The everyday travails of suburban Australia go under the microscope in Andrew Bovell’s smash hit comedy Things I Know to be True. The return of youngest daughter Rosie from a stint overseas into the family’s smothering bosom sets off a chain reaction as a bundle of intersecting personal crises crash into one another with catastrophic results.
Director and Castle Hill Players stalwart Carol Wimmer brings this new production to life at the Pavilion Theatre from February 5-27, casting Kate Jirelle, Annette van Roden, Stephen Snars, Vivienne Rodda, Adam Garden and Ben Freeman as the Price family. As they congregate in the garden, things get a little thorny over unrealistic expectations and wildy differing opinions. Something we’re all very used to in these heated days of social media outrage.
“There are many things I know to be true about Andrew Bovell’s writing,” Wimmer says. “I know that he watches and listens. That he is perceptive. That he uses what he observes to create characters that are very real, who speak naturally about complicated emotions. I wanted to direct this play even before I finished reading it, because it’s more than a play about a family. It’s about love and understanding and misunderstanding.”
After a year of being so far away from everyone, watching one fracturing family figure out how to overcome the hurdles it takes to keep them all together seems like the perfect antidote, with a wry helping of Aussie humour to boot. That’s well worth the trip to Castle Hill.
