Empire Burning

Empire Burning
By Eugene Gilfedder. Co-presented by the author and Metro Arts as part of Independents programme. Sue Benner Theatre (Qld). 13-28 May 2011

This show has legs! Shakespearean in its universality, it would work equally well worldwide. It should become a study text for students (and not just drama students). Theatre directors and teachers, take note!

Disclaimer: This is not ‘a nice show for a night out’. The closer you examine it and discuss it, the more it fits today’s world. It is about us, citizens of the world.

And what a pedigree: a star-studded cast of eight actors (fourteen Matilda Awards between them including the author’s six) and development grants from both state and federal governments.

Empire Burning burst onto our theatre scene as a mature piece ready to move on to greater acclaim.  

Gilfedder employs a clever dramatic conceit: time and place are fluid. While his characters remain Romans of first century AD, they behave in a remarkably familiar – if surreal – way to us: struggles for power; knee-jerk reactions to disasters; the challenge to identify ‘an enemy’ (frequently incorrectly); failure to listen to rhyme and reason; abandonment of well-developed legislations at will … Citizens demand answers and our leaders are only human; they try to placate the baying masses without diminishing their support.  

Playwright Eugene Gilfedder plays Seneca; Finn Gilfedder-Cooney is young Nero; Niki-J Price (Nero’s mother, Agrippina); Dan Crestani (mute ‘enemy’ prisoner); Damien Cassidy (Quinnus, the common man); Steven Tandy (Burrus, a Senator); Sasha Janowicz (Calpurnius Piso, a senator); Michael Futcher (Faenius Rufus, a senator).

Their talents are supported faithfully by Freddy Komp (Stage Manager & Production Design), Geoff Squires (Lighting Design), John Rodgers, Ken Eadie, Havergal Brian, and Eugene Gilfedder (Sound Design), Jess Stanton & Tiffany Beck (costumes).

Jay McKee            

Photo Credit: SYC Studios

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