A Hoax

A Hoax is an impressive second play from Rick Viede, premiering in this La Boite/Griffin Theatre co-production. Viede’s targets are those artful peddlers of misery hoaxes, those writers of false memoirs of victimhood which are lapped up by our celebrity culture in love with glib tales of confession and redemption. Centre stage is Currah, an indigenous girl who was repeatedly raped in a cellar by her father.

She’s actually plain and ordinary Miri Smith, recruited by a frustrated writer to masquerade as “Currah” so as to convince a publisher that her story (his story) must be told. It is. Nobody’s Child is a heart-rending hit book, and the play unfolds as a dark satire on fame-seekers and identity politics.

Shari Sebbens (after making her film debut in The Sapphires) is enchantingly inscrutable as the shy Mari transformed into the confident horror of Currah, gushing with media platitudes about her “personal journey”. Glenn Hazeldine brings solid truth to the writer, Ant, desperate for love, for recognition, for Mari, anything. Sally McKenzie is the larger-than-life publisher and Charles Allen is her queeny Afro-American assistant, whose story adds another level of sexual identity to this witty portrait of contemporary belonging.

Director Lee Lewis keeps all the realities and deceptions of these characters dancing to final exposure. The uneven acting sometimes breaks natural rhythms, robbing the play of yet more comic strength, but The Hoax is a stimulating and enduring revelation of our voyeuristic celebration of abuse. It’s worth seeing.

Martin Portus

Images (from top): Shari Sebbens & Glenn Hazeldine and Shari Sebbens. Photographer: Brett Boardman.