THEATRE: DESIREE DIN & THE RED FOREST

Youngest in the family, Desiree Din feels overlooked and unappreciated. A fight with her brother, sister, and mother causes Desiree to retreat into the radioactive Red Forest where she meets some bizarre characters, all seeking her help to save them from the poisonous ‘bad air’. But Desiree’s family needs her and the longer she stays in the Red Forest, the more they start to disappear from view. Playwright Maxine Mellor wrote Desiree Din as part of the Australian Theatre for Young People’s Fresh Ink playwrights’ initiative, and is also three-time winner of Queensland Theatre Company’s Young Playwrights’ Award and the George Landen Dann Award, and here she has created a wondrous parallel universe. The set is amazing, the
production is skillfully directed by Fraser Corfield, and the cast is full of freah young faces from the atyp. It’s a little bit of a Where The Wild Things Are adventure of discovery and there are some scary bits, although the story peters out towards the end. But the rich overlapping of the real and fantasy worlds of Desiree Din and The Red Forest captured the imagination of my nine-year-old and it was all he could talk about for the rest of the evening.

Until Dec 4, Studio 1, The Wharf, Pier 4/5, Hickson Rd, Walsh Bay, $15-20, 9270 2400, atyp.com.au