Apocalypse Bear Trilogy
"The Apocalypse Bear Trilogy is best piece of theatre I’ve seen this year. Co-directors (and performers) Luke Mullins and Brian Lipson build tension so gently that we’re only aware of it when it’s released and we realise we’ve been holding our breath.”
Anne-Marie Peard – Aussie Theatre
“Apocalypse Bear Trilogy is far more than a reprise of familiar themes. Rather it’s a bold step forward for the company, a radical refinement of all its work so far.
The production, which is as elegantly minimal as the script, features a spectacular sound design by Jethro Woodward and some smart video work from Martin Coutts. It frames detailed and sharply observed performances from all three actors that fully exploit the delicate allusiveness of the text. It adds up to a haunting and unexpectedly moving night of theatre.”
The Australian, Allison Croggan.
“…an exceptional production…Try hard to get a seat – a play of this caliber is rare new writing and it may not yet be impossible to see this outstanding ensemble premier during MIAF.”
Gary Anderson – Arts Hub
Apocalypse Bear Trilogy
by Lally Katz
Directed by Luke Mullins and Brian Lipson
This is an invitation. New lands are being created. Memory, Now and the Future and pouring onto the internet. Reality is splintering into shards of a mirror and a casual, congenial Bear is showing up at people's houses.
If you’ve had a really bad day at school, he’ll be making your afternoon snack. If you crash your car, he’ll drive you home in the cab. If you’re getting divorced, he’ll take you back to where it all went wrong. Or he may invite you to the woods – a place of myth, transgression and discovery where outcasts can start again – but not without grave consequences. The woods are a land he is making, much like the internet, which exists alongside this reality, but is separate.
This is an invitation.
The Apocalypse Bear Trilogy has been created by Melbourne’s award winning Stuck Pigs Squealing Theatre. Stuck Pigs’ work explores the mythic structures that lie beneath the surface of domestic and suburban reality – 'magical, memorable and mighty real.'
A Stuck Pigs Squealing Production
Written by Lally Katz
Directed by Luke Mullins and Brian Lipson
Design: Mel Page
Composer / Sound Design: Jethro Woodward
Lighting Design: Richard Vabre
Artistic Adviser: Chris Kohn
Producer: Lucy Evans
Performed by Katherin Tonkin,
Brian Lipson, Luke Mullins
Presented by Melbourne Theatre Company
in association with
Melbourne International Arts Festival
“Apocalypse Bear Trilogy is a dark and hilarious comedy, very much of its time – now. As an uncompromising theatrical exploration of existential angst, it is full of fascinating hints, suggestions, ambiguities and shadows."
Suzanne Sandow – Stage Whispers
“The production is stunning and is the perfect showcase of Melbourne talent that the International Arts Festival commands. Mullins and Lipson, with the directorial assistance of Stuck Pigs Squealing contemporary Chris Kohn, give the text enough stillness to breathe without ever being delicate or precious. They find comedy and meaning in subtle gestures and nuanced delivery, and work to create a world which is never the one that we recognise as our own, but at the same time, never one intangible and out of our reach.
Mullins and Lipson have teased out in Apocalypse Bear Trilogy the very strong subtext of metatheatricality and the awareness of both the fake reality in front of us, and the realities we, and the characters, subscribe to in order to give meaning to our lives.
Jethro Woodward’s sound design strongly captures, and accentuates, the fantasy, danger and deep sadness of the performance, always bubbling underneath the drama without ever needlessly dominating, and as Mel Page’s simple, stark and slowly dismantled set reveals the depth of the Lawler space, we are left with the chilling picture of almost nothing but Mullins and Tonkin, washed in a simple spotlight, standing still in between the trunks of trees.
Like our dreams and our fears, it is gut-wrenching and profoundly moving stuff. Apocalypse Bear Trilogy is theatre unafraid of being challenging and misunderstood. It is also theatre unafraid of being theatre, and unafraid of being so much more.
Chris Summers – Theatargh