THE BIGGEST
The Court Theatre, Bernard Street, Addington, Christchurch
16/06/2018 - 14/07/2018
Production Details
NEW KIWI COMEDY MAKES A SPLASH AT THE COURT THEATRE
The Court Theatre will be reeling in the laughs when its newest Kiwi comedy The Biggest opens this June.
Set in small-town Coromandel The Biggest follows Walter, Pat, Mick and Stu as they try to win big at the local fishing competition. They’re after a replacement for Stu’s dream boat – the one that he spent his life-savings on and then wrote-off the first time he used it, landing himself in a wheelchair.
Only problem is, they don’t know how to fish.
For Ross Gumbley, the director of The Biggest and The Court’s Artistic Director, the idea is simple but fantastic.
“It’s a great idea for a comedy – a group of characters who have to catch the biggest fish when none of them know how to!”
For writer Jamie McCaskill the inspiration for the play came to him when working in a local pub in Thames.
“I wanted to write a play about raw, rural men and try and find the beauty under their rugged exterior. The characters are based on archetypes of people who used to drink in the Thames pub.”
The script reflects McCaskill’s aspirations for a raw, rural play; full of dialogue that Gumbley calls ‘salty language’.
“It doesn’t feel like dialogue from other plays you might have seen – it feels like dialogue from people you know. It’s going to be one of those plays where people leave with very sore ribs – and they’ll have sore ribs because their partner will be elbowing them in then saying, ‘that’s you up there! You’re like that!’”
The director is particularly proud of the cast he’s gathered for the show.
Mark Hadlow returns to The Court to take on the role of Stu, joined by Phil Grieve as Pat; Robert Lloyd as Walter; Apirana Taylor as Mick; Juanita Hepi as Walter’s put-upon daughter Cassie and Nick Dunbar as ‘local prick’ and fishing rival, Jan.
Beyond big laughs, the story also explores the politics of identity – namely the confusion and misunderstanding that McCaskill feels still exists around Māori culture within New Zealand.
“We still don’t fully understand how we should value each other’s culture in this country. Hopefully The Biggest can create conversation that doesn’t point fingers but makes us realise that values to Māori culture can be inclusive – and aren’t there to alienate non-Māori. I think we need to appreciate all aspects of life in Aotearoa.”
Although set in the far North, the play felt much closer to home for Gumbley.
“When I think about the world of The Biggest I think about Christchurch right after the quakes. The quakes were awful, but as a community we were brought together to support each other. And that’s what happens in this play. It’s about the strength and love that you find in your whanau; in your family and in your friends. And how at the end of the day if we don’t support each other through this then life’s a whole lot harder.”
The Biggest
Tonkin & Taylor mainstage at The Court Theatre Show
16 June – 14 July 2018
Sponsor: Newstalk ZB
Show Times
● Monday & Thursday 6.30pm
● Tue/Wed/Fri/Sat 7.30pm
● Forum 6:30pm Monday 18th June
Discuss the play with cast and creative team after the performance
● Matinee 2:00pm Saturday 30 June
Ticket Prices
Adult $54.00 – $62.00 | Senior 65yrs+ $47.00 – $55.00
Supporter $45.00 – $53.00 | Group 6+ $44.00 – $52.00
Child (U18) $25.00 – $33.00 | 30 Below (max 2 per person) $30.00
Bookings: phone 03 963 0870 or visit www.courttheatre.org.nz Images can be found at The Court Theatre’s Media Centre
Cast
Stu Wakefield Mark Hadlow
Pat Chestnut Phil Grieve
Walter Mack Robert Lloyd
Mick Taipari Apirana Taylor
Cassie Mack Juanita Hepi
Jan Martin Nick Dunbar
Creatives
Playwright Jamie McCaskill
Director Ross Gumbley
Set Designer Mark McEntyre
Costume Designer Hayley Douglas
Lighting Designer Joe Hayes
Sound Designer Gil Craig
Operator/Head Technician Giles Tanner
Stage Manager Erica Browne
Properties Manager Christy Lassen
Construction Manager Bryce Goddard
Production Manager Flore Charbonnier
Theatre ,
Some gorgeous moments but frustrating to watch
Review by Erin Harrington 17th Jun 2018
Jamie McCaskill’s play The Biggest is one of three that came out of time spent writing in his hometown, Thames, in recent years. A touring production of Not in Our Neighbourhood, an affecting, devastating one-woman drama about a women’s refuge safehouse, played at The Court in 2016. The Biggest, directed here by Ross Gumbley,is an entirely different beast: a broad comedy about the everyday rituals that rural men use to connect with and distance themselves from one another, and the ways that Pākehā and Māori relate to one another.
