Belleville

Paul Ashcroft and Christina O’Neill. Image by Jodie Hutchinson. 

American playwright Amy Herzog doesn’t disappoint with her new work, Belleville. After the success of last year’s production of 4,000 Miles by Red Stitch, and knowing how highly lauded Herzog is in the States, anticipation has been running high for the Australian premiere of Belleville. Denny Lawrence directs Paul Ashcroft and Christina O’Neill as a young American couple, Zack and Abby, living in Paris, living the good life, at least in theory.

The play opens with Abby coming home early from a yoga class she was meant to teach, but no-one turned up. Zack is meant to be at work and the two startle each other. We don’t buy Zack’s excuses about a half day at work but Abby pretends to. We quickly understand that she refuses to see Zack for who he is, and that the two collude in creating a false image of him and their relationship. Zack is essentially avoidant and manipulative, which makes it even hard for him to be truthful about their lives. Abby’s attempts at honesty are sidelined by Zack’s avoidance tactics. He answers her questions by questioning her perspective; she is vulnerable and has recently come off anti-depressants; and Zack persists in undermining her confidence in herself. It’s an ugly picture of spoilt, neurotic characters in a tangle of manipulation and deceit; they do, however, care for one another but can only see things from their own point of view.

By apparently naming the tensions and the sources of her insecurity, Abby skirts around the deeper issues. She’s jealous and insecure around other women. Zack doesn’t refrain from trashing Abby behind her back to their landlords (nicely portrayed by Tariro Mavondo as Amina and Renaud Momtbrun as Alioune) and is essentially disloyal to her. Neither Abby nor Zack are doing what they came to Paris to do and what looks like a shiny life is anything but.

On top of their emotional problems, it turns out that their rent is in arrears. Zack attempts to emotionally blackmail Alioune into allowing them more latitude, reminding him of their friendship, which is already stretched. At times the play threatens to become melodramatic but pulls away just in time. The sense of claustrophobia in Red Stitch’s production is intense and the pace is tightly held throughout. The dialogue is realistic, excruciating and spiky, and the strongly controlled narrative spirals inevitably downwards to an ultimately tragic resolution.

The play is naturalistic in style and this production employs a set which nicely creates the feel of a tiny Parisian bijou. It would have been nice to understand Mavondo’s ending speech; you know she’s saying something interesting. (Perhaps this could be included in the program notes?)

With complete psychological acuity, playwright Amy Herzog demonstrates her prowess as a writer in this stunning performance by Red Stitch.