The concept is immediately intriguing to anyone interested in our nation’s cultural heritage. Due to the French gaining the advantage in the ‘famous battle of Picton’ in 1839, Aotearoa as we know it doesn’t exist. Instead the South Island, Le Sud-Zelandais, is under French rule whilst the British have somehow retained governance of North Zealand.

The action takes place inside the Wanaka conference centre, a sumptuous pale-green classical Parisian mansion adorned with columns, gilt-lined entrances and elaborate fancy scenic wallpaper. This, according to designer Tracy Grant Lord, is how the affluent Socialist French government of the Le Sud likes to conduct diplomatic relations.

The opening scene plays entirely in French which somehow a virtual non-speaker of the Gallic tongue such as myself manages to follow, peppered as it is with current political and local geographical references. Andrew Grainger’s arrogant playboy French Prime Minister of Le Sud, Monsieur Francois Duvauchelle, is preparing to meet with the British Prime Minister to discuss a pressing political issue. His deputy Dominique Le Bons (Jennifer Ward-Lealand), a handsome haughty feminist unafraid of exhibiting strong lesbian signals, is also la Minister d’Energie or however you’d say that… 

I’m from North Zealand you see, not much culture up our way; we don’t even have broadband or iPhones yet. The issue on the table involves the North’s dependence on Le Sud’s hydroelectric power, the price for which has suddenly doubled from two to four dollars per unit. 

A third significant character on the French side is George Henare’s Minister of Indigenous Affairs, Tama te Tonga, a cheeky opportunist who milks every potential chance to exploit his cultural status and expertise – beginning with the embarrassingly absurd powhiri welcoming their Anglo-Saxon cousins from the north. 

North Zealand’s pitiable slob of a chief whip Jim Peterson (Michael Lawrence) is not a million miles from Brian Sergent’s classic PM in Flight of the Conchords; a scruffy, oafish, uncultured and dim-witted conservative. Lawrence’s Jim plays very much to our country’s petrified reputation as a behind-the-times welfare state, first immortalised in the 70s with Glide Time. 

Thanks to the lambasted curse of mixed-member proportional representation, Jim comes flanked with his coalition partners Lyndsey Marsland (Greg Cooper), diminutive uptight Kings-educated financier from the hyper-right wing Federation of United Consumers and Taxpayers Party, and Moana Marie Matakana, a strikingly attractive somewhat schizoid Parnell yuppie of Tuhoe descent, representing the Maori Party.

Tensely courteous negotiations ensue, quickly degenerating into a vitriolic screaming match about rugby. By now it must be clear that any notions of sensibility, let alone political correctness, are unlikely to get much of a look-in in this farcical, hyper-relevant, trans-dimensional satire. A nod to the famously acerbic 17^th century works of Moliere, no-one’s dignity is safe from ridicule, even – or especially – the tangata whenua. 

The climactic solution to the political impasse is contrived, idealistic, unlikely and gut-bustingly hilarious, and it’s a trifling inconvenience that we may need to adopt in some small way a similar mindset to the six self-serving bigots comprising the cast, in order to allow ourselves be amused.  

A less skilled and talented company could see all the outrageous farce, obvious political sideswipes and cheap shots fall flat. Under director Raymond Hawthorne the levels are pitched very well throughout, with gags hammed up and underplayed at all the right points. Hawthorne was central to the original script-development workshops with playwright Dave Armstrong, clearly to the production’s advantage.

Speaking of Armstrong, at this opening for ATC’s Le Sud the playwright took a bow in the curtain call. I believe this was the first time I’ve ever witnessed such an occurrence, a parting nod to the peculiarities of this alternative dimension perhaps? It also occurs to me that given how much real-life politics continues to spew forth issues and episodes screaming to be lampooned, the play will need to be almost rewritten each time it’s produced.

In conclusion, whilst the idea itself is worthy of extensive contemplation, there’s no great moral or inspirational message provided in this conceptual cross-cultural examination but there are curtain-to-curtain chuckles, guffaws and belly laughs to offer us a greatly welcome cathartic release from the more frustrating absurdism of our real parliament. 
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Auckland Theatre Company’s season opener explodes with the jaunty impudence of a jack-in-the-box as it bounces around the alternative reality of a South Island that was colonised by the French, leaving our Anglo-Saxon forebears to make do with the North.

In the anarchic imagination of playwright Dave Armstrong this historical "what if" throws up the delightfully absurd image of French poodles trained as sheep dogs, with some predictable jibes about a local cuisine sans Watties tomato sauce and the truly horrifying realisation Dan Cartier wouldn’t be playing for the All Blacks. [More]
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For more production details, click on the title above. Go to Home page to see other Reviews, recent Comments and Forum postings (under Chat Back), and News. 

Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer