‘night, Mother

Few shows swing the pendulum between life and death to such dizzying and uncomfortable heights as Iron Lung Theatre’s ‘night, Mother. Onstage till Saturday, 17 August at Chapel off Chapel, the macabre tale centres on a fractious mother–daughter relationship and pulls the bandaid off taboo topics such as suicide, mental health and disability. Milk Bar Mag were among the opening-night crowd, many of whom were in tears by the end of the show. 

Set in 1983 in a semi-urbanised American town, ‘night, Mother opens with Thelma (Caroline Lee) sitting on the couch waiting for her daughter Jessie (Esther van Doornum) to join her to give her a manicure. Jessie enters the room and works through her invisible to-do list, filling empty containers with confectionary and other sweets. (Thelma has a sweet tooth.) Thelma becomes inquisitive when she spies the pile of towels and garbage bags Jessie has gathered, but her daughter rebuffs her, and instead asks where her father’s gun is kept. Thelma – in Caroline Lee’s beautifully enunciated American drawl – asks why she needs a gun, to which Jessie responds that she intends to kill herself. She intends to shoot herself that night. 

Over the course of the 90-minute run, Thelma grapples with a gamut of emotions – beginning with disbelief, curiosity, anger, hostility, despair, hope, and lastly, absolute horror. The back and forth between Lee and van Doornum is palpable and it isn’t too long before the intensity of the situation envelopes you in an uncomfortable blanket of anguish and anxiety. 

Jessie’s confession unroots a tangled web of resentment and contempt, and love and devotion, between mother and daughter. In what could be Jessie’s final moments, she urges Thelma to be honest with her, hovering the magnifying glass over the family’s unacknowledged truths, including the state of Thelma’s marriage, the cause of Jessie’s epilepsy and Thelma’s true feelings for Jessie. When Jessie announces “‘night, Mother” at the end of their harrowing conversation, has Thelma done all she could to keep her from going over the edge? 

Written by Pulitzer Prize-winner Marsha Norma, ‘night, Mother is a character study between two women embittered by life’s woes and hardships. Lee is a tour-de-force in her role as Thelma, and van Doornum was formidable in her task of portraying Jessie, a woman who has lost everything except the decision to be here alive one moment and gone the next.  

The final moments were probably the hardest to take, almost suffocating. Looking around, I could see many of the audience members were wiping tears from their cheeks, serving as a warning that this isn’t for the faint-hearted. The performances were astounding given the emotional energy it would take to convincingly play characters entirely grappling with the topic of suicide. 

One criticism, and it’s just a minor one, would be that the two clocks that appeared on stage (one on the kitchen table and one of the wall) should be set to the same time, especially given that the show is meant to be told in real time. It’s all in the details.

Intense, shocking and unforgettable, ‘night, Mother will make you want to call your mum right away and tell her you love her. 

Update: Since publication, we learnt that the clock on the wall that was used in previews and on opening night both stopped working mid-show. 

‘night, Mother
Till Saturday, 17 August 2019
Chapel off Chapel, 12 Little Chapel Street, Prahran, 3181
chapeloffchapel.com.au/show/night-mother-marsha-norman

Images: Pia Johnson