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Vitalstatistix: 'Still Angela'.
"It's about a contemporary urban woman who has lost her sense of perspective and direction, and she's wondering what it's all about and where she will end up," suggests writer and director Jenny Kemp of 'Still Angela', a work being produced by Vitalstatistix Theatre during August. Kemp, not a well known figure here in Adelaide, works predominantly in Melbourne, where she has been a member of Black Sequin Productions for nearly two decades, a collaborative group of theatre writers, designers, actors and the like. "We're working towards making performances and theatre pieces which gives equal focus to the theatrical form to the piece of work," she says.
Having introduced herself as part of the team, Kemp very much considers herself an independent artist, and (I think) a bit of a 'gun for hire', which explains why she's in Adelaide working with Vitalstatistix on play which seems, on paper, to be tailor-made for them.
She laughs, "Even negotiating going from writer to director is a good way to get perspective, and to avoid some of the pitfalls."
'Still Angela' is a story of journey and discovery, albeit with a diffrenece. Coming up to her fortieth birthday Angela begins to question aspects of her life... "what is it that has been disfunctional for her in the relationship is a key part of what underlies the performance. Was it within her or does it come from outside factors?", explains Kemp.
The approaching birthday gives Angela a reason to pause and reflect, and she heads off on a train journey to the Simpson desert, a time for travel and unraveling aspects of her life. Is her life unravelling? Become stultifying? The journey itself is an extended metaphor for Angela's quest, the most striking aspect of which - for Kemp - is that within the mind.
"It's about finding a form to express the relationship between our inner worlds and daily lives."
There are some inherent difficulties with 'Still Angela' for the audience to come to terms with. For one thing, the play travels across time as Angela reflects upon herself as a child, and as a younger woman. The performance takes place in flashback, but as Kemp explains, "There's three actors, mostly all up at the same time [on stage], and the oldest one of the characters is the one we're tracking in the play. I believe they're all inside her at the same time, which is why we've chosen to do it that way." The three stages of Angela, as depicted on stage, are played by Natasha Herbert, Margaret Mills and Lucy Taylor.
For all of us there are incidents or happenings in our lives which have great significance even though they may - in themselves - be small and isolated occurrences. So it is with Kemp's Angela, for whom she describes such occasions as "The fantasy world, using a scene such as the one with the chessboard as a trigger-point, a symbol or signifier. I guess it's a gateway used to resonate things.
I'd written 'unravelling' in a previous paragraph, which sounds a little complex - a little deconstruction - and the way Kemp describes it sounds much more reasonable. "If one listens to oneself the resources are there - through our memory and our use of imagination," she explains. "It's that which we explore in 'Still Angela'. Allied to this point is the idea of disconnection... and Kemp gets a bit Freudian as she explains an individuals disconnection from thoughts or emotions when they're not being used. When we're busy they get left behind. Does this tell us about conformity within society, I ponder?
"I'm interested in the part that says 'how do we do it?', in a way that's open and part of society," suggests Kemp. "How do we keep all of these things active within ourselves every day? In the play Angela starts to form a more full relationship with the world..."
Alex Wheaton
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Vitalstatistix Theatre's 'Still Angela' plays at Star Theatres, Hilton, from Tues 17 August.
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