Mother May We – REVIEW
Image: Mel Ree in Mother May We. Image: Griffin Theatre Co, supplied
By GUY JAMES WHITWORTH
You may already be familiar with Mel Ree from her work running and hosting the monthly poetry night, Revolution Renegade formerly at The Giant Dwarf and more recently at The Eternity Playhouse. Knowing this may explain how Ms Ree prowls the stage at The Griffin Theatre with such remarkable coolness, self-knowledge and confidence.
That said, any ticketholder could wander into this one-woman show knowing absolutely nothing at all about the star and leave sixty-five minutes later understanding exactly, who she is, why she is and how she is. The show is as unflinchingly honest as it is thought-provoking.
It sounds like such an easy exercise to write a straightforward, honest autobiography, but anyone who has tried it will appreciate the pain of honest self-reflection, and how the truthful depiction of one’s own failings can create a muddle of introspective meanderings. However, no such muddles exist on this stage.
The narrative here could not be clearer or braver. As fierce as she is brilliant, Mel Ree inhabits the dialogue of her own life. Through poetry, spoken word and even dance, she forms a show, that, although certainly brutal in parts, offers an understanding of what it is like to be a single, creative, strong woman of colour existing in modern day Australia.
It’s a cliché to say “we are more alike than we are different,” yet this middle-aged male reviewer who grew up in the North East of England was left contemplating that exact cliché when leaving this show.
Unlike Mel Ree, I have no connection to the Pacific Islands, I rarely have conversations with sisters over the partitions of club bathrooms and I have never experienced racial profiling by police; yet this show connected with me on so many levels and indeed, left me considering who, why and how I am.
Quite simply, this show is not to be missed.
