REVIEW: Let’s Talk About You

AFI and Gold AWGIE award-winning director and playwright Rivka Hartman’s latest work is a humorous look at mid-life relationships with lovers, partners – and oneself.

The main character, Ernestine (played by Elaine Hudson), is married to Geoff and has a 19-year-old son, but she has fallen in love (or is it in lust?) with Hope (played by Taylor Owynns), a childhood friend.

Hope is trying to disengage herself from her lesbian relationship with Trixie, who makes her presence on stage through the phone calls Hope frequently receives from her. It seems she is really not all that keen on Ernestine but plays her along either out of boredom or to have someone conveniently on hand should Trixie fall through.

Ernestine is plagued by her alter ego (played by Anne Tenney), who shadows her around the stage teasing her, comforting her, cajoling her and generally being delightful and annoying, like a younger sister.

Ernestine’s deceased mother also makes her presence by way of admonitions sent to her wayward daughter through the ether, much to Ernestine’s frustration.

Even though the characters are clearly meant to be middle-aged, Hartman shows that they are not above acting like adolescents when it comes to affairs of the heart.

In the end, Hartman’s play seems to suggest that it is the relationship with oneself that we have to sort out before we can have a meaningful relationship with anyone else.

Hartman’s witty dialogue and the energetic choreography of Christine Mearing, a former Casino de Paris dancer who trained at London’s Royal Ballet School, knit the disparate elements of Hartman’s piece into a warm and entertaining piece of theatre.

Until Nov 26,  8pm Wed-Sat, 5pm Sun. Depot Theatre, 142 Addison Road, Marrickville. $22-32. Tickets & Info: www.thedepottheatre.com