WHO’S THE BEST?

Performance collective post is Mish Grigor, Zoe Coombs Marr and Natalie Rose. As a team, they’ve tackled the GFC, the spectre of truly frightening stage-moms, endurance work-outs and more. As part of this year’s Sydney Theatre Company’s Next Stage series, they are turning on each other to find out once and for all: who is the best? Zoe Coombs Marr and Mish Grigor let us into the training room in the lead up to trophy time …

Is there a winner at the end?

Zoe: Well there may be at points, but it’s essentially an unanswerable question, and it’s always changing anyway. We had this joke after we made a few shows together about how awful it would be to put on a show and then turn the lights on at the end and ask the audience: who was the best? Please raise your hand and show us who has been your favourite… It seemed like such an awful thing to do (both for us and the audience) that we decided to make a show out of it.

Mish: We have been trying to figure out ‘who is the best?’ for about a year and half now. In February 2010 we tallied up the results (Zoe was the best) and in January 2011 we tallied them up again (I was the best). It’s always up for grabs. Some criteria are relatively set, like ‘genetics’, but most, like ‘mental health’, have room for movement, depending on circumstance and situation. For instance, Nat did pretty badly in physical skills such as ‘balance’ when she was pregnant. Also, during the show, the audience will be able to vote, so it depends on them as well. They might have all come straight from really intense arguments with their boyfriends, and one of us may have an off night, or a sore throat, or heaps of pimples. It’s all conditional, so, we’ll see.

In case we feel like placing bets on the outcome beforehand, what are all your strengths and weaknesses?

Mish: Well, it is a complicated system, because sometimes you can gain points in one area only to lose them in another. For example, Nat is great at felting (a ‘special skill’) but has no real flair for music (which comes under ‘talent’). Zoe has a real talent for music but her forehead is definitely the worst out of the three of us. I score really well in personality for ‘being different and proud of it’, which, according to our Google search of ‘desirable personality traits’ is number one, but my vegetarianism means that I would do really badly as a contestant on Survivor, so I am really suffering in the category of ‘life skills’.

Zoe: However, the results thus far are still evolving, and there is room for improvement. For example, Mish has made a real effort over the last 12 months to read both Hello! and Who which has meant that her ranking in ‘knowledge of celebrity culture’ (a sub category of ‘intelligence’) has gone up.

What tests do you submit yourself to?

Zoe:  We don’t want to give too much away, but there will be lots of competing going on onstage. But not really in the traditional ‘running race’ sense. The criteria aren’t always defined, for us, or the audience, so it’s as much about working out the competition itself, treading water to keep on top, as it is about competing in it. But in the lead-up there’s been lots of tests, including enneagram tests, narcissism tests, Dolly quizzes, balance tests, wallet throwing tournaments, bank balance comparisons, and an afternoon in our underwear in front of a mirror judging who had the best ankles, thighs, elbows, etc.

Is this a commentary on how competitive the world of independent theatre in Sydney is?

Mish: For us, the show is about trying to be the best when all the tools you have to compete with is your ‘self’, whatever that is. Theatre and acting is a great example of this, because people are working with themselves, their identity, their presence, but that is not all the show is about. It’s about waking up in a Saw 2-style scenario where you wake up knowing only that you have to compete, but there’s no clear context. There are no easy outcomes, no set rules, and no way of gaging your success so far … and yet really, really wanting to win. You just have to make it up as you go along. It’s also about when people are so deeply engaged in competition that they forget why they started competing. So that might be a contestant on The Biggest Loser who eats six cakes in order to gain immunity and stay another week on the compound. Or it might be the corporate climber who spends so much time networking that they forget to do their work.

What is next for post?

Mish: We are going on tour around Australia with this show, which is pretty exciting. We are most pumped about hitting Darwin because we’ve never been there. Well, Zoe has, but not since she was 11. And that was only a stopover on her way to Bali. All she remembers is that it was very hot and she had to buy a pair of green shorts.

Zoe: At the end of the year we want to start research for our next show. It might be about death. Or immortality. Or something else huge and important. We always like a challenge. We think we might call it What Even Is That. But that’s just Mish’s favourite sentence at the moment so it may not stick…

Jun 17-Jul 2, Wharf 2, Sydney Theatre Company, Hickson Rd, Walsh Bay, $25-35, 9250 1777, sydneytheatre.com.au