0.7°C Paul T. Davies reviews Burnt Out, staged at the Mercury Studio.
As the images from Spain have proven this week, climate catastrophe is real and with us and needs to be urgently dealt with. This topical piece, created and performed by Penny Chivas, encapsulates her experience, as an Australian, of the devastating bushfires and her personal experience as the daughter of an environmental geochemist.
Her father, in 1979, provided data and predictions that are now coming true. Yet, his work was not validated or listened to. That document is central to this investigation, and through a physical theatre narrative, the effects of coal mining and the consequences are explored. The only prop is a piece of coal, and her overalls and face gradually become smeared with coal dust.
The movement is precise and controlled; even when fleeing from flames, there is strong clarity as Chivas represents the animal catastrophe as well as the human. Given how chaotic and horrifying environmental disaster is, I felt the movement was perhaps too controlled, and the soundtrack, beautifully constructed as it is by Paul Michael Henry, lacks the sound of burning, so we don’t get a feeling of mounting horror and panic. We do get sirens, though, and, most poignant, the calls of magpies mimicking the sound of the fire engines.
The piece does build towards a powerful final image, and here we do get the horror and despair. It’s a piece that builds and is very thought-provoking.
Reflecting on it, I feel its strength is in its quiet despair, that this situation is beyond saving, and Black Summers will become normalised.
