{"id":67137,"date":"2023-09-04T02:03:49","date_gmt":"2023-09-04T02:03:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celeband.com\/?p=67137"},"modified":"2023-09-04T02:03:49","modified_gmt":"2023-09-04T02:03:49","slug":"a-love-letter-to-the-theatre-that-also-shows-its-dark-side","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celeband.com\/lifestyle\/a-love-letter-to-the-theatre-that-also-shows-its-dark-side\/","title":{"rendered":"A love letter to the theatre that also shows its dark side"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Before Allee Richards was an author and theatre lighting technician, she was a dancer. Her love for it stemmed from a callisthenics class she attended at the age of eight, when she was invited by her best friend. \u201cI remember coming home and being like, \u2018I have to do this\u2019. I just was completely intoxicated by it,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

A year later, callisthenics turned into regular ballet classes. Richards acknowledges with a laugh that the fundamentals of ballet can be \u201cboring\u201d to learn: \u201cObviously, the most enjoyable part about it for me was the costumes and the theatre and everything.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Author and theatre lighting techncian Allee Richards has had plays produced at La Mama Theatre in Melbourne.<\/span>Credit: <\/span>Jason South<\/cite><\/p>\n

Ballet was Richards\u2019 first taste of being on stage, and she was hooked. When she got to high school, she performed in school musicals, as an actor or in the dance troupe: Fame<\/i>, Cabaret,<\/i> Jesus Christ Superstar<\/i>, Grease<\/i>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was an incredibly embarrassed and self-conscious kid. I was always worried that everyone at school hated me or that I wasn\u2019t cool,\u201d Richards says. \u201cBut then when I was on stage for the school musical, I would be right out the front with the big face and doing the jazz hands and all of it. I don\u2019t know how I would have survived high school if it hadn\u2019t been for that.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

A Light in the Dark is Melbourne writer Allee Richards\u2019 second novel.<\/span>Credit: <\/span>Hachette<\/cite><\/p>\n

An appreciation for the wonder and potential of youth theatre runs through Richards\u2019 second novel, A Light in the Dark<\/i>.<\/p>\n

The book follows Iris, a misfit teenager who lives for her annual school musical and craves the attention and admiration of her unnamed drama teacher. She grows up to become a lightning technician, like her author, but struggles with grief and addiction. When she finds out that her drama teacher had an affair with another student when they were at school, she begins to re-examine her memories of the time.<\/p>\n

The book is redolent of issues facing the Australian theatre industry, including sexual harassment and assault. A 2017 survey by the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance found that between 40 and 60 per cent of performers had experienced sexual harassment in the workplace.<\/p>\n

In the wake of the #MeToo movement, the industry committed to change, including the implementation of a code of conduct governing sexual harassment and bullying, and the establishment of intimacy guidelines. The federal government\u2019s Creative Workplaces body, announced as part of the National Cultural Policy, was also created earlier this year to ensure that organisations meet minimum workplace safety standards.<\/p>\n

Richards knows the issues facing the industry intimately, having worked in theatre in Melbourne over the past decade \u2013 as a playwright (her plays have been produced at La Mama), usher, stage doorkeeper and lighting technician.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is this really dark side of the industry that I wanted to expose and grapple with,\u201d she says, citing a 2016 Victoria University study that found higher than average levels of substance abuse, suicide and mental illness in the performing arts.<\/p>\n

She recalls her anger about comments made by legal professionals during the defamation trials undertaken by Geoffrey Rush and Craig McLachlan.<\/p>\n

One was a statement by the judge during the Rush trial, Justice Michael Wigney: \u201cI wouldn\u2019t say \u2018yummy\u2019 or \u2018scrumptious\u2019 to anybody in my workplace but I\u2019m a boring lawyer, and Mr Rush is an actor in a theatrical workplace where people use florid language.\u201d<\/p>\n

Richards explains that she felt \u201cwhite-hot with rage\u201d hearing those words. \u201cThere are so many things that aren\u2019t normal about our job, that are so joyful and so fun and so beautiful, and it\u2019s like that\u2019s being weaponised to excuse [inappropriate language].\u201d<\/p>\n

In his judgment, Justice Wigney ultimately said the appropriateness or otherwise of using that kind of language depended on the context of the workplace and relationship in which it was used.<\/p>\n

\u2018I do think that I regret it and I should have pursued it.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really hard giving up all your weekends and your evenings, and getting disconnected from your family and friends, and working on New Year\u2019s Eve and over the Christmas holidays, so you need the joy to make it worth it,\u201d says Richards.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not the first time the author has drawn upon her life in theatre in her writing. Small Joys of Real Life<\/i>, her first novel, is about Eva, a successful actor who gets pregnant after a one-night stand and decides to quit her job and have the baby.<\/p>\n

\u201c[She] hates the industry and says a lot of negative things about the monotony and the annoyance of having to perform the same show all the time,\u201d Richards says.<\/p>\n

A Light in the Dark<\/i> is then a kind of course correction. \u201cI had to redeem myself and write everything that I love about theatre,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

It was something Richards was thinking about a lot when she was writing the book over the course of the pandemic, when theatres closed: \u201cI was really missing work and yearning and romanticising [it].\u201d<\/p>\n

But while she missed being in the theatre, she never considered going back on stage as an actor. After she finished school, she says she lacked the confidence to admit that she wanted to pursue acting. \u201cI do think that I regret it and I should have pursued it,\u201d she says. \u201cI also pull myself up on that, and I\u2019m like, \u2018Well, if you really wanted to do it enough, you would have\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

Richards points out that writers can develop their craft in private, while actors can\u2019t, and that rejection for an actor feels more personal than receiving a negative book review.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt hurts, but it\u2019s a rejection of the work,\u201d she says. \u201cIf you\u2019re an actor, that rejection is so much more about you \u2026 I don\u2019t know if I actually would have been able to do it [be an actor]. You can fail a lot more privately as a writer.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Light in the Dark<\/i> is anything but a failure. It\u2019s a love letter to the theatre, even as it simultaneously shines a light on its issues. \u201cI really hope it\u2019s embraced by theatre nerds,\u201d says Richards. \u201cThe theatre, drama groups of the country, they\u2019re my people.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Light in the Dark<\/i><\/b> is published by Hachette at $32.99<\/b><\/p>\n

The Booklist is a weekly newsletter for book lovers from books editor Jason Steger. <\/i><\/b>Get it delivered every Friday<\/i><\/b>.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

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