Audio review: Looking for Alibrandi is still searching
At Kaleidoscope, we’re all about trying new things. In that vein, Vaanie Krishnan and Charlotte Smee have had a go at recording their post-show thoughts in a podcast(ish) style called “Foyer Talks”!
Have a listen by pressing the play button and read along with the transcript below.
The episode runs for about 18 minutes.
00:00:01 Vaanie
Hi, I'm Vaanie. Sometimes I review theatre in Sydney, sometimes I don't. My arts blog, the Theatre Enthusiast, is all about bringing diverse perspectives and audiences to theatre. I've recently partnered with a fellow reviewer, Charlotte, on a new venture, the Kaleidoscope Journal.
00:00:15 Charlotte
Hi, I'm Charlotte. I'm the editor of Kaleidoscope, and I drag all my friends to the theatre all the time.
00:00:23 Vaanie
We just saw a new theatrical adaptation of Looking for Alibrandi at Belvoir St Theatre and we're sitting in the car chatting about what we thought.
00:00:32 Charlotte
You probably know that Looking for Alibrandi is originally a book by Melina Marchetta; I read it as a kid, my mum gave it to me, I loved it. It was a movie as well! I think it's probably a 90s movie, I have to check that, but yeah.
00:00:48 Vaanie
I also read it as a young teenager, and it was the first time that I really read about a migrant family in any of the mainstream media that I read or was engaged with.
00:01:00 Vaanie
The play centers around Josie Alibrandi, a scholarship kid in the 90s in Sydney that's competing with the rich kids while fending off the Italian spy network and trying to get a boyfriend.
00:01:13 Vaanie
So, we're just going to chat through our overall impressions, comparisons to the book and movie, what we liked, what we didn't like, and give you our recommendation.
00:01:24 Charlotte
All right. So, what was your overall impression, Vaanie?
00:01:29 Vaanie
I don't know. I feel a little bit lukewarm about it.
00:01:33 Charlotte
Yeah, I agree.
00:01:33 Vaanie
I had, I don't know if it's I had high expectations for the show because it meant so much to me growing up and like Melina Marchetta I've read her other book, Saving Francesca, was like, really shaped my teenage angst years.
00:01:52 Charlotte
Yeah. Totally. Yep.
00:01:54 Vaanie
And um, I just felt this was really lacking in angst. I thought it would be more emotionally heavy and I appreciate that it's an adaptation for stage so there may be some differences with the film and the book, but...
00:02:12 Charlotte
And you can't expect it to be the same as the book or the movie because it is inherently different.
00:02:17 Vaanie
Yeah! But for me, I think I felt like, I mean this play especially lent into more of like the humour, that is a little bit in the film, yeah, but like the book’s definitely much heavier and and the film I felt actually it's like it starts out as a bit funny with like the aunties and like the spy network and stuff but then it turns much darker, more serious, a lot quicker.
00:02:45 Charlotte
Yeah, and I think it also gives you a bit more of an insight into Josie’s head and I think that's what I liked so much about the book and that's what I also liked about the film was that it's focus was very clear: we're following Josie, we're following her at school and then Nonna and her mum are just kind of incidental but still very important parts of her life. But that was different here in the play.
00:03:15 Vaanie
Yeah, it felt like they were trying to give them equal weight like the like Nonna, Josie’s mother and Josie, they were trying to give them equal weight, but in the process maybe lost -
00:03:26 Charlotte
Yeah, a bit of that focus.
00:03:30 Vaanie
And you sort of almost didn't get enough of any of them to really buy in, um, so it was quite different to the film and the book, which is OK depending on what you want to go to the theatre for. Like, I think if you're going for a really lighthearted take on kind of a nostalgic classic then maybe you'd really enjoy it. If you wanted something a little heavier, little deeper maybe not so much.
00:03:59 Charlotte
Yeah, although I think, it's it's different from the film and the book in the sense that yeah, you're right, it's - it leans into the comedy aspect of it. Like the Nonnas are very silly on the stage: they're dressed in all black and they've got these funny sort of speed dealer type sunglasses on and they have scarves around their head and they pop out of the curtains and it's very sort of pantomime almost, but in the movie they're very ever present and sort of hanging out of the windows and you can see them on their phones and all that sort of thing. So it's a different vibe.
00:04:36 Charlotte
And the same with this sort of, I think that kind of leads into the set in a good way, is, obviously a movie being a movie means you can move from different locations very easily and I don't think this play necessarily suffered from being in one place. I'll just, yeah, describe it to you, it's kind of, if you had a wog grandma, like I did, you probably know the carpet that they've got sitting on the ground. It's like grey and floral and a bit ugly, and then they had huge velvet red curtains at the back, and then they had these large sort of white, yeah, crates filled with tomatoes, which is a fantastic image.
00:05:19 Charlotte
Like I said, I remember as soon as we sat down I was like, yeah, cool, yeah, what an interesting thing but then it kind of didn't move on from the tomatoes and I I don't think it added too much?
00:05:32 Vaanie
No, it it actually like some of the scenes felt a bit lost among the tomatoes.
00:05:38 Charlotte
The tomatoes!
00:05:38 Vaanie
Some others like, you know, we're supposed to imagine being at school. We're supposed to imagine being in a kitchen, in a home, we're supposed to imagine being maybe, in a bed or all these different scenes and like, I think once they talked about being at Coogee Beach, I was like, I did not get that.
00:06:00 Charlotte
Like from sitting on Nonna's carpet on the floor.
00:06:03 Vaanie
And it also resulted in, like a lot of the time, the actors sitting on the floor. And it just felt like they were always sitting on the floor and maybe that's partly because of the set, maybe that's partly because you know, we had different heights in the in the cast, different sort of sizes as well shapes and sizes, so trying to manage that in a dynamic way, but it kind of just felt a bit flat, yeah.
00:06:30 Charlotte
Yes, I agree.
00:06:33 Vaanie
But I think broadly the lighting was lovely there was great use of like the entrances and exits at Belvoir, like it's a uniquely shaped stage, is a bit of a like half diamond. But I thought they exited and entered, and you had sort of actors jumping in and out of different characters from most of the actors played more than one character other than Nonna and Josie. Uhm, everyone played sort of multiple characters.
00:07:01 Charlotte
No, Nonna was the nun as well! Yeah!
00:07:03 Vaanie
Oh, there you go! So it’s just Josie really!
00:07:10 Charlotte
Is the one person, the one constant...
00:07:10 Vaanie
Oh, the one character.
00:07:12 Vaanie
Yeah, so.
00:07:13 Vaanie
I think like using those entrances and exits, there were a couple of times where the character that plays Josie’s mum come, kind of like goes through one exit and then all of a sudden like turns up and another exit like, as someone else -
00:07:27 Charlotte
As someone else!
00:07:30 Vaanie
As her friend, yes. And I think she did a really fantastic job. Like, yeah, like she was able to move between like this mother character that was like definitely feeling the weight of motherhood and a strict parent and an older, like, respected figure to then this like friend that was like typical wog like, like you know, always hanging out with the boys, never studying then like gets into medicine.
00:08:03 Charlotte
And she's so bubbly and very funny and loud and -
00:08:08 Vaanie
Lots of punch lines delivered excellently.
00:08:14 Charlotte
And sort of played off Josie well, like, yeah, yeah, the actress who played Josie -
00:08:17 Vaanie
Had a nice chemistry.
00:08:22 Charlotte
- Sort of brought a nice seriousness to the role and I think was very earnest in her portrayal of a teenager. I thought it was funny because I often felt like that as a teenager too, is sort of this “Oh yeah. No, I don't care about all these things that are happening around me.” And that was very well done.
00:08:42 Vaanie
Again, like playing into the humour of the characters and then the male characters I thought were good. So, we had like Josie’s father who's kind of estranged but then reenters her life, Miguel, and then her love interests, which there are two so one is -
00:09:02 Charlotte
Jacob Coote.
