Alysha Herrmann. Somebody’s Lounge Room. 16 Feb 2016
Production creator Alysha Herrmann partly sums up Another Elusive Maybe as being about “loneliness, and love and community and how we don’t ask for help.” It is that, yet so much more.
A little community is created in the intimate lounge room of an urban Adelaide home where an experience is created and shared, rather than a production observed. The room features ceiling high windows looking out on the street. A cosy three seater lounge and chairs bestride wood floorboards. On the floor, are three little white clouds with cute faces on them, a white rug with a table next to it and opposite, a box with a guitar on it. Herrmann is garbed in a pink robe, top and pink hair band with white flowers and pyjamas.
Her program notes suggest Herrmann offers nothing remotely associated with the darker edges of loneliness, or stoic desperation of refusing to seek help, as to appear strong.
Herrmann’s exploration of loneliness and love springs from the experience of early motherhood; all the joys, mystery, doubt and angst of that experience. Herrmann and Soundscape artist Ryan Morrison ply the audience’s ears via Bluetooth Silent Safari headphones with a delicious stream of poetry, conversations and sounds. Offered in a light, cloud soft dreamy style the difficult experiences and feelings prompted by motherhood and more take on a fairy tale like air.
Here lies the work’s great magic. Herrmann teases out a blend of fantasy and reality in conversation with audience members. The audience is peaceably seduced aurally, while responding to game like questions, then genuinely warm conversational ones. All of it’s anonymous.
There are so many simple, yet sophisticated layers to this wonderfully human work providing deep food for thought about the issues Herrmann set out to explore and experiment on. You feel comforted by what you hear, because the delivery takes the sting out of the real struggle those words are dealing with, as much as you love the genuine warmth and joy there too. Equally, because of this, you feel at ease anonymously having a frank and honest discussion about some deep things. You are in a comforting place known to most, a lounge room. This one was deeply comforting, using only two lights for atmosphere up facing front and back of the room.
You might feel you’ve spent years being close to this mother who sat before you. Yet you never directly expose yourself to her emotionally. This experience sharply prompts a reassessment of what it means to be brave enough to say things out loud, to seek an honest place, non judgemental, in which you can let it all hang out. You are a small community in that lounge room. You are personally disconnected. Yet you feel safe.
The sold out season is no reason to fear you will not get to experience something highly recommended. Email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and invite this experience to your lounge room.
David O’Brien
When: 16 & 23 Feb & 8 March
Where: Somebody’s Lounge Room
Bookings: Sold Out
