Couples

Couples, a one act ‘comedy/drama’ (as the program calls it), is set in a ‘couples’ retreat’ – a sort of health spa for dysfunctional marriages.  Four couples check in for a weekend of country air, bickering and therapy: Holly and Gary; Phoebe and Steven; Rachel and Mark; and Brittany and Karl.  Their hosts, Dr Edwin and Jessica Bialy, have a pretty rocky relationship too. 

It’s a show of impeccably worthy intentions, but it’s more of a ‘play for discussion’ in real life marriage counseling than an actual play.

The couples’ problems are recognisable, but this is no Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf marital bloodbath and there’s not much plot.  Attitudes are stated (and re-stated) and grievances aired in a rather one note way.  The comedy comes from insults, put-downs and zingers, some of the last sounding a little familiar.  (E.g. ‘What’s the definition of a mixed emotion?’  ‘Watching your mother-in-law drive off a cliff in your new car.’)  With five couples getting about equal time, there’s no climax.  One couple leaves the stage because the woman reckons the marriage is over (and on balance we agree with her), but the, until then, obdurate husband goes after her.  Another couple leaves because they are actually okay (in a politically incorrect sort of way) and are affronted by the aggressive insults from another woman.  Those remaining admit that, yes, they might need to change.  The show sort of peters out with some moral-of-the-story advice on marriage from Dr Bialy – who, minutes before, has had his face slapped. 

For much of the show’s running time of just over an hour, the four couples sit in a row of chairs facing the audience, so that if they wish to speak to each other, they must turn and lean forward while the two therapists range about behind them.  If that sounds awkward, it is: a problem director Phillip A Mayer and co-director Rachel Lambert have yet to solve.  Another is the acting, which is, overall, uneven, but then the text does not provide much scope.  Is it a coincidence that Mr Mayer, as a macho businessman, and Ms Lambert, as a lawyer, turn in the best performances?  Mr Mayer has a solidity and reality; Ms Lambert is way over the top (or her character is), but she has presence and entertains.

A good-natured and (I’d have to say) indulgent audience laughed obligingly, but final applause was short-lived.  However, despite my dissatisfactions, the play has received twelve awards and thirty-seven nominations at Touring Victorian One Act Play Festivals 2014.  With only two performances at La Mama, I assume this is a city try-out for the show. 

(Here, There & Everywhere is a self-funded regional company established in Gippsland in 1993.) 

Michael Brindley