A group of aging barflies – Walter, Mick, and Pat – decide that the best way to help their mate Stu, who’s wheelchair-bound with a busted leg after writing off his car and boat, is to enter a high-stakes fishing competition. Never mind the fact that none of the men managed to work up the courage to visit Stu during his painful convalescence. The person who catches the biggest fish will win a new boat and, even better, bragging rights – great currency at the local pub, which is the men’s de facto home.
Their biggest obstacle, apart from an inflated sense of their own abilities, is Jan, the boyfriend of Walter’s daughter Cassie, who is both a terrific fisherman and a total wanker. It’s a clear set-up for good-natured comic hijinks that are muddied by the revelations of some long-held secrets that trouble the easy pattern of everyday boozing and ask the men to look harder at their lives and relationships.
Robert Lloyd is warm, energetic and charming as swandri-wearing Māori serial shagger Walter Mack, and his fearful unwillingness to engage with the serious issues of his own health and wellbeing will be recognisable to many. Mark Hadlow is such a physical performer that it’s a lot of fun watching him channel this energy into a frustrated alpha male who feels trapped by his wheelchair and humiliated by his impaired mobility.
Walter’s no-nonsense but discontent daughter Cassie (Juanita Hepi) is the only character, apart from taciturn Māori expat-come-home Mick (Apirana Taylor, reprising his role from the 2016 Wellington production), who seems to have an ounce of sense, but the role doesn’t give her much to do.
Bumbling, genial but miserable Pat (Phil Grieve) offers some clownish laughs, and acts as an unwitting example of some of the entrenched aspects of everyday Pākehā racism, especially in his articulation of the myth of the ‘good’ Māori and his unexamined attitudes towards what Pākehā should, and should not, share with Māori. For anyone who’s spent any time in local pubs or taverns, with men who are solving the world’s problems one jug at a time, these are recognisable archetypes.
I particularly appreciate the way that Nick Dunbar takes Jan from an insufferable prick of an antagonist to someone who, while still a complete jackass, is nonetheless more sympathetic and complex. Dunbar is clearly having a great time with the character’s obnoxious hyperactivity, and a brief scene in which Jan is shaving, while singing a Lorde track to himself, has me roar with laughter.
I am a big fan of McCaskill’s other work, but it breaks my heart that, despite pockets of vitality, much of this production feels really underdeveloped, didactic and reliant on cliché. The script sounds as if it still needs a couple of passes to better develop subtext and character, to make the heavy signposting a little more complex, and to find ways to show and not tell. Or, perhaps the production itself has been unsuccessful in drawing nuance out from the broad and often predictable prompts the script offers. Either way, I feel like I’m being clubbed over the head like one of the poor snapper that are caught by the men.
It’s a pity, as there’s so much here that’s worth exploring: fears about literal and figurative impotence; the impact of being disconnected from your culture, language or family, by choice or circumstance; what it means to be Māori, or even ‘Māori enough’, in 2018; the Pākehā denial, or embrace, or Māori knowledge and custom; the opportunities, or lack thereof, offered in New Zealand; the cultural and psychological stagnation of small towns; the importance of social ritual in small communities.
There’s also a canny celebration and critique of homosocial male bonding, some prodding at the tangled notion of the ‘good old days’, and some pointed eye-rolling at Pākehā whose notion of race relations is still stuck back in the 80s, but it’s all presented in very broad strokes.
