Mary Bryant — A musical
By Nick Enright and David King
Directed by Crispin Taylor
Ensemble Theatre, Sydney
Until October 10
Review by Brendan Doyle
Try to imagine the movie Titanic redone as a musical, set in a longboat on a tiny theatre stage, without the special effects. The result could be something like the Ensemble's latest offering, Mary Bryant.
The trouble with both is that they take themselves seriously. Golden boy Nick Enright at his best gave us the gritty realism of Mongrels, about the stormy relationship between two writers, and Blackrock, about young people in trouble. Both plays felt firmly rooted in the real world.
Not so Mary Bryant. Here, Enright has gone mushy on us again, as he did recently with Chasing the Dragon, which had the added annoyance of being pretentious.
But maybe that's all the mainly middle-aged Liberal-voting north shore Sydney subscribers can stomach after a few flutes of champagne in the harbour-side bar.
Admittedly, many a lesser writer has run aground on the rocky ambition of writing the great Aussie musical based on our convict past.
The true story behind this musical is indeed remarkable. In 1791, Irish convicts Will and Mary Bryant made a daring escape from captivity in Sydney Cove in a stolen longboat with a few other prisoners, and baby daughter. After 70 days on the high seas, they made it to Dutch Timor, where they enjoyed a brief taste of freedom before being recaptured.
With this promising raw material, Enright and King have come up with what is billed as "a heroic love story" that is "heartfelt and full of surging energy".
Sound familiar? Mary Bryant turns out to have the same manufactured, cloying sentimentality as the Hollywood movie.
Pippa Grandison, who plays Mary, looks not unlike her Titanic counterpart. And, as in the movie, the heroine survives while her (weaker) male partner carks it.
Don't get me wrong. This is a competent production, and the actors sing their hearts out. The best moments are the duets between Ben Harkin (Will) and Grandison. But what do they have to work with? Repetitive lyrics and musical themes that wouldn't be out of place in a Saab commercial.
All this tarting up of "the convict experience" is, of course, supposed to be uplifting. The cast do their best, but without the writers' passionate commitment to the story — and to history — it all finally falls flat.
After 70 days in a longboat, I started to wish that it, like the Titanic, would have the grace to sink without a trace.