Rhinestone Rex and Miss Monica

What does a theatre company do when its star playwright retires? When the year’s one spot that is certain to pull in the crowds – the latest play from David Williamson - becomes vacant? Well, it searches back though all those past Williamson productions. And the great thing about 2010’s Rhinestone Rex and Miss Monica? Not only is it a two-hander, but the original performers, Glenn Hazeldine and Georgie Parker, are both raring to go. 

With a bit of updating here and there, the comedy is all set for a return. The twosome, especially Georgie Parker, as the violinist from the Sydney Symphony Orchestra badly injured with Repetitive Strain Injury, is ready. Thirteen years on, the critically painful shoulder that ended her musical career is still a reality.

Gary Gould (Hazeldine) is in her attractive flat (designed by Venonique Benett) as a tradie doing much-needed repairs to her kitchen. She’s desperate for him to stick to his quote; he wants to creep over it. 

And he wants to play his music on her sound system, loud country western, which is absolutely contrary to her refined classical taste. When he plays Jolene by Dolly Parton, she cuts it off saying it takes more than ‘big tits’ to make good music.

He also listens to 2WWW, the Community Radio Station he broadcasts from with his own after-hours program, as Rhinestone Rex, a former Tamworth country singer. She gets to hear it one night, and it’s an excellent dramatic device, for he speaks his mind about ‘Miss Monica’ and the whole business he’s found himself in.

The relationship gets a boost when he invites her out for drinks one night and, remarkably, she reveals herself to be a ready, steady drinker. With plenty of Williamson wit, the couple grow more and more together.

Repairs to the flat are done with much off-stage banging and buzzing, maintaining the beauty of the setting: but the only thing we see is a towel used to clean shoe marks off the floor.

The twosome is managed beautifully by director Mark Kilmurry. Rhinestone Rex gradually sees the love that this job has brought him: Miss Monica decides to pick her own way out of the hole in which she’s found herself.

Frank Hatherley

Photographer: Prudence Upton