My date asks me if I remember the discovery of the ozone hole over Antarctica in 1985 and I suddenly feel old (I don’t think she was alive yet). But I don’t – I was 8 at the time and I was more concerned with New Kids on the Block than the environment. Don’t judge me. I care about the environment now in my 40s, which is why I’m at this ground-breaking play on a weekday when I’d normally be hanging out with my cat, watching Selling Sunset (again, don’t judge me).

Award-winning playwright Lynda Chanwai-Earle’s Hole is about some deep, dark stuff like sexual orientation, filial duty, environmental disaster and the complexities of the human heart, but it manages to temper all of this with just the right amount of humour. It takes a while to get warmed up, I admit. The radio scenes, while hilarious, are a bit jarring at first, especially when my own heart is drawn to the love story between Stella – the phenomenal Elle Wootton – and Bonny – the equally magnetic Stevie Hancox-Monk. I’ve never seen them perform before and I regret this! I make a note to go see whatever they’re starring in in the future.

But I digress. Who doesn’t love a beautiful, yet somewhat awkward lesbian love story? Now add a saucy love triangle twist with US Marine, Ionane, played by the stunning Sepelini Mua’au and sprinkle a dose of LSD on it and you’ve got the best Wednesday you’ve had out in a long time.

It helps that outside of Circa, it feels like Antarctica tonight with gales and rain. But even though the play takes place in a kind of frozen over hell, it’s cozy in here (thanks to green power from solar panels and a wind turbine), and the love scenes help to make it steamy too.

As much as this play is about the discovery of the ozone hole and the impending environmental doom we face, it’s a love story about the heart: Antarctica, the heart of the world that drives our climate, and the fragility of the human heart. I won’t drop any spoilers here, but one of the takeaways is that the heart is capable of great love, often with multiple people, and at the same time.

Hole is the second instalment in Chanwai-Earle’s Antarctic Trilogy [Heat was the first], and was developed during her residency at the International Institute of Modern Letters in 2019. Her work has the support from women in science including Hall of Fame atmospheric scientist Susan Solomon, and Dr Maj De Poorter, who Bonny is modelled after. With a strong science focus, there are parts where I’m less interested in the Greenpeace rants, not because it’s not interesting but because the chemistry between the actors is so strong that that’s the story I’m most invested in.

A playwright’s mission to reduce emission and heal the heart of the world, Hole runs at almost two hours. And being in a development stage, my suggestion would be to cut some of the enviro-rants – tighten up the arguments, and Bonny might get her message across better if she’s not yelling it all the time. But don’t take my word for it – or do but go and see it yourself and then challenge me in the comments. Oh, and bring your lovers, all of them. After all, read the news: this is the end of the world as we know it. But our hearts beat on.

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