Review by Tatum Stafford
Back Door Productions have established themselves as a staple local theatre production group when it comes to Perth Fringe time.
With Connections Nightclub as their home turf, the group have produced a series of entertaining shows over the past few years, and I was lucky enough to catch the premiere of ‘Til Death Do Us Part’ this week, after seeing one of their other shows, ‘Chart Toppers’, a few years back.
The set-up of this show is simple and familiar; the crowd is invited to the wedding of Logan and Alison, a couple who met at uni and who have filled their groom and bridal parties with friends Josh, Ryan, Hayley and Sarah. Throw in Sammy, the bride’s step-brother and waiter at the wedding, and Abigail, the wedding singer who was sourced via Instagram, and we have the full cast of characters.
The show starts with Hayley, the maid of honour, preparing the venue for the happy couple’s arrival. They enter, the wedding singer begins her set, the food is served, and everyone gets up for a dance. The plot twist (spoilers) comes when Logan takes a bite of food, falls to his knees, and is pronounced dead. The venue quickly transforms into an active crime scene, with six detectives leading groups of the audience around the room to ‘interview’ each character and get to the bottom of whodunnit.
The structure of this show is very clever, and allows for all of the characters to have plenty of interactions with one another; all of which encouraged the audience to pay close attention to conversations, eye contact, and other small moments. The cast of this show were committed to their roles and clearly very well prepared when it came to improvised moments in the ‘questioning’ section. Big props especially to the distraught Kate Sisley as Alison, the banter between best man Ryan (Tate Bennett) and Josh (Mark Retzlaff), and the fierce confidence of maid of honour Hayley (Tory Kendrick). My favourite moment of questioning, however, came when we had a chat with waiter Sammy (Kier Shoosmith) – he was absolutely hilarious, so quick, and so committed.
Rachael Coltrona provided plenty of comic relief as the loyal and enthusiastic Sarah, Ethan Churchill played a convincingly deceptive groom (no spoilers) Logan, and Kelsey Cruse’s vocal chops shone in her two numbers as Abigail the wedding singer. In terms of pacing, Abigail’s two songs were beautiful but dragged slightly, so I wonder if they could have been trimmed – particularly the first song, in which there weren’t many ‘background’ moments between characters for the audience to tune into.
This show was clearly a hit with the audience on the night I saw it, and the Back Door team have a great formula on their hands. It was a real treat to hang back and watch people in my group put their detective hats on, and team up with complete strangers to theorise and make a final decision. A great, entertaining night out that has something for everyone.
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