Singing Their Hearts Out - Monkey Baa's Fox

It’s almost a full-house of school children when I attend Fox at the Ipswich Civic Centre. I’m catching the production, produced by Monkey Baa Theatre which is in the middle of a large national tour. They’ve just come from Darwin and Mount Isa, and started in Sydney. It’s a long road ahead for the company, who will be touring until October. This isn’t the most ambitious aspect of the production, however. Fox is an opera for ages eight and up, sung by a single performer on stage, accompanied with dance by three other performers. The mere thought of this is enough to leave some theatre companies shaking in their boots. Not so for Monkey Baa, who have partnered with Siren Theatre Company, an independent Sydney based team, to create the show.

Fox is based on a classic children’s book by Margaret Wild and Ron Brooks. It’s a charming tale. A magpie burns her wings in a bushfire, but is taken to safety by a dog. The two become friends, and the bird travels on the dog’s back so that she can ‘fly’. All is merry until the arrival of a fox, who tempts the magpie with the promise of faster travel. The animal-based love triangle is made for the operatic form.

Sarah Jones plays the ‘spirit’, serving as a narrator for the tale. She is the lone singer of the story. Jones’ voice is pure and skilled. It partners with composer Daryl Wallis’ score beautifully. It’s this mode of narration, however, that was the production’s greatest weakness for me. I had incredible trouble understanding what Jones was saying, and could only make rough guesses. This meant the story was lost at key points. I believe this is the main reason why, about fifteen minutes or so into the show, the theatre got ants in it’s pants, and the children became unsettled.

The other performers, David Buckley, Jay Gallagher and Jane Phegan, are certainly skilled dancers. The director, the accomplished Kate Gaul, has managed to create some stunning and clever moments here. Illusions of travel and flight are well-achieved and mesmerising. The use of puppets was received warmly by the audience. In this way Fox serves as an excellent introduction to theatre for young children—the variety of conventions allows them to access the story in many ways.

Gabriela Tylesova’s design is wonderful. These costumes are grand, and are of a quality not usually seen for a national tour such as this.

The use of black and whites between the magpie and dog are set against the purple of the spirit and the passionate red of the fox. This simple but well-conceived design provides an excellent introduction to the semiotics of performance in the same way that the dance and puppets enchant the children. The only set is a large audio-visual screen, which slowly cross-fades between hand-drawn pictures of landscapes.

Luiz Pampolha’s lighting design is quite dark, and was described by a young viewer behind me, quite excitedly as ‘really creepy’. Indeed, this is a show with a very sombre undertone that Pampolha has picked up on. Unusually for a children’s show, there isn’t a single opportunity for a good giggle. The subject matter is quite serious. The moments of lightness are derived from the friendship between the magpie and dog. The ending of the piece is particularly beautiful and surprising in it’s melancholy.

Kate Gaul has obviously put a lot of focus into making this show as accessible to children as she possibly can. In most cases, Fox really works in this regard. However, Sarah Jones’ articulation, in the particular performance I saw at least, was a major disappointment, and I wasn’t convinced the show had managed to enchant most of it’s audience. This is unfortunate, because had this one simple aspect been remedied, I believe the children would be thoroughly taken by the entire show. It is a wonderfully crafted piece of theatre.

In this age of fart jokes, superheroes and speedy story-telling for eight’s over, Fox represents a brave return to more traditional theatrical values. The plot moves calmly and with steady pace. Moments of beauty are examined with careful grace. The music gently takes us on a charming journey. Even with it’s weaknesses, Fox is incredibly unique, and deserves it’s national tour.

Children should see it for it’s difference. It never insults it’s audience, nor compromises it’s theatricality to the demands of television. It is, unmistakably, theatre, and it uses the medium excellently.

Fox is touring nationally until October 2010.

For more details, you can visit the company’s website at www.monkeybaa.com.au

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