COSI FAN CRAZY. MOZART'S SHAME.
"I started to wonder, was this burnt out theatre some sort of coincidental metaphor, it seemed like it represented their brains, burn out, hollow and no discernible purpose”
When my editor first gave me this assignment I cringed. He told me, with force, “that because of your last pile of garbage article… on a pet iguana stuck in a persons hair for two days you have something hard, something… A little confronting. Hopefully something decent this time. A bloody Iguana… Really?”
I was to be reviewing a play in a burnt our theatre acted out by a troupe of mental asylum patients. My balls dropped and the fella crawled back in his cave. The crazies are doing, wait for it, Cosi Fan Tutte By Mozart. Wow, this is going to be interesting.
As I rocked up to interview a couple of people a few days before the show there were flames bellowing from the back of the theatre. Dare I go in I asked my self. As I entered the building, handkerchief over mouth, I was confronted by a group of people in a heated debate. I introduced myself and was immediately met with a barrage of profanity, one girl asked me if I had gear, another one asked if I was hungry, one gentleman attempted to light the back of my shirt on fire!
Gratefully, the person who was running this show, a man called Lewis, berated the mad people and came to talk to me. He looked young, handsome, gentle.
“Yeah sure” he said “it is a little crazy in here, but they are getting something out of it, it is worth it”
I asked him how long he had been working in asylums. He replied this is his first job. What a surprise. Lewis had just come from university where he completed his Arts degree. What a shamble. I talked to Lewis some more and left… Wondering at the state of the Asylum system in Australia when a man who reeked of smoke raced up to me
“You like that fire? You see it?”
The aftermath, I replied.
“Makes ya hard doesn’t it?”
I unlocked my car, this guy was loose, “Cat owner mate?”
I got in my car and drove off.
I am looking forward to this play. It is sure to be a riot! Literally.
