Lifespan of a Fact – REVIEW
Image: Sigrid Thornton in Lifespan of a Fact. Photo - Prudence Upton
The popular adage “never let the truth get in the way of a good story” is at the centre of a contentious war of words in this engrossing one-act play by Sydney Theatre Company. Based on a book by the same name, the plot pits ethical integrity against poetic licence, trying to find the right balance between journalism and art.
It’s the real-life story about an essay, “What Happens There” written by John D’Agata, describing a teen suicide in Las Vegas in 2002 and D’Agata’s ruminations around it. Though the essay was commissioned and completed in 2003, it wasn’t published until 2010, and not by the magazine that originally commissioned it. The final edited version was ruthlessly fact-checked by a writing intern, Jim Fingal.
It doesn’t sound like a compelling premise for a book, much less a stage play, yet it successfully became both. Jeremy Kareken and David Murrell and Gordon Farrell adapted it in 2018.
The play’s plot features fictional magazine editor, Emily Penrose (Sigrid Thornton in her STC debut) who has received the commissioned essay from John D’Agata (Gareth Davies) and assigns an intern, Jim (Charles Wu) to do what she believes will be a routine fact-check before it goes to publication.
Jim, alas, becomes obsessive, getting into the minutiae of the essay, investigating every factoid. He and D’Agata are at loggerheads about how much compromise is acceptable for the sake of a better reading experience – D’Agata is very elastic while Jim is as rigid as a red pen. Penrose is midway between them, torn by her love of D’Agata’s eloquence and the threat of reprisal from readers, lawyers or interested parties.
The three actors have a wonderful rapport, exchanging rapid-fire banter and being wholly aware of their designated stances in the play. They each have a particular chemistry with each other when paired and when all three are in a scene.
The stage design is elegant and clever with an especially impressive opening scene in which elements of the set descend individually from above eventually creating the New York office of Penrose. The edges of the set are a few metres short of the wings on either side, and when an actor leaves a scene they are still visible. It’s very meta – a visual depiction of the boundary between fiction and reality.
Also worthy of note is the music and sound design by composer Maria Alfonsine, whose live clarinet interludes imbue the ambience with a distinctive New York jazz flavour.
This is a play for those who enjoy intellectual debate, social critique, and good writing.
Until October 22
Roslyn Packer Theatre, 22 Hickson Rd, Walsh Bay
