Looking Forward, Looking Back

Marcel Dorney, Emily Tomlins and Tim Wotherspoon formed the Elbow Room theatre company after making the move from Brisbane to Melbourne in 2007. Following the outrageous success of their rumination on human destination, After All This, at the 2011 Melbourne Fringe, the group return to this year's Fringe with two shows: Rule Of Three and As We Mean To Go On.

Rule Of Three is, “science fiction, which is sort of about ideas rather than special effects, which works because we're in a theatre,” Dorney says, in the middle of Elbow Room's season at the current Brisbane Festival. “We love British science fiction from the 1970s, like Dr Who, but, like, Seven, as well. Those guys had no money and no sets, so the stories were great, and the acting was really good and the writing was really good.”

Their other show is cosmic in a different sense. As We Mean To Go On is part of the group's existentially themed trilogy, Now More Than Ever, which also includes After All This, Dorney explains. “After All This is concerned with what happens after 'the end', and how we think about that. As We Mean To Go On, on the other hand, is about origins. About how we imagine what the moment was when we became what we are.

“Obviously that's a really shadowy thing. When people talk about the past they talk about darkness and shadow, because there is all this history that stretches back and back and back, and it's up to every human group to pick their time where they say, 'At this point, we turned into us. Before that, we were something else'. So, the show's about how and why groups pick that, and how we want to be and live, and how that changes.”

Dorney apologises for these concepts being difficult to translate from the stage. But it's clear that Elbow Room is intent on resisting any kind of conceited performance rhetoric. “We're not trying to look at a particular style, or a particular genre. What we're trying to do is look at this particular situation, and be honest and up-front. We have found that people really respond to having their attention drawn to the fact that the whole situation of performance is weird. And that's why it's wonderful.”

So the audience's presence is a key component to the show's fabric and meaning, Dorney continues. “It's okay for the audience to not know what's happening at all times. It's fine for them to sometimes go for an extended period of time thinking, 'I don't really know what's happening, but I'm still interested'. And that's the hard part.”

A theme of fascination and inquiry, mutual to the audience and performers, seems integral to Elbow Room's approach. “The prejudices that we have are often due to not having paid attention, or not having asked the right question. You could read all the information in the world, but if you're not looking at it in the right way, it'll make no sense.

“We just want to change the quality and focus of people's attention so that they go, 'Wow, I've never actually thought about that in that way before'.”

WHAT: Rule Of Three and As We Mean To Go On, part of the Melbourne Fringe Festival

WHEN & WHERE: Friday 28 September to Saturday 13 October, Fringe Hub: the Warehouse