Two angels, Martin (Tom Kelly, The Credeaux Canvas) and Francis (Sebrina Thornton Walker), the souls of two gay men who have died, observe and comment on their grieving friends, lovers, and relatives from on high. The set is bare except for one multi-purpose piece of furnishing that resembles a red AIDS Awareness Ribbon.
A play invoking both angels and AIDS inevitably brings to mind Tony Kushner’s Angels in America, which debuted in 1991. Three Winters Green by Australian playwright Campion Decent (The Campaign), who co-directs here with Les Solomon, was first mounted in 1993, so the pair are contemporaneous. Indeed, Three Winters Green feels like a response to Kushner’s Pulitizer-winning monolith. It’s a smaller affair, but it’s also warmer, more human – and humane – and more intimate.
Over the span of three years we track the lives of a number of characters affected by the AIDS epidemic. Gay schoolboy Francis navigates being openly queer in the markedly less tolerant early ‘90s and struggles with a crush on his closeted teacher, Joseph (Samuel Welsh). Alcoholic and “very Catholic” Maxine (Norah George) tries to reconcile her faith with having two queer children, Beck (Julia Muncs) and the aforementioned Martin, who is in a relationship with aspiring actor Jen (Maddison Silva). Two other characters’ stories are interwoven: Andrew (Ben Jackson), a young gay man coming to terms with being HIV positive; and Mick (Tom Kelly pulling double duty), a straight(ish?) country boy in the big city whose well meaning ignorance supplies both laughs and a perspective on the “average” Australian’s lack of knowledge about the queer community and the AIDS crisis at the time.
In many ways, Three Winters Green is a time capsule, and it is remarkable and sobering to reflect on what a different world it was less than three decades ago – an audio sting taken from a contemporary AIDS awareness TV commercial is a powerful memory stimulant for anyone who lived through those years. Of course, we are currently dealing with another deadly pandemic (that is the reason this production has been rescheduled twice), which could be said to lend the work a little more relevance for modern audiences. However, that feels like a disservice. This show resonates because of its sensitive writing and some stellar performances from the cast.
Sebrina Thornton Walker gets the showiest role as Francis, who trades in school uniforms for drag and a life on the stage, their work perfectly counterbalanced by Samuel Welsh’s more restrained but heartbreaking turn as a man tortured by his sexuality and his duty as a teacher. Maxine’s arc from sozzled suburbanite to committed activist and supporter is brought to wonderful life by Norah George.
Pathos and nuance are the order of the day; in the small confines of Fringe HQ in Newtown (formerly the Old 505 Theatre), Three Winters Green is at times almost unbearably intimate, the space between audience and performance all but eliminated by the powerful emotions in play.
What remains after seeing Three Winters Green is a sense of genuine authenticity. While this is a work of fiction, it feels like lived experience, deeply rooted in its time and place, and functioning not only as a work of drama but as a wilful act of memory and commemoration. As such, it behooves us to bear witness, and it’ll be a rare audience member who doesn’t come away from this production deeply moved.
Three Winters Green plays at Fringe HQ until November 20. Shows from Wednesday to Saturday, with early and late sessions on Fridays and Saturdays. Get your tickets here.
