Bakehouse Theatre
James Johnson's The Audition is about the audition from hell, the ultimate audition which plays on the theory of the actor as a blank canvas.
It is a ferocious two-hander which pushes the actors to extremes but, of course, is quite the showcase for the talented upcoming performer, being both a challenge of intensive dialogue and a playground of veering emotions.
It describes Lauren, an aspiring actress who attends an audition for an unidentified play. Stella is the steely director who seeks to put her applicant through not only all the tricks in the acting book but also all the games of psychological confrontation. Lauren already has a few vulnerabilities, scarred by the ugly volatility of her parents' relationship, for instance. Stella presses her emotional buttons and then some of the most primal of human insecurities as she exerts all the mighty power and mystery of the director and, beyond that, a strange calculated sadism.
It is not a play which speaks well of directors. Then again, it is really a fairly ridiculous play. It is an exercise in dramatic theory and virtuosity. The dense script calls upon lots of shouting and weeping, sex, violence, drugs and absolutely no humour or even irony.
But director John Hartog has picked a couple of very capable actors to engage in all the sturm und drang. Clare Mansfield reaches into the realms of desperate overplay as the aspiring actress Lauren, giving her all the cornball histrionics which would ensure that she will never get the role. From the silliest formal self-written audition piece right through to the writhing cot case, she delivers it as breathtakingly stereotyped. It is exhausting simply watching her.
Krystal Brock's character of Stella is a counterpoint of steely restraint. Brock nails it nicely. Passive aggressive manipulative cruelty is her game and she imbues the role with graceful sangfroid.
Hartog's design is rather effective, The Bakehouse's black stage is opened to the back wall where ladders and scrims rest in the spirit of a dark theatre. Centre stage is a blackboard, oh so symbolic, where names are written and erased. Then there is the director's table and chair and an isolated chair for the vulnerable actor.
Lighting and sound by Stephen Dean and Matthew Chapman are apt and effective - and, indeed, all round it is a highly proficient production of an annoying play.
Samela Harris
When: 17 Sep to 3 Oct
Where: Bakehouse Theatre
Bookings: bakehousetheatre.com
