Blue Love. Directed, written, designed and choreographed by Shaun Parker. Original direction by Shaun Parker and Jo Stone. The Playhouse. Canberra Theatre Centre. Until August 17. Bookings: canberratheatrecentre.com.au or phone 6275 2700
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Free beer and popcorn should be enough to entice a Canberra audience to sit back and enjoy Shaun Parker's wickedly satirical jibe at the flaws and fortunes of love in his latest work, Blue Love. With the audience warmed up and eager to be entertained, Parker and his partner in satire, Lucia Mastrantone, coax the audience to enter their brightly lit Love Arena of theatre, film, dance and physical theatre as they travel through the many aspects of love. In Act One of their 60-minute performance, Glenn Flune (Parker) meets and falls in love with Rhonda (Mastrantone). They marry and Act Two sees the relationship develop through the many stages of courtship, marriage, career, children and the inevitable cliche of an affair and the breakdown of the relationship. Love is a battlefield and Act Three concludes with an ingenious spoken medley of snatches of pop songs from KISS to Gaynor and from McCartney and Lennon to Carly Simon. With a farewell smile they slip away through the bedroom door with a word to the applauding audience to "love the one you're with".
Combining film footage with dance, song and agile physical theatre, Parker and Mastrantone play out their tongue-in-cheek account of love's trajectory through the romantic, the fraught, the disillusioned and the argumentative. Imagination and mockery combine in expertly choreographed routines and images. Highlights include a film sequence of a nonchalant synchronised swimming sequence while smoking a cigarette, Flune's falsetto aria to affirm devoted love, and a discreetly placed bunch of grapes, while striking a classic statuesque pose before the semi-naked Rhonda. Skill, stamina and comic timing delight in a rag doll sequence, reminiscent of Donald O'Connor's routine in Singin' in the Rain.
Parker and Mastrantone revel in their originality and sources of inspiration. Their flippant, frivolous parody of the depiction of love, stereotype and cliche in art, film, dance and theatre is infused with an infectious sense of fun. Love may be a battlefield but the audience revelled in the contest, and delighted in an evening of sheer entertainment. Blue Love has been a bright inclusion in this year's Canberra Theatre Season.
