A ONE WOMAN SHOW ABOUT CANNIBALISM AND ICECREAM

Written and performed by Lisa Chappell

 

at The Basement, Lower Greys Ave, Auckland

Until 24 Apr 2014

 

Reviewed by Kate Ward-Smythe, 9 Apr 2014

------------------------------------------------------------------

Miss Chappell – what a ride: a hurly-burly, topsy-turvy, roller-coaster-through-a-haunted-house-at-high-speed ride. In terms of the demands on an actor's craft, in the hands of anyone less than brilliant and at the top of their game, this hour-long one-woman play would be too dense and complex for many to navigate. In the hands of Lisa Chappell, this self-penned multi-layered stream of consciousness exposé of the human condition is edgy and intriguing.

 

Regarding Lisa's play, I thought I had it all in check: we meet central character Deirdre – a woman living on her own grieving for her dead cat – then along come Roger and Carl (a couple I wouldn't recommend you have over for dinner), followed by Fred, her imaginary bro-friend; and Caroline, her text-book therapist.

 

One hell of a tale of macabre cannibalism and ice cream unravels, driven by themes such as isolationism, self-deprecation, internal turmoil, mental unrest and demons.

 

However, the arrival of Samantha and a hitherto unmentioned doctor, both in the dying minutes of the play, have me confused and unsure about what the core of the story is. I do know, in retrospect, that the flippant reference to her teacher at the top of the night is more poignant than all the other characters.

 

Director Christopher Stollery and Assistant Director Grae Burton set a cracking pace, with quirky physicality, life-lessons reinforced by body tattoos and reoccurring vocalisations — all of which greatly enhance Lisa's absurdist yet entertaining narrative.

 

The opening scene, as Lisa's central character Deirdre fidgets in the shadows and hovers in the edges of light, is fantastic: a wicked performance with Rainman-like movement. The laugh out loud dialogue, as Deirdre narrates the experience from the audience's perspective, plus a manic energy in Lisa's voice, is pitch-perfect and joyful to watch and listen to.

 

Did I enjoy it? Yes. Am I left slightly confused? Yes. Am I bothered? No. Would I recommend it to enthusiastic lovers of risk-taking mind-expanding theatre? Hell yes, absolutely.

 

Lisa Chappell not only shows once again that she is one of New Zealand's most watchable actors, with one of the most compelling voices heard in The Basement for a long time, she also reveals a playwright's fine intellect and an appetite to write out on a limb.

http://www.theatreview.org.nz/

 

