On at the Alexander Upstairs Theatre is A Woman Alone, a one-woman drama written by Italian playwrights Dario Fo and Franca Rame and translated from Italian by Gillian Hanna.
Michael Kirch (Fleur du Cap-nominated director for Bench) directs Anna Kurgan (pictured) in this darkly comical post-feminist look at a woman unhinged. In the original script, Fo and Rame take a wry look at a repressed, disempowered housewife who is killing time while adrift in timeless issues.
The one-act play originally formed part of Fo’s five-part monologues entitled Tutta Casa, Letto e Chiesa (All House, Bed and Church) from 1977.
Kirch has contemporised the hour-long play, getting Sharon (Kurgan) to sit down in front of her computer to Skype a friend, instead of talking to the neighbour as the character does in the original. Sharon is having a really bad day, between being locked up in the flat by her husband, a peeping-Tom neighbour, a brother-in-law with wandering hands and a crying baby, it’s not going well.
Popping pills doesn’t help as Sharon struggles with her reality, both real and the one in her head.
Kurgan was the one who approached him last year about directing her in the work, and he has always been a fan of Fo’s writing so they have been rehearsing about 10 hours a week for the past two months.
“It’s supposed to be sit and laugh and then when you leave you go: ‘OMG, that was a bit weird and disturbing,’” said Kirch.
He hopes they can take this around to theatre festivals once the Alexander Theatre run is done, though he knows they are too late to apply for the National Arts Festival. He will be going though, to direct Scot Cooper in a one-man show and take part in the next Butlers comedy.
• A Woman Alone is on at the Alexander Upstairs Theatre from Monday to Saturday, May 2 at 9pm. Call 021 300 1652 to book.