00:09:04 Vaanie
Jacob who can forget Jacob from the film?
00:09:06 Charlotte
Jacob Coote!
00:09:08 Vaanie
Like Looking for Alibrandi the film I feel like everyone in my grade daydreamed about him like the ones that liked guys like, it was just like -
00:09:18 Charlotte
And that scene, the scene in the film, you know what I'm talking about?
00:09:22 Vaanie
It's so iconic!
00:09:23 Charlotte
It's so you as a teenager just wanting to have sex with the bad boy or -
00:09:28 Vaanie
I know!
00:09:29 Charlotte
And you didn't even know what sex was!
00:09:31 Vaanie
I yeah, he's got like the wifebeater, like so iconic!
00:09:35 Charlotte
Yeah, yeah.
00:09:38 Vaanie
So unfortunately, they had to compete with that, uh, but yeah. So there's the love interest, Jacob and then there's the the other sort of love interest, but also kind of like best friend character as well, which was played by one of the the female -
00:09:59 Charlotte
Who played Poison Ivy?
00:10:03 Vaanie
Yes, she played two characters.
00:10:03 Charlotte
Another school friend of Josie's, yet, well, not really schoolfriend, more like the bully, the private school bully.
00:10:09 Vaanie
Yeah, like the private school bully.
00:10:13 Vaanie
So yeah, like a really dynamic cast that, like played their roles well I again, I'm sort of like the chemistry between Josie and the love interests wasn't always there for me. I think maybe it's an unfair comparison because like, the film is just, the chemistry in the film is so strong and I remember reading it as well and just feeling that kind of like sensual, like it was sort of the first time I'd really read, um, something like that?
00:10:46 Charlotte
Something like that. And that's hard to do on the stage too, yeah.
00:10:50 Vaanie
Extremely hard, extremely hard, and in a short amount of time we needed to build like the sexual chemistry between 2 characters -
00:10:57 Charlotte
Yes.
00:10:57 Vaanie
Like in a film you've got like a montage thing that shows them like running through the streets and like -
00:11:03 Charlotte
Or going to the arcade or whatever -
00:11:04 Vaanie
Like doing all these things together and like in the book it's like obviously a lot longer that they’re together before those sorts of intimate moments happen. And you know, that could also change with the number of performances I think will come later in the season. And maybe they, that chemistry sort of like comfort and all the character, all the actors are sort of sunk into their roles that could also change. But it wasn't really there for me. I don't know how you felt.
00:11:33 Charlotte
No, I I think it's a thing of expectation maybe, but then also. I think it comes back to that thing that we were saying before of it leant into the comedy like Vidya’s interpretation leans into the comedy so then sometimes the rest of it sort of suffers a little.
00:11:58 Vaanie
Well, the even the sexual moments were comedic and I don't remember that being funny.
00:12:00 Charlotte
Yeah! Funny, I remember that being charged.
00:12:05 Vaanie
I remember like - yes charged is the word! Like just extremely sexually charged, and that was sort of lacking for me.
00:12:11 Charlotte
Oh yeah.
00:12:14 Vaanie
But for me, for standout performances was like Josie’s Mum.
00:12:21 Charlotte
And Nonna? Was brilliant because the stories, their stories are -
00:12:25 Vaanie
Yeah, beautiful.
00:12:28 Charlotte
So well drawn, yeah.
00:12:29 Vaanie
Important and like what's so lovely about Looking for Alibrandi is like it was written such a long time ago and it still holds so much power. And that intergenerational story of like, you know, yeah, this whole idea of a curse that a grandma feels is, you know her fault for something she's done and then that being passed on, you know, that's the very concept of intergenerational trauma that we that we know is like the modern day term now is this sense that you know someone who's done something and held an emotion about it and then that is what has been passed on subconsciously through actions or how we parent. And you know, to see that generationally was always a really profound thing and that's definitely there in this show like I think they've definitely captured that.
