Great Island

Great Island is a blissful escape from the grit of intellectual theatre and simultaneously hyper-intellectual. Great Island is an escape from the real and an introduction to its essence. Great Island is thoughtless and thought-provoking. Far more importantly, though, Great Island is a bit of fun dressed up in a Hawaiian suit and sunnies.

Pierce Wilcox and his cast have devised a lighthearted response to Pierre de Marivaux's 1725 farce,The Island Of Slaves. An experiment observing human nature based on the relationship between slaves and masters and their inversion plays out over a delightful 60 minutes. A backdrop of clouds and a stage populated with inflatable marine life remove the audience from any semblance of realism and invite them instead on a getaway.

Rob Johnson and Harrison Milas offer a relationship that was wrought for farce. Their work together on the Sydney improv scene resounds continually throughout the show. Eleni Schumacher and Anna Chase create a truly baffling physical opposition that heightens the island's ludicrous insights. Nicholas Starte is the fifth element, astute, somewhat sadistic and entirely unaware of his own failings. Together they're entirely various and strange. While its exaggeration is definitely jolting, it's a risk that bolsters the piece.

The space is tiny, the characters huge and an entire world is presented in an off-handed manner. On an island where everything is topsy turvy, nothing is out of place. Wilcox's Great Island asks poignant questions while pulling its own finger, and it smells… fresh.