Most importantly, the quest to be, or catch, ‘the biggest’ – as Cassie calls it, a dick-measuring contest – highlights the way that the patterns of habitual, demonstrative, boorish pub-going mate-ship, which here is built on binge-drinking and insult-laden banter, might fulfil an immediate need for company, while also effacing the more vulnerable and intimate sorts of relationships that we need to sustain us emotionally and spiritually, especially in the face of our own mortality.
For all its obvious and enticing promise, and despite some gorgeous moments, this is a frustrating play to watch. The men’s antics never really get out of second gear, there isn’t a lot of panache in the staging or setting, and there are little things – like being able to hear offstage stage business, sound problems, and clunky technical transitions – that have no place in a professional production like this. Perhaps it will relax a little, find a more confident sense of flow, and head out of shallow waters, as the run continues.
Finally, as an audience member who has heard Dave Dobbyn’s ‘Language’ and Th’ Dudes ‘Bliss’ signal communication difficulties and getting on the piss respectively in half a dozen productions of New Zealand plays in the last few years, I’m begging local theatre makers for a moratorium on tracks from the ‘Nature’s Best’ pop music hit compilations acting as grossly unsubtle narrative shorthand during scene transitions. Surely there’s a better way to tell stories.
Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer
Comments
Joanie Mitchell July 8th, 2018
I read this review and thought I must have been to see a different play until I saw this response from the playwright - https://www.facebook.com/jamie.mccaskill/videos/10155640248438097/
Certainly on the night I went (opening night), in the final scenes of the play, you could hear a pindrop which suggested by far the majority of us were engaged.
Phil Grieve June 18th, 2018
Thanks for taking the time to reply Erin. I appreciate the context and the additional insights about what you did enjoy about this production. I never said Broad was a disparaging term though - that was something you seemed to be disappointed with not me.
Erin Harrington June 18th, 2018
Kia ora Phil -
Ordinarily I wouldn't engage with the usual knee-jerk 'well clearly the critic's a grinch' schtick - funny how the critic's only right when they praise a production - but I do object to the old 'well everyone else liked it' line: from where I was sitting the response from the audience was really divided, with a pretty strong 50 / 50 split between being really into it and being completely disengaged, which is not an ideal strike rate. For what it's worth, here's a few gorgeous moments: Wal's bullseye; Mick perfectly hitting his mark with the pinspot, and the lighting transition and speech that come after it; the meltdown over the letter / Jan's name, which is made even better by the fact that no one can go anywhere; Jan's impression of Hawking; the subtle transition to moon and stars outside; Pat's fear of Cheryl; and wrangling the wheelchair, which seemed to have a mischievous mind of its own. Beyond that, I'd been really looking forward to this show and arrived excited and with an open heart, but left feeling flat and disappointed with the overall package, and won't pretend otherwise. To be honest, I'd much rather go home and write that something was wonderful, and I get as little joy saying something that's not positive as I'm sure you do reading it. But since when is 'broad' a disparaging term? I can think of loads of broad comedies that are as intelligent as they are funny.
Ngā mihi, and best wishes for the rest of the run.
Phil Grieve June 18th, 2018
My apologies John. It did seem like an odd choice to travel to the 'Chur just to dump on our efforts from what seemed like a very lofty height from the tone of the review. Now it all makes sense. I would've liked to hear more about some of these "gorgeous moments" though Erin. It does beg the question - if Jamie had written, and we had presented, the play YOU obviously needed to see - would anyone else have come?
Editor June 18th, 2018
Major editing error there - apologies to all! The review was written by Erin Harrington. Byline is now corrected.
Phil Grieve June 17th, 2018
I see "Grumpy John" is back. I'm sorry you had such a miserable time when so many of your fellow audience were laughing their arses off. Perhaps you should've stayed at home in Wellington where standards are obviously SO much higher. Also, you talk about the 'broad' nature of the play/production and yet you are able to list extensively the many themes that are alluded to in the play - obviously Jamie (and this production) is doing something right. I'm sorry that it wasn't enough for you. Thankfully yours is but one opinion.