Midsummer

(Sydney Theatre Company)

The Sydney Theatre Company is staging the Traverse Theatre Company of Edinburgh's production Midsummer described as a play with songs. A couple meet in a bar on the Friday of the Midsummer weekend and what starts out as a one night stand turns into a weekend of mayhem.

It is interesting to compare and contrast this stage work with the recent film Weekend.

In Weekend two gay men meet in a bar on a Friday evening and then spend the weekend together discovering their public and private selves. By the end of the weekend they face decisions about their future as a couple. The film is mostly serious and dark.

In Midsummer a straight woman meets a straight man in a bar on a Friday evening and one way or another they spend most of the weekend together discovering themselves at the end of which they face decisions about their future as a couple. The play is mostly breezy and light hearted but with serious tinges.

I'm not certain whether this is a play in the traditional sense. It seems to me more like an entertainment with the two characters referring to each other regularly in the third person as they describe what happens to themselves over the weekend.

Cora Bissett and Matthew Pidgeon play the couple. They are a likeable pair who present a very realistic portrayal of a sexual encounter which morphs into a tentative relationship. Between them they portray a range of other characters as well with the twist that Bissett's other characters are almost all male.

A slightly unusual work which felt to me like the product of linked Fringe or Festival type skits but the program notes indicate it's genesis from the outset was a musical with indie music.

I really enjoyed Midsummer and the audience at last night's performance gave it a rousing reception at final curtain.