Little Monster

Little Monster
Created and Performed by Telia Nevile. Dramaturg – Sameena Zehra. Music – James Dowell. Costume – Sharon Nevile. Melbourne Fringe Digital. October 9 – 17, 2021 On Demand.

The many faces and few delights of the inner demons we try to hide but can’t ignore.

Something many of us have in common is the experience of living in share houses.  Telia Nevile  bases the premise of this new show on that experience.  However, the share house portrayed is her mind - in this cleverly and constructed, beautifully remembered and executed, epic poem.  So, aspects/ways of neurotic thinking and behaving are represented as personified tenants in a share house.

Charismatic Nevile uses a charming dry ironic delivery with a generous, engaging and quirky approach.

We are invited to look at the darker side of the experience of loneliness, and how the mind can play tricks and how worries and anxieties can become overwhelming. This is something that many of us can surely identify with in the time of severe Covid aloneness, particularly, after having let friendships drift through the over use of Facebook and other social media - often so full of nauseating and off-putting self-aggrandisements. 

The presentation, of this intense, seedy but ultimately rejuvenating journey, is clear and uncluttered. Ms. Nevile has masterful and complete command of her material. It does require the audience to pay pretty careful attention as one needs to make sense of who the invented characters are, and the thought patterns they symbolised. At the same time, though, it rolls on beautifully due to its fluid poetic nature.

This work is presented in the rhyming pattern used in many of Dr Seuss’s children’s books, and is measured. This is most particularly due to the pentameter of the verse, which, because of its nature, gives one the sense of something weird happening like a tricky/risky visit from ‘The Cat In the Hat’.  As with books like ‘The Cat In The Hat’ and ‘Green Eggs and Ham’ there is a sort of ironic remove. Therefore, initially, the performance does not appear to be fully embodied by poet Nevile.  It does start out like a bedtime story. In the latter stages this restrained presentation is broken by some fabulous punk music by James Dowell and great singing by Nevile and other wacky staging changes.

Awesome show, stunning performance with a great ultimate message.  Telia Nevile is certainly a performer to keep an eye on.

Suzanne Sandow

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