Review Roundup: Australian Tour of 1984
By: Alan Henry Jun. 01, 2017
George Orwell's seminal novel 1984 is suddenly more relevant than ever and, in a stroke of synchronicity, the casting for the Australian tour of the West End smash hit production has been announced on the same day that a Broadway season of the production has been confirmed. These announcements come as sales of Orwell's book surge in the days since President Donald Trump took office in the US, with his office coining the phrase "alternative facts".
Let's see what the critics had to say!
The Australian (Meredith Booth): Icke and Macmillan's interpretation, seen by Melbourne Festival audiences in 2015, shows Winston's mind slipping between his reality and a horrific alternative where he cannot tell if he exists in the oppressive world of 1984 or in the world of those who read his journal a century later.
In Daily (Bension Sieber): A barely-audible mosquito-pitch tone is the unsettling warning of what's to come. In stilted crescendo - punctuated by very, very loud white noise, or a piercing gunshot - the action climbs from drab mediocrity to utter horror. The setting is physically torn apart in an explosion of heavily armed police, flashing lights and deafening sound to reveal a vast expanse of nothingness. Massive walls descend, shrinking Winston to miniature.
The Guardian (Kate Hennessy): Icke and Macmillan have come to Australia to direct a local cast, aided by Australian associate director, Cory McMahon. The production is noisy and novel, with inventive multimedia flourishes. But the adaptation isn't able to surmount three key challenges presented by Orwell's book - and this particular staging brings its own specific flaws as well.
BroadwayWorld (Benny Lenny): The three central characters, Winston Smith, O'Brien, and Julia, are played respectively by Tom Conroy, Terence Crawford, and Ursula Mills. Conroy, who is on stage from start to finish, gives a performance that is a tour de force, a term that I seldom use as it is so rarely warranted. In this case, it is extremely well-deserved. Many very quiet theatregoers left the auditorium, the power and darkness of the play and the authenticity of Conway's Winston throwing them into a stunned silence. There were grave expressions on the majority of faces, so moved were patrons both by the production and, no doubt, by recognition of Orwell's vision in our current world.
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