, involving and – for me, at least – deeply moving. It is a testament to all involved that what could have been either trite or over emotive in lesser hands is pitched with such truth and integrity that narrative and imagination transform into actual experience.
When, at the conclusion, we are thanked for braving the elements, I am deeply aware that a bit of exposure to the cool evening elements has been nothing compared to what others suffered back in the day, whether they were ship-wrecked passengers or rescuers.
Knowing it was directed by Kerryn Palmer led me to expect it would be good, and so it is. But I wasn’t prepared for it to become so profoundly moving. And only in retrospect do I begin to appreciate how purposefully and adroitly Adrift has been developed, structured and performed. An exceptional experience.
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