Elephents

Image by Jamie Breen.

Characters in Tuskville are blessed with the ability to sing the truth that they cannot speak in this end times satirical musical.

Tuskville Zoo is the home of the world’s last four elephents. They are depressed, wonder about the point of their existence in a manufactured artificial environment and watch their eggs for signs of hatching.  Annabelle, a zookeeper, is rocked by the death of Caribou, a male elephent.  While her friends comfort her, Nellie and Roger writing a song to mark the occasion, her contracted partner, Horton, is more concerned with his home renovations. Roger’s younger brother, Manny, also seeks solace with the musical duo, but falls in love with his brother’s contractee. An awkward dinner with the mystical – SINGLE! – Flora backfires, and confusion abounds. Horton’s life of self-serving perfidy unravels and Benjamin the Missionary finally finds his first soul to save. With the end of the world approaching, everyone makes do the best they can with a rousing tune at the end.

Four of the five actors play a combination of human and elephent roles, each demonstrating impressive quick change skills with role changes calling for complete costume switch, including wigs and ears. This in turn makes the rapidly developing script easier to follow, especially as the performance and dialogue contain so many clues suggesting that while some aspects of Tuskville are similar to modern-day Australian life, the fires on the freeways, scorched clothing from being outside and casual use of towels when entering a room are just some of the differences.

Brett Smith plays the ghost of Caribou throughout, his speechless presence dominating musically and grounding some of the more farcical aspects of the satirical sequences. Jeffrey Jay Fowler not only writes the words and music, but, as a performer, occupies the equal but haplessly different Horton and Roger as two strongly conceived types. While the self-absorption of Horton contrasts strongly with Roger’s dreams of musical stardom, Fowler nails the essence of each. Gita Bezard brings Annabelle to grief-stricken life, but also splits sides with her comic relief as Flora, the blind date from hell. Pete Townsend as Manny and Benjamin presents a strong voice that seems made for musical theatre, as well as physical control and comic timing that makes his performances memorable.  While Nellie and Queenie are contrasting roles, Adriane Daff makes them both strong women despite their dissimilar concepts about relationships.

Musically, the diverse range of styles engages attention, with interludes from classic musical cheese to grunge, and the device of using lyrics for hidden thoughts and feelings is effective. While timing and pitch are wonderful across the cast, there are a few patchy moments where vocal quality does not seem up to the challenge of a solo or where it is possible to hear a voice ‘warming up’ through a song – this is likely to improve as the season progresses, as should the balancing of instrumental levels in more raucous routines. The considered set layout allows creative lighting design to enhance proceedings, and the script keeps the separate locations clear. 

While dark issues are addressed  ̶  extinction, social pressure to conform and environmental catastrophe each being confronting topics  ̶  Elephents takes them all on with a jaunty tune and leaves the audience smiling.