00:13:25 Charlotte
Because that's kind of the heart of it I think and yeah, something that's really good about Looking for Alibrandi is that it's it's something so specific that it becomes universal.
00:13:40 Vaanie
And in that sense, timeless too. Because yeah, like, there wasn't too much about this that you would that I thought was like, oh, they've updated it for like 2022 was like, no, this still feels like, it's like it's set in the 90s, but everything still feels relevant.
00:13:50 Charlotte
Yeah, yeah.
00:14:01 Vaanie
Yeah, it's still a little lukewarm for me probably overall. I don't know.
00:14:07 Charlotte
Well, I think that leads us to our sort of final question. This is something that I find really important about theatre is that it makes you feel something, it kind of forces you to feel something. So how did it make you feel?
00:14:24 Vaanie
I I definitely laughed a lot. And there was some like moments in particular where I was like Oh my God, that is so funny, but it's really smart! Like there was some they made like Josie’s father, a lawyer for Clayton Utz. So there were a couple of comments about that I just found really hilarious. And there's some pretty like unique immigrant kind of jokes, which really resonated with me, but I think for me, it didn't quite leave me with the feeling maybe I thought I was going to walk out with.
00:15:04 Vaanie
Like, I don't think it's a play that I'm going to be thinking about this time tomorrow. I think I really enjoyed it. It was a nice night out. Some scenes really dragged for me, like personally like the first half I was getting a little like where is this going?
00:15:24 Vaanie
Yeah, like, like it didn't seem to be moving fast enough for me. Like, I was like, OK, we get it. You're at school like, you have bullies like, we get it. Yeah, but the second-half was much better, I think from a pace perspective and then there was some lovely emotional moments that we delivered very well so.
00:15:42 Charlotte
Yes, yes.
00:15:45 Vaanie
Overall, like, I think it did make me feel like nostalgic, you know, proud that we have such a play or like such a piece of writing, you know, like in Australian theatre and Australian writing history. But also, I wasn't that attached to it.
00:16:05 Charlotte
I agree. Yeah, I I think I feel much the same. There were some moments where I wanted to cry like.
00:16:12 Vaanie
Oh, really?
00:16:13 Charlotte
Yeah, well,
00:16:15 Vaanie
Oh, like you thought you were meant to.
00:16:15 Charlotte
I felt like I could have, but because of whatever reason, you know, I hadn't been built up, built up to that point. Like there's a particular point. In the movie, you know and the book, and something happens.
00:16:31 Vaanie
Yeah -
00:16:31 Charlotte
And the same thing happened in the play, and I just -
00:16:36 Vaanie
I know I didn't either.
00:16:38 Charlotte
Yeah, I didn't feel what I needed to feel in that moment.
00:16:39 Vaanie
Didn’t really hit me.
00:16:43 Charlotte
And that's disappointing, I think. So yeah, nostalgic, definitely and it was a nice night out and I agree with the thing of feeling proud that this is a story we have in our Australian sort of canon. But yeah, I think a little short changed maybe.
00:17:01 Vaanie
Yeah, little short changed.
00:17:02 Charlotte
Yeah, trying to be something that it's not maybe.
00:17:08 Vaanie
I think it's just, it's just not a comedy and I think leaning a little bit too much into that also lost the weight of -
00:17:16 Charlotte
Yeah, what it actually is.
00:17:20 Vaanie
But I still encourage everyone to see it, especially if you're a fan of the book and the movie and assess it for yourself and let us know what you thought!
00:17:31 Charlotte
Be part of the conversation!
00:17:35 Vaanie
Everyone experiences theatre differently and we all bring different things to the theatre, so, we'd love to hear what you think.
00:17:43 Vaanie
Looking for Alibrandi plays at Belvoir St Theatre until the 6th of November, based on the book by Melina Marchetta, adapted by Vidya Rajan, directed by Steven Nicolazzo. The cast includes John Marc Desengano, Ashley Lyons, Chanella Macri, Lucia Mastrantone, Hannah Monson and Jennifer Vuletic.
