Ella Hope Higginson’s Goldfish Girl, described as surreal by Two Productions, may also be seen as absurdist satire: the realities a highly capable and accomplished woman faces in a male-dominated work space are taken to an absurd dramatic conclusion in order to make its political point.  

Reylene Rose Hilaga’s positively optimistic Ruth arrives at her new desk on the hallowed first floor to be greeted by Tom Eason’s apparently friendly Toby, already incumbent at this level and in the same job. Although Ruth has led the company’s highest-performing team with great success, Toby’s patronising restrictions on her potential soon become apparent. Likewise his privilege, exemplified by the constant arrival of packages gifted to him by the company and his having a seat at the Board table – an entitlement he airily says he was born with. The profusion of gift boxes means the glass bowl containing Murphy the goldfish, purposely underfed by Toby, has to be moved to Ruth’s desk.

Not only has Ruth hit the proverbial glass ceiling, she also has to negotiate an inhibiting underground tunnel to get to work, entering through a separate door. The office space begins to physically shrink as she is constrained. When (spoiler alert …) Toby expresses effusive horror on realising what she has to endure, and takes it to the Board on Ruth’s behalf, he turns their apology into an amplified song and dance act that puts him literally at centre stage, makes him ‘look good’ and totally side-lines her (…ends). So nothing changes.

The ‘closing-in walls’ motif reminds me of French absurdist Boris Vian’s The Empire Builders (1959) described by Backstage (USA) critic Laura Weinert as a politically inspired allegory that “tells the story of a middle-class family pursued by an inexplicable noise that forces the family members to flee upward through their own home to progressively smaller quarters, leaving behind all the comforts they once enjoyed while maintaining a semblance of calm and denial. Their only release seems to come when they beat on a mysterious, dark-skinned, bandaged man who appears in the corner everywhere they go.”

Rather than give Ruth an even more marginalised minority, like Vian’s Smurtz, to take her frustrations out on, playwright Ella Hope Higginson’s offers the allegorical goldfish, Murphy, as a friend and ally who – man-sized, besuited and played by Trubie-Dylan Smith in the epilogue – gets to soliloquise over (some might say mansplain) his parallel situation. Nevertheless Ruth and Murphy seek a new future together. (Pedantic footnote: a freshwater goldfish would not thrive in the saltwater ocean.)

As directed by Holly Chappell-Eason, Reylene Rose Hilaga and Tom Eason make a dynamic contrapuntal duo and Trubie-Dylan Smith blends innocence and wisdom to bring Goldfish Girl absurdist expose of reality to a satisfying conclusion.

If you seek out Goldfish Girl online (I’m not sure how long it will remain availablee) it actually starts at the 17:45 mark and runs just under 30 minutes. Being performed in Andromeda’s very small space allows it to be simultaneously web-cast in a single wide-frame shot, intercut with close-ups of the hand-written credits held up by Ruth and of Murphy the Goldfish in his bowl. Simple and effective. 

Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer

Theatre Live Online is an initiative offering hybrid live theatre, presenting three new short plays to streaming and in-person audiences simultaneously. Each play is staged at a different theatre around New Zealand, over three weekends, with an ‘omnibus’ screening at the season’s conclusion.  

The first piece, Ella Hope-Higginson’s Goldfish Girl, is a satirical surreal one act, set in a very boring office, and performed live at Little Andromeda in Christchurch. It dramatizes the realities of the insidious barriers (here literally rendered) that minorities face, well, everywhere.

Ruth (Reylene Rose Hilaga) is a competent and experienced worker who has just been promoted to the heady heights of the first floor of a poorly performing company. She’s a ‘lady’ who, we are assured, is definitely not there to satisfy quotas or optics. Her cheerful colleague Toby (Tom Eason) is at great pains to acknowledge the barriers she faces – he’s disbelieving! Then horrified! Then he’s defensive! And then he’s contrite! And then he’s sorry! So sorry! He is also rewarded, at Ruth’s expense, for his glib recognition of structural bias. As a woman who works for a large organisation, I find everything painfully relatable.

Observing throughout is Toby’s fish, Murphy, who is chronically underfed and trapped in a bowl that might as well be a glass ceiling. The unexpected ending, which features a terrific monologue by Trubie-Dylan Smith, is a little didactic but in keeping with the play’s tongue-in-cheek approach; it’s certainly not supposed to be subtle.  

The play, directed by Holly Chappell-Eason, is entertaining and fast-paced, combining physical comedy and an awkward comedy of unease. Tom Eason’s sound design features ominous rumbles that shake the walls of the office, echoing the obnoxious way that Toby repeatedly taps Murphy’s bowl – because the naughty fish likes it, apparently. An anxious synth soundtrack emphasises the rising discomfort. There is a keen sense of mounting tension, and when Ruth finally loses it, after wave after wave of micro-aggressions turn macro, the audience is cheering her on.

I flicked through the livestream this morning – 900+ views within just over 12 hours! – and as you’d hope it offers details that weren’t apparent to a seated audience, including a neat credit sequence, a better view of the fishbowl that also traps Ruth within the frame, and a different perspective on Toby’s marvellously awful, over-the-top apology. In particular, it emphasises the claustrophobic nature of the office, which sits in a field of black. As the play reaches its climax, the walls literally close in on Ruth in a way that reminds me of Terry Gilliam’s film Brazil.

Goldfish Girl, which was written and rehearsed in a short period of time, reminds me in the best possible way of the sort of scrappy student theatre that is both high concept and lo-fi, using whatever’s at hand to put together something original, immediate and engaging. The cast are funny and precise, balancing the absurd comedy of their characters with the play’s serious undercurrents. It’s a good night out, and nothing more than it needs to be.

It’s great to see initiatives that promote the creation of written work (as well as work for performers), and that are clearly bringing this to a much wider audience that would ordinarily benefit. I am keen to watch, by live-stream this time, the other two plays in the series.

Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer