After The End

After The End

Written by Dennis Kelly

Directed by Felicity Nicol

Reviewed by Catherine Hollyman

The TAP Gallery in Darlinghurst is a mismatch hub of both static and performing art. It’s where emerging artists of any persuasion have chance to showcase their work without the costs (and often limitations) of a commercial space. The small area is highly conducive to the play’s setting – a bomb shelter - and theme: survival after an attack.

A nuclear attack on the city.A personal attack on another’s beliefs.A vicious sexual attack.An internal attack on oneself. As the synopsis asks:“The end is nigh.Will you survive?What will happen After the End?”

Louise (Rebecca Martin) and Mark (Drew Wilson) are co-workers and perhaps the only survivors after a nuclear bomb went off outside the pub they were in. Thankfully, or perhaps suspiciously, Mark has a Cold-War bunker to which he carries an unconscious Louise. Once she comes around, the pair explores the evening’s events as well as their past interactions with each other. Comments flippantly thrown are magnified in the circumstances and what may once have been easy to ignore, can now mean the difference between life and death.

As the pair walks the tightrope of trust, questions are raised…and I’m still not quite sure that they’re ever answered. Regardless, Martin and Wilson seem perfectly at ease on the stage, tackling Dennis Kelly’s tense subject matter and director Felicity Nicol’s confronting action with a steely determination and resolve that is reflected in their characters.