Daughter to the slaughter WORDS: ANDREW FENTON October 15, 2009 11:30PM LISA Chappell spent three years in SA making McLeod's Daughters in some unglamorous locations - and some things seemed all too familiar filming her new horror movie. TRYING TO HAVE a baby can be a stressful business. Just how stressful - and how desperate and anguished a woman can become after continually failing to conceive - gives the edge to Coffin Rock, the new SA- made thriller from Wolf Creek producer David Lightfoot. Former McLeod's Daughters star Lisa Chappell, who plays the lead role of Jess, says she immediately identified with her character's plight. "She was just me, one left turn away," says Chappell. "At the time when I auditioned for it I was turning 40 and thinking: wow - I've missed that boat - which is exactly where Jess is at." Jess's desperate desire for a baby drives a wedge in her relationship with her husband Rob (Robert Taylor) and sends her into the arms of a charming Irishman Evan (Sam Parsonson). She immediately recoils from the affair, but her rejection of Evan makes the young man dangerously unhinged and his obsession with her ends in tragedy. While it's a very effective thriller, Chappell says that grounding it in a credible real-life problem helps elevate the film above its genre roots. Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar. End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar. "I think it has a lot more heart than that and touches on a subject matter that is rarely discussed but is hugely, hugely important," she says. Chappell, who now lives back in New Zealand, conducted her own research into the mental state of women undergoing IVF treatment. "I spoke to one woman who specialises in counselling women who are going through IVF in Christchurch and I said: `Is this over the top, this storyline? The character is a really smart woman, she's educated, she has a great relationship and yet she sleeps with this young guy.' She said: `I'm counselling someone right now who is happily married and going through the same experience.' She said `it makes women crazy."' For her part, Chappell has come to terms with the idea that she may never have a family of her own. "I've had to put that one up into the lap of the gods for a number of years now - and I think the gods might be busy with other things," she says. "I'm OK with it now, but I wasn't before, and that's why I really felt for Jess. But I think you have to come to terms with what you've been given in life, otherwise it's a really difficult ride." Coffin Rock is the brainchild of debut writer/director Rupert Glasson. The former graphic artist says the screenplay began life as a very different beast indeed. "The idea started as very much a monster movie, still about pregnancy, but it was foetuses that eat each other and other people!" he says. "But then when we moved it into the real world it became a lot more interesting to me. I mean, I love monster movies but somehow having it emotionally real was interesting, was exciting." Lightfoot and co-producer Ayisha Davies played a crucial role, encouraging Glasson to develop the idea away from a gory horror movie and into what the director now calls "a relationship thriller with scary bits". Chappell believes Glasson's experience of having a child of his own during the writing process altered the 38-year-old director's perception of the world. "Fatherhood really changed him and he got to thinking: `Well, what if you couldn't have a baby? What would you do then?"' she says. Glasson smiles: "Fortunately, women in these situations have very extreme and heightened responses." Rob Taylor - a staple of television but also well known for films The Matrix and Vertical Limit - plays Chappell's weather-beaten husband. He took pretty much the opposite approach to research as Chappell. "I asked a few blokes and they all seem to run a mile," he says in a gruff voice. "I thought: `that'll do me'. No, I didn't (do much research). I mean what would I learn? He doesn't know anything and he's trying to find stuff out. If I had all that knowledge I'd just be making my job harder." The actor has worked with Lightfoot before on Wolf Creek director Greg McLean's $30 million killer croc pic Rogue. Taylor introduced Lightfoot to Davies, his partner of seven years, and she ended up working with Lightfoot at Ultrafilms. Glasson and Taylor also go "way back" - and the actor says Coffin Rock was born from a desire for "our gang" to make a film. "But the movie hadn't been written so Rupert had to go off and write a script with me in mind," he says. "You'll notice the character is called Rob - that was just the working name to represent me. We just never changed it." He grins. Lightfoot was the critical component in bringing the production to SA. "He never shuts up about Adelaide," says Taylor. "He's the best spruiker for SA. He'd make anything here. He'd make a movie about mountain climbing in the Swiss Alps here." Taylor's joke is actually dead on the money, as later on Lightfoot explains he's already used Mt Lofty to double for a snow-capped peak. Chappell says she was pleased to have the opportunity to make her first feature in SA. She lived here for three years while making 74 episodes of McLeod's Daughters - the high point of her career so far which won her two Logies - including a Silver Logie. "It felt like coming home," she says. "I think it's because I had a break for a while so you can really appreciate what a place has to offer. It was like me coming back to New Zealand to live thinking: I remember all the lovely things about this country now." Filming the low-budget Coffin Rock also put her in mind of the sometimes un-glamorous and difficult location work she experienced on McLeod's Daughters. "It did feel familiar when I was stuck up on a cliff at three in the morning with hardly anything on, going: `Ah yes, I remember this'," she says. The scene she's referring to is one towards the end of the movie where Jess is alone on a cliff top, trying to flag down a motorist while Evan advances on her. Rob is speeding towards the scene in his car. "There were gale force winds that night to the point where Sam (Parsonson) could hold his jacket either side and be picked up and travel two feet in the air and about six feet across!" she says, adding the crew were forced to work from their trucks, and couldn't even rig up lights in case they blew away. With everything and everyone hidden, Chappell was stuck in the cold by herself. "I was just standing alone in the middle of the road for 15 minutes going: `What are they doing? Are they coming? What's happening?' I was so cold I was shaking." But she says what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. "The resilience I learnt doing McLeod's has meant that I went shooting in the bush (for TV series The Cult) in a wet, cold New Zealand winter for four months and I didn't even get a cold," she says. "I feel indestructible now I've done McLeod's." The Cult, which is currently screening in NZ, sounds like an intriguing blend of Lost and Twin Peaks. By all accounts it's one of the biggest and most ambitious series to have been made in NZ. Chappell plays Sophie Macintyre, who is hired to deprogram members of a cult. "She's a very violent woman, a bit of a mercenary and I had to learn how to kick box, handle weapons and shoot guns," she says. "It was quite challenging because I'm a bit of a softy. The first time I had to shoot the gun at someone I burst into tears!" Chappell is also about to make her debut as a playwright, workshopping Don't Hold Your Breath at the Auckland Theatre Company. She'll star in the finished play early next year, which is "about two sisters, Frank Sinatra and a bath!" she laughs. "The tag line is that it takes sibling rivalry to the edge and throws it over." The "over-the-top" play features music and songs and is a long way from the naturalistic acting style of her TV and film work. "I started writing it when I was doing McLeod's and I just felt like playing a really big, over-the-top character because I'd done a lot of TV," she says. "It was an exercise for myself, creating this horrific character to play, and it grew from there." Chappell admits she finds writing difficult and time consuming. "I'm literally writing until four in the morning after rehearsals, trying to get rewrites done," she says. "But it's exciting and a very interesting process to be on the other side of the script." Coffin Rock opens on Thursday.

By Clint Morris

 

Like a Leptospirosis-infested K-9 that’s had on too many drained longnecks thrown at it, Aussie thriller ‘’Coffin Rock’’ is primed to attack - and unlike a lot of similar-themed genre peers (*cough* "Prey" *cough*), it’s actually got the teeth to do it!

With a strong fright-fest bloodline behind-the-camera (Producer David Lightfoot was one of the “Wolf Creek” team; the Visual effects crew worked on such sublime genre efforts as “30 Days of Night” and “Black Water”) and a first-class local cast (Robert Taylor, Lisa Chappell, and Sam Parsonson) in front-of-the-Nikon, “Rock” was always going to entertain. But with a tight, effective and genuinely unnerving script by Rupert Glasson (“Teratoma”), its silver propped up to gold.

Jessie (Chappell) has been unable to conceive a child with her husband (Taylor), despite years of trying. In a desperate and drunken mistake, she sleeps with a young stranger, the mysterious Evan (Sam Parsonson). Determined to prove his paternity, Evan’s intentions soon become borderline-psychotic and the young woman finds herself at the centre of a psychological and brutally physical battle which she must win if she is to survive and have the family she longs for.

Taylor (“Rogue”, “The Matrix”) and Chappell are terrific (especially good to see Taylor playing an Aussie again, having donned a Yankee accent for a couple of high-priced Hollywood blockbusters of late), but its newcomer Sam Parsonson (who some will recognize as Dylan from cable hit “Love My Way”) as the film’s, well, ‘Glenn Close’, that truly impresses. Not only does the young actor mercifully master a believable Irish accent for the film, but he truly immerses himself in the role of the rickety, latently-schizophrenic desperado. It’s a very believable and frightening performance from Parsonson – one that’ll ultimately get him noticed by the higher powers. His turn makes up a good section of the glue that holds the thing together. The real star of the show though may be writer/director Rupert Glasson, who’s come up with a very entertaining, and very tense thriller that’ll make you think twice about dipping your pen in another’s ink.

It’s not exactly brimming with fresh plot, but Glasson’s deft hand makes you feel like it is. And there are moments in the film that won’t just have you on the edge of your seat (the ‘Joey’ scene; the ‘Handbrake’ scene; the ‘Phone-Bashing’ scene) but likely see you getting to know your pillow a whole lot better. In some respects, it’s an even more frightening film than “Wolf Creek”.

Okay yes, “Coffin Rock” is flawed, and of course you can pick holes in the script, but if you’re prepared to switch off, go with it, and just enjoy the ride… you’ll be treated to what’s possibly the most unnerving Australian thriller since ‘’Dead Calm’’.

 

Source: Moviehole

 

Coffin Rock

 

COFFIN Rock is a new Australian film that seems uncertain as to what it wants to be.

It's being marketed as a horror thriller, but only near the end does it tilt in that direction, and that's when it's least successful. Evocatively filmed near Cape Jaffa and Thompson Beach in South Australia, the film mainly deals with the problems of a couple who are trying, without success, to have a child.

The establishing scenes strongly convey this small community in winter; the fishermen at work, the retail establishments that service them, and the world of Jessie (Lisa Chappell), who seems to be some kind of marine biologist. She lives with her fisherman husband, Rob (Robert Taylor), and they seem happy except for the fact that Jessie can't get pregnant.

It's while visiting an IVF clinic in the city that Jessie is spotted by Evan (Sam Parsonson), an itinerant Irishman doing temp work behind the reception desk. He tracks them down to their beachside home, gets a job locally, finds lodging in a caravan, and impresses Jessie with his apparent devotion to an abandoned joey he's found.

Jessie, after a particularly bitter, drunken row with Rob, even lets her guard down to the extent that she allows Evan to have sex with her, though she instantly regrets it and sends him away almost before the act is completed. This brief, drunken fling, not surprisingly, results in pregnancy. Rob, assuming he's the father, is delighted but poor Jessie is understandably conflicted.

To add to her woes, Evan, as the audience has long suspected, is as mad as a hatter, which leads to some protracted and mildly suspenseful scenes once his true intentions are revealed.

Writer-director Rupert Glasson takes care in establishing the characters and setting, and as a result the early scenes, handled realistically and intelligently, are far stronger than the denouement, where subtlety goes out the window. The film fails to satisfy as a relationship drama or a horror flick.

Performances are generally strong, with Taylor and Chappell particularly convincing as the couple. It's a pity they weren't given a stronger screenplay to work with, but there's strong support from stalwarts such as Terry Camilleri, Geoff Morrell and Jodie Dry.

 

Source:  The Australian

Stalked by a psychopath in Coffin Rock

By Derek Malcolm, Evening Standard  23.10.09

In this Australian version of Fatal Attraction, Lisa Chappell plays a wife who is unable to conceive with her husband but becomes pregnant after a drunken tryst with a young Irishman (Sam Parsonson).

He turns out to be a psychopath who mercilessly stalks her, claiming the child as his own.

What should she do? She daren't tell her husband (Robert Taylor) and can't get rid of her stalker.

Robert Glasson's film is well-shot and directed, and more than decently acted. As a genre movie, it suffices.

As anything better - a psychological thriller, for instance - it falls short of full enjoyment.

 

Source: thisislondon.co.uk