Review: SONS OF VAO at ASB Waterfront Theatre

        YOU CAN BREAK THE CYCLE - LOVE, FORGIVE, LEARN 

What an honour for the audience at the historic first world premiere of a play by a Niuean playwright.  Sons of Vao by Vela Manusaute is a beautifully crafted script which won best play by a Pacifika playwright at the 2021 Adam New Zealand play awards.  Sons of Vao explores inherited patterns of masculinity, family violence, displacement, and the long shadow these forces cast across generations. It asks what it takes to unlearn the systems we are raised inside, especially those that leave little room for softness or change. “No tears in our family. As kids, we laugh at our pains. We laugh at our hunger. We laugh ourselves to sleep.”

Skillfully brought to life by a creative powerhouse team led by co-directors Anapela Polata’ivao and Vela Manusaute, the story is enacted with vivid truth, powerful passion and superb physicality by Beulah Koale (Samoa: Sala’ilua, A’ele. Tuvalu: Nanumea) as Vao, with Haanz Fa’avae-Jackson (Tonga: Ma'ufanga, Tongatapu & Tauga, Vava'u, Samoa: Satalo, Falealili & Moaka’a, Niue: Alofi, Mutalau, Hakupu), Epine Bob Savea (Samoa: Salelesi, Safotu) and Brett Taefu (Samoa: Tagunamanono, Salamumu).  
 

Each and everyone in the audience was moved by what is essentially a son’s love letter to his father.The play is based on the vital necessity of releasing the past and is the reflection of looking back and looking forward. The opening moments are immediately compelling.  Not only does the physicality of movement capture us, but the wave of the white hints at the play’s themes of renewal, and love. Spanning four decades, the play follows three brothers (To, Seki and Sau)  in Niue : “We are the village kids … our life is simple. Broken window. No door. Our food is simple. Taro, fish, drinking coconuts.”

The story is anchored in the violent reign of their father - a plantation man with a machete in hand, a belt to be beat them with, a drinker (the missionaries taught us how to make homebrew), a fighter, the village champion. “ Who’s the man?”  Beulah Koale is Vao, funny, handsome, and charismatic, but when anger comes, “he is a monster.”  Beatings are a part of the upbringing. “We must love our father.” The rule is simple: break his laws, and he breaks you.

Migration to NZ and the suburbs of Ponsonby, and cultural change shape their world. There’s a magic initially in the new world which smells new and where everybody has a smile. But soon the boys find themselves with a “witch grandmother and a fat aunt.”  There’s so much raw reality (and reminders) in the world presented to us, where coconut oil is replaced by sunlight soap, and where the parents never went to meet the teachers, where the hungry kids take the milk money to feed themselves. Sau (Brett Taefu) remains fixated by the movies, a world full of promises and dreams he desires but will never attain. When their mother finally finds the courage to leave their father after a lifetime of beatings, the boys are distraught. It was clear, however, that the audience were proud of the women who did leave their violent husbands.

Vao becomes even more demanding and violent. “Never trust anyone” he tells them. He demands for “smokes and beer” whilst also commanding obedience from his now grown sons. Handsome Seki, (Epine Bob Savea), the most like his father,  is adopting the violent ways and emulating his values. The raw tension when To (Haanz Fa’avae-Jackson) confronts his father for the first time is palpable. “The real man’s words are when he’s drunk.”  As the sons grow into men, raised in a world shaped by trauma and violence, Manusaute suggests, love, eventually, can bring healing. It’s a long road but the cycle of violence has to be broken. The past does not disappear but it can come to be understood and overcome. To tells us that “we knew how to fight, We grew up angry men, not knowing love. We didn’t want to give in to love”. To finds love – “she found me and I let her into my life.”  He learned how to love because it is the way of healing, the way of forgiveness.

Quite simply, beautifully executed by outstanding performers, the storyline of reconnection to your roots and reconciliation is well captured. At times poignant, emotionally confronting and raw, at times witty, always authentic and honest, the story is imbued with love. Get along to see it. You will not be disappointed. This is a story for all Aotearoa.

To ensure accessibility for all audiences, $20 tickets are available for Relaxed, NZSL-interpreted and Audio Described performances. 30 tickets for under-30s, supported by Europcar. 

Advisory: Contains strong language and themes of family violence.