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Queensland Theatre Company’s Grounded is a compelling delivery of George Brant’s one-act, one-woman play. First performed in 2013, it’s a contemporary play that explores the rift that can occur between a person’s humanity and the realities of war, while touching on the themes of domestic life and being a working mother.
The play begins by introducing us to our pilot, a salty and strong-headed woman from Wyoming, who worked her way up the ranks to become a decorated pilot. She meets a man at a bar who isn’t intimidated by her profession; as things happen they fall in love and marry. The first turning point occurs when she finds herself pregnant, and subsequently has to take a desk job. How will she adjust from the action and excitement of the blue skies to a life seated in front of a colourless screen? Her new appointment as a drone operator turns out to be more exciting than she anticipated. Her machine is an expensive, state-of-art model with more capabilities than her previous aircraft. Although there’s hours of monotonous drudgery, with it comes the triumph of successfully executing a strike.
Life working for the army is a world away from her domestic life as a mother and wife, one which she finds herself at odds with. It becomes a reminder of her humanity that’s too immediate following a day’s work in which the goal is ultimately to kill. The destructive nature of her work slowly chips away at her sanity, evident in the defensive rationalisations she makes to justify it. This will later be revealed to have been apparent to everyone except herself, including her husband who futilely suggests they seek counselling.
The characterisation is convincing, owing both to a script rich in subtext and finely tuned acting from Libby Munro who embodies the pilot with each mannerism and a convincing rural American accent. Similarly real is the world created by just a monologue, and one which is limited to the vernacular of a pilot with working class sensibilities. We see it – her daughter, the grey on her screens, the Las Vegas dessert as she makes the drive between the military base and suburbia. At parts it is gripping; the pilot’s exultation after she makes her first drone strike is remniscent of Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now.
The staging is minimal, with no use of special effects or props aside from the pilot’s US Air Force suit. The lighting and sound design that is used is used well. Although this play doesn’t need it, it may be bolstered by a set up that’s marginally more elaborate – just enough to hint at this high-tech world where nations can be brought down from a glorified computer desk half the world away.
Grounded is showing at The Greenhouse until 22 August. Tickets are available on the Queensland Theatre Company website.
