‘When you are at zero anything can happen. It’s like total possibility.’
Modern suburbia was never meant to be like this. Lisa D’Amour’s Obie Award-Winning play Detroit is a startling, poignant and humorous exercise in subtext and social observation that pinpoints what the American Dream has become in the 21st century.
The play opens with the middle-class Ben and Mary hosting a barbecue to welcome the younger Sharon and Kenny to the neighbourhood. Both couples become acquainted comfortably, discussing niceties and seemingly open about their mutual setbacks: Ben has been laid off from his old bank job and Sharon and Kenny aren’t shy about admitting they met at rehab and have been taking life day-by-day to stay on the wagon. Finding they have much in common, a friendship blossoms, with the men both trying to get back on their feet and the women, both suffocated by the neighbourhood, wanting to escape to nature for a camping trip. When both parties join forces to bring these dreams to life, secrets on both sides surface and consume each of them.
Before you think you’ve guessed the ending all I can say is… no, this isn’t a classically structured tragedy, or at least it isn’t played out that way. D’Amour’s great skill is her contrived handling of the unspoken and her plotting is simple. There is no hysterical “confess all” monologue from anyone in the third act, nor is anyone doomed to live their lives wandering in an Oedipus-like wasteland for eternity, although D’Amour does give her characters a thorough moral cleansing. She allows her story to tell itself, resisting the urge to show off and it is a genuine delight to watch.
Dickson and her talented cast inject a sense of lifted naturalism into the material that never feels overly theatrical or stale, a common trap for most “kitchen sink” dramas of which I wouldn’t classify this. Once the cast found their groove (it took a few scenes the night I saw it before they all finally clicked in), the play ran smoothly with nuances and joy with the ever delightful Brett Cousins and Ngaire Dawn Fair owning their roles with unencumbered aplomb. Sarah Sutherland gives a slightly stilted and play-by-numbers performance as Mary but brings an intelligence to the role not evident in the script and it is the scenes where she is trying to keep up appearances where she really shines.
Dickson’s handling of the material is skilful, showing a natural talent for handling life’s absurd humour, (as evidenced in her production of NSFW also for Red Stitch), and it is showcased nicely here. She carefully avoids melodrama where this play could easily have ended up.
Matt Adey’s detailed, but not overwhelming, set plunges us straight into this play: one typically middle class family trying to stay afloat, complete with patio, sliding door and umbrella, while on the other side of the picket fence, the yard is nothing but dirt, the windows guarded with temporary curtains and that is it. Who the hell would live there? One guesses only those who have no other choice.
Overall, this is a solid production charting the current state of suburban life in its extremes from a talented cast and director married to a fine script. The fact this play is called Detroit is a flag of convenience, this could be anyone’s backyard.
Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5
Detroit
Red Stitch
Director Tanya Dickson
Assistant Director Sam Russo
Set and Lighting Designer Matt Adey
Sound Designer Russell Goldsmith
Costume Designer Jack Grifford
Choreographer Helen Duncan
Stage Manager Elizabeth Downes
28 August – 26 September 9, 2015
