By BRUCE DENNILL
A Good House / Directed by Amy Jephta / Mannie Manim Theatre, Market Theatre, Newtown, Johannesburg
Processing the complexities of politically traumatised, multi-ethnic society via drama and comedy in theatre is a good, even necessary thing, but it is not necessarily easy to create something that is genuinely entertaining even as it covers the tough issues and the differing, long-held perspectives behind them. Amy Jephta’s A Good House, already refined via runs at the Royal Court Theatre and the Bristol Old Vic. There, the powerful social satire that drives the story would have been powerful and direct. In South Africa, it all of that and awkwardly, uncomfortably relatable.
The set-up involves an estate or boomed-off middle-class suburb in which a trio of couples from different background are enjoying or looking for versions of the same dream: safety, comfort and a scenario in which stress comes from somewhere outside of where they live. The most established residents are Chris (Jose Domingos) and Lynette (Mary-Anne Barlow). He is a serious, starchy sort, a lover of committees and clipboards and happy to voice an opinion long before considering how it might land in the room. She is an estate agent who sells houses in the area and may have convinced herself that her idealistic, naïve sales pitch is actually reality.
More recent arrivals are Sihle (Nhlakanipho Manqele) and Bonolo (Lesoko Seabe), who both understand that, as a Black couple, their arrival in this area is a marker of ongoing changes in South African society, though their respective journeys to reach this point have varied considerably, which affects how they approach issues in their new surroundings. Newcomers Jess (Christine Van Hees) and Andrew (Conrad Kemp) are the least established couple in a number of ways – younger, with lower-income jobs and a heightened awareness (particularly in the hyper-anxious Andrew’s case) of their perceived place in the suburban pecking order.
It’s an intelligent framework that could lend itself to a range of compelling narratives, and Jephta arguably chooses the most effective one: pinpoint satire that, though it leans towards racial dynamics, also prompts nervy laughter around gender and class identities, among other things.
All of the characters have their equilibrium upset by the sudden appearance of an informal shack on an open plot in the estate. Their concerns are manifold: the shack’s unseen inhabitants may be dangerous – physically or politically threatening; the land values may drop; more such arrivals may change the character of the area and, psychologically, the status quo as defined and enjoyed by the settled inhabitants will be shaken up. How each character feels, interprets and expresses these fears is explored in tight, trenchant dialogue – between spouses and between couples – that allows each of them to reveal, to the audience and to each other, the depth and diversity of their prejudices, in bleakly hilarious ways. These chats also allow for the suggestion of traumas that help to explain (if not condone) particular behaviours.
Jephta’s script doesn’t shy away from layering angst and anger and faux pas and biases and all of the profound discomfort that comes with both trying to voice all of those in vaguely permissible ways and realising that trying to do doesn’t mitigate the bigotry behind the thoughts. The pace is kept high, as is the intensity emotional intensity and, if the ending is perhaps just a touch neat for the authentic messiness that has preceded it, the relatability of everything to that point – along with traverse staging – guarantees an engaged, involved audience.
The cast is universally good, with each allowed development that showcases the dominant feature of their character – anger, anxiety, brittleness; closed-mindedness and more. And the characters that aren’t on stage – the unseen occupants of the shack – have just as powerful a presence.
A Good House is challenging and entertaining; political and diverting; sardonic and real. Go an see it with a group of friends from varied backgrounds and expect an animated discussion on the way home!