REVIEW: August: Osage County

November 25, 2024

 

 

August: Osage County
Presented by Belvoir St Theatre
Reviewed by Danny Yazdani

Belvoir’s 2024 lineup of productions has been one of its most impressive seasons yet, taking audiences on adventures into the idiosyncratic lives of countless characters. To end on a high note is more than ideal, and if it’s done successfully, it is a great triumph for any theatre company going into their 2025 season. It is without a doubt that Belvoir has achieved this, programming Pulitzer Prize winner for Drama August: Osage County as its grand finale of the year. Led by an ensemble of stellar performers, August: Osage County is an invigorating testament to Belvoir’s high calibre of performance known and loved by Sydney theatregoers.  

 

 

With the disappearance of family patriarch Beverly Weston (John Howard) and the cancer diagnosis of opiate addicted matriarch Violet Weston (Pamela Rabe), ‘shit hits the fan’ in an unexplained and ill-timed family reunion. The Weston sisters, Barbara (Tamsin Carroll), Ivy (Amy Mathews), and Karen (Anna Samson), their aunt (Helen Thomson), uncle (Greg Stone), and cousin (Will O’Mahony), and various other characters (Bee Cruise, Bert La Bonté, Rohan Nichol, Esther Williams, Johnny Nasser), join Violet around the proverbial family dinner table. With direction from Belvoir’s renowned Artistic Director Eamon Flack, the family estate in 2007 Oklahoma comes tumbling down as ugly family secrets gradually reveal themselves, constantly poked and prodded at.  

Tracy Letts’ dialogue is so incredibly meticulous, so well-constructed where each word is equally responsible for propelling the plot of the play forward, not a second wasted. Sitting at three and a half hours with two fifteen-minute intervals, Letts has a masterful command over the action of the play; I first doubted whether a modern-day audience could sit still for so long and be entertained. But there is not a moment that the fast-paced nature of the play falters, proving my assumption incorrect. Flack and the cast run wildly with Letts’ text but also harmonise their performances with the crux of the play’s message: the inheritance of trauma.   

 

 

“A random selection of cells”; that’s all family is at the end of the day, despite the social meaning we have attributed to it right across the globe. But the trauma we inherit from our families, directly or indirectly, is the powerful message August: Osage County carries. As it snowballs into the play’s most extravagant scene – the family dinner - the impact of this trauma begins to ‘leak’ from some of the play’s most distressed characters. Stone’s rambling rendition of a Christian grace, O’Mahoney’s mishaps with his mother’s dreaded casserole, and Rabe’s sneering and demand for formalities is pure comedy gold. But it is just as tragic. Much like other iconic tragicomedies performed, while characters are pushed to their limits, audiences are torn between feeling for them or laughing at the absurdities they see unravel on stage.  

Set designer Bob Cousins should be highly commended for his interpretation of the Weston estate, an epic battleground for the wars waged between the Westons and company. The play’s set is akin to a puzzle carelessly put together by a toddler intent on finishing the task, rather than completing it accurately. This is not to say that Cousins work was sloppy or anything of the like. It is to say that the set gives the impression that it has been forced together with little autonomy over its composition, much like the way families are formed.  

 

 

By the time Act 3 rolls around, audiences trickle back into the theatre, and so too do the characters, recovering from the emotional whiplash of Act 1 and 2. Just as the audience feels the play is coming to a close, no more room or source for painstakingly delicious drama, Rabe and her larger than life performance reminds us of one final bitter take away from Letts’ script, becoming what we most fear - our parents. Younger, but equally nasty, we are reflections of our parents we can’t begin to stomach, let alone see without others pointing it out. Caroll, as the eldest Weston daughter, portrays this utter sincerity, her complete control of mind and body as Barbara being the production’s greatest standout. As Rabe and Carroll are left alone in the empty Weston house, audiences come to understand that this nightmare is twofold. Conversely, our parent’s worst nightmare - being left alone to wither away into nothingness with no child to look after them. “This is the way the world ends”, Rabe, a giant of Australian theatre, portrays in her character, the fear of isolation haunting her as much as it fuels her bitterness. The mother-daughter chemistry between the two is phenomenal, matriarch and matriarch, is terrifyingly impressive to watch.  

 

 

This take on family feuds may appear to be distinctly American or Midwestern, but it is just as relevant to Australian life. After all, “some people get antagonised by the truth”, but seeing oneself in one of Belvoir’s greatest productions of the last decade is too good to run away from. I challenge you to attend and to find even the tiniest grain of truth in what it has to offer.  

 

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August: Osage County is playing at Belvoir St Theatre until 15 December 2024. Tickets can be purchased here.

Production images by Brett Boardman.