Theatre Review: The Architect

At the Sumner Theatre until 31 October.

5 Stars.

I rarely give standing ovations. When I mean rare, here are a few of the performances which have got me to my feet at the end of the show that I can remember:

• Cat on a Hot Tin Roof  with Brendan Fraser, Ned Beatty and Frances O'Connor in London around 2001.
• Richard III at the MTC with Ewan Leslie in the title role in around 2012.
• Derek Jacobi as Uncle Vanya - sometime in the late 90s
• Richard Flanagan's keynote speech for the Melbourne Writer's Festival in 2016 (and I'm still not worthy.)
• Jane Eyre by Altered States at the Melbourne Festival in 2000.
• The Bell Shakespeare's Henry V in 2015.

And that is about it.

Last night, both Jay and I got to our feet and stayed there through four curtain calls.

The Architect is one of the best things the Melbourne Theatre Company has produced in the last five years. Hands down. 

Aiden Fennessy, the playwright behind What Rhymes with Cars and Girls, has written a marvelous exposition of life, and death. This play has a bit of everything. First up, it is very, very funny in places. 

On the way into the theatre, I asked Jay if she knew what the play was about. She didn't. We looked at the poster. "This play has themes of euthanasia." Joy. This will be fun.

What followed was two and a half  hours of the most honest, disarming, hilarious and affecting theatre this country has produced in years.

A potted plot. Helen (Linda Cropper) is dying. Her partner, John (Nicholas Bell) is going away on a short overseas trip and he tries to arrange a live in assistant to ensure Helen's welfare while he is away. In walks Lenny (Johnny Carr) and itinerant odd-jobs man with a heart of gold and "What you see is what you get" air, who comes into Helen's life at just the right time.

I won't say anything else about the plot. You know Helen is dying - that's apparent from the first five minutes of the play. You know that nobody is coping. And you are forever wondering what is going on - which is half of the joy of this play.You're kept on the edge of your seat for most of the play, wondering just how this matching of opposites will play out - that is when you're not laughing with delight by some of the best one liners and situational humour that Melbourne has seen in ages (a joke about fitted sheets comes to mind).

What really stuck for me is the performances. Linda Cropper is superlative as Helen - an obviously intelligent woman coming to terms with her fate. Nicholas Bell is perfect has her worried, harried husband, looking to take a short break before the inevitable happens. For me, it was Johnny Carr's Lenny who stole the show, taking a joyous larrikin energy and mixing it with empathy and pathos. Stephen Phillips has a smaller part as Helen's son, Jeremy, who comes along to throw a very large spanner in the works.

The other major character is a can of Cabot's deck oil. I can say no more about this.

Seriously, there are two weeks to run on this. Do yourself a favour and find a ticket to this amazing play. I have not seen better in Australian theatres in many years.