Venue: Belvoir St Theatre (Surry Hills NSW), Jan 16 – Feb 2, 2025
Playwright: Declan Furber Gillick
Director: Mark Wilson
Cast: Danny Howard, Mandy McElhinney, Guy Simon, Greg Stone
Images by Stephen Wilson Barker
Theatre review
Having moved to the city, and now starting to put down roots, Jacky is hoping to finally be able to buy his home. Even though he is of Indigenous background living on unceded lands, he accepts that the prevailing system requires a lot of jumping through hoops, before he can be granted approval for a loan. In Declan Furber Gillick’s marvellous play Jacky, we watch as the titular character twists and contorts himself into all manner of awkward and humiliating states, in order that he may feel like he is getting ahead in life.
Jacky strives for success and is willing to compromise endlessly his own integrity to attain his dreams. However, the realities of a colonized existence gradually reveal demands that extend beyond his personal sacrifices. Furber Gillick’s writing makes an exceptionally powerful statement about injustice, through a narrative of normative modernity, contextualising contemporary politics in a way that resonates with all. His work is blisteringly spirited, whilst being consistently witty and entertaining, effortlessly holding our attention as it drives home some of the hardest truths about the foundations of our communal life.
Direction by Mark Wilson is commensurately daring, memorable for pushing the delicious but agonising drama to the edge of our nervous limits. Difficult discussions are presented unvarnished, allowing us to consider these matters of national importance with absolute candour. Although unyieldingly serious, the show is often very funny, filled with ironic humour for an experience nothing less than scintillating.
Design elements of the production are all rendered with efficacious simplicity. The set by Christina Smith delivers logical demarcations of performance space. Emily Barrie’s costumes help create believable personalities from everyday life. Lights by Matt Scott, along with sounds by James Henry, offer uncomplicated solutions that signal movements in time and space.
Leading man Guy Simon sets the tone with restraint and charisma. His minimalist style of presentation is thoroughly mesmerizing, perhaps due to the contrast with the many provocative situations Jacky finds himself in. Simon articulates perfectly the immense complexities involved, when Indigeneity has to navigate structures that are fundamentally about the entrenchment of white supremacy.
Danny Howard plays Jacky’s brother Keith, with wonderful effervescence and disarming depth. An admirably nuanced Mandy McElhinney in the role of Linda confronts the values of our white middle class, asking troubling questions about whether a person can survive the economy, without furthering racist agendas. Greg Stone is fearless as Glen as he demonstrates most convincingly, the extent to which racism can appear so benign yet be so damaging.
Linda and Glen are entirely oblivious to the hurt and harm they cause, in fact they only ever think of themselves as being generous and helpful. We see in them, the familiar intention to do good, followed by a painful observation of devastating results. We are reminded of the famous words from American activist Audre Lorde, that “the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house”. In Jacky it can be seen so clearly, the very real problems that hold us back, and only if we really want to, we can detect the solutions that Jacky provides.
Suzy Goes See 