“Where there are roaches there is a boot, and where there is a boot – are there roaches? It’s an existential idea, and perhaps it’s the way of the world. It’s a thoughtful play while being a lot of fun.”
Julia Newbould
4.5 boots
Venue: Flight Path Theatre
Marrickville
Dates: Until May 2nd
When you think of roaches, you think of something small and somewhat insignificant. The Roaches & the Boot punches above its weight. This little Australian story is full of battlers, trying to make their way in the world and carve out their positions in the workplace and life.
The Roaches & the Boot is about control, hunger, and power tools – pretty much in that order.
Opening to Aussie anthem “Thunderstruck”, you know this is going to be an Aussie tale. And it’s great to hear stories with Australian accents and Australian sensibilities without it being a story that is only relevant to Australians.
Four larrikin building site workers are doing the graveyard shift. Chaz and Jezza are holding the fort – and having a smoko – while the others Squirt and Bazza are off to pick up pizza, booze, and smokes.
Each is trying to assert themselves and give themselves power. They take turns in holding the power and it changes back and forth subtlely through the play.
It’s a story that could be set anywhere, but in this case, we recognize these people as our own.
Language like smokos, tinnies, shooies localizes the story for us. It focuses us on our own society, and we embrace the characters immediately.
The humour is ours, as are the dialogue and the characters, who show toughness with an underlying softness, and weakness with an inner strength.
Playwright John Tsakiris has a way with dialogue. He has given each character perfect expressions and language. Tsakiris has also cleverly created gender balance on the building site and with the cast. It’s a nice touch.
With co-director Megan Hefferen, he’s assembled a super talented cast. Elyse Phelan as Chaz is outstanding. Her scenes pitting her against Tsakiris at the beginning perfectly showcase her comedic timing and physical expressiveness. The directors have also done a great job in pacing the play. There are moments where characters are using actions in place of words. Each actor does this exceptionally well.
The first characters we meet are Jezza (played by playwright John Tsakiris) and Chaz (Elyse Phelan). They are on a building site and whinging about having to work another graveyard shift. Jezza is asserting his power over Chaz by not wanting to hear her mindless chatter and stupid questions. He wants to be left alone for his smoko – a right on any building site.
Squirt aka Roach (Owen Hasluck) is the bottom of the foodchain on the building site. He is treated like a cockroach by boss Bazza, played here beautifully by Holly Mazzola. Bazza behaves like she is superior to the rest of the workers; through her language, her expressions, and throwing her weight around, she asserts herself at the top of the heap.
Mia MacCormick has done a great job of the set; it’s perfect for all the action. It remains static but gives the cast opportunity to move in and out of the incomplete building skeleton.
Lighting designer Holly Nesbitt has worked magic to put expressiveness in the unchanging set with her clever use of lighting to let the audience feel the heightening emotional times.
Where there are roaches there is a boot, and where there is a boot – are there roaches? It’s an existential idea, and perhaps it’s the way of the world. It’s a thoughtful play while being a lot of fun.
Julia Newbould, Theatre Now
