Review: UFO is a chance to watch the magic happen
Written by Kirby Medway, directed by Solomon Thomas
Review by Mitchell Donnan
The audience takes their seats in the Stables theatre and the house lights go down. The projectors burst to life and it’s immediately obvious that this show is unusual: the entire stage is clouded with haze and several diorama platforms covered with fake grass are spread out across the stage.
UFO — written by Kirby Medway, directed by Solomon Thomas, and produced by re:group performance collective – is the first of Griffin Theatre’s Lookout program for 2023, which champions emerging, exceptional, boundary-pushing work. And UFO delivers.
Set in a rural Australian town, the play follows a group of young people who have been recruited to maintain watch over a grounded UFO. Tensions are building as... nothing happens, driving the employees to confront each other about the truth of their presence and of the UFO.
But this is more than just a room full of actors playing their characters. The actors have incredibly detailed 1:8 miniatures of themselves (designed by Miri Badger and Chris Howell) that they move and operate around the diorama set of a golf course and clubhouse – which are equally detailed and realised by Angus Callander. On top of this, they operate two cameras around the space to capture cinema-quality stills, stop motion and video that are projected on the walls behind them. And to top it all off, they’re voicing their characters too.
On a technical level, UFO is an absolute masterpiece. The amount of practice, coordination and choreography that would be required to get all moving parts working together is unbelievable. Stop motion in the most controlled environment is a tough and taxing process, and re:group are doing it live. Voice acting in time with your miniature’s movements while also remembering the framing of the shot and locations of where the model needs to be moved to – these are all things that need to be second nature. Seeing all four actors playing their roles was truly amazing, moving models and set pieces as needed and swapping between cameras and camera operators. If any team is a well-oiled machine, the actors Matt Abotomey, James Harding, Angela Johnston, and Tahlee Leeson are. The integration of sound (designed by Tom Hogan) is equally seamless.
The story and the situation that the characters are dealing with is playing second fiddle to the world that the creators have built to tell the story. It’s something like postdramatic theatre, with the story almost a MacGuffin for the medium to immerse the audience into the experience of the creation of a story. We’re entranced by seeing something new being created on stage, right before our eyes.
Wonderfully captivating and refreshingly innovative, UFO is a theatre experience that is drastically different from anything else you are likely to see this year - in the best way possible.
UFO played at the SBW Stables Theatre from 18 - 29 April 2023. Find more info here.
Images by Lucy Parakhina
Mitchell Donnan is a finance bro with film bro origins. Having dabbled in music, dance, theatre, writing and production — though never too seriously — he has an opinion on everything from floristry to Franz Ferdinand. He is a loving kitten dad to six-month-old Fig who keeps the cockroaches in his Inner West rental at bay.
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