Nobody Will Ever Forgive Us

Nobody Will Ever Forgive Us is the very achievement that the NTS and Traverse partnership of its Debuts season was hoping to accomplish: an excellent production of a strong script that was written by a novice.

Well, kind of. Calling writer Paul Higgins a novice is a bit of a cheat. Though this is his first full-length script, he is a proficient actor with an impressive CV and clearly understands what makes good theatre.

In fact, his acting skill is what makes this such a great play because he has crafted a script that allows each cast member to shine and gives any potential director and designer ample opportunity to create interesting and dramatic visual interpretations.

The play follows a downtrodden family with dysfunctional parents and grown children best described as 'lost'. There is a narrative that involves financial hardships, but in truth this only acts as a catalyst to allow the characters to interact with each other, which is far more interesting and entertaining than seeing them trying to achieve some plot-driven objective.

All five cast members give solid performances. It is easy to care about these characters, all of whom are in truth people most of the audience would want little to do with. From Gary Lewis's drunken philosopher of a father, Ryan Fletcher's loveable but financially tragic older brother Johnny, Carmen Pieraccini's skin-irritated sister Cath, John Wark's na've and recent seminary drop-out brother Patrick and Susan Vidler's edgy and desperate Mum, each character is given at least one moment where they individually shine but multiple and delicious moments to play off each other.

Director John Tiffany has created a production full of memorable moments that are both amusing and heartbreaking. It is a performance that feels much quicker than it is and manages to be far more poignant than one assumes it will be. It is also so well staged that there are fleeting moments where it feels like one is witnessing events in an actual living room.

Nobody Will Ever Forgive Us is quite an artistic triumph. It is excellent on every level and shows further potential for Higgins, already an accomplished actor, to become a writer of substance.