Theatre review: A tasty touch of the absurd

Fred is an odd little piece, and very dark, says writer-actor Lisa Chappell.

One-woman tale about survival, cannibalism and icecream is a shockingly funny thing.

They are the type of reviews actors pray for: "Exceptional and unmissable" from blogger Suzy Go See and, from the Sydney Morning Herald, "A highlight of the Fringe Festival," but they made Lisa Chappell, writer and actor in the one-person show Fred, nervous.

"It's the terror of people having such high expectations," says Chappell, who divides her time between New Zealand and Australia. "Fred isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea; it's an odd little piece and very dark. When you're in an intimate theatre space, you can clearly see the expressions on people's faces and I could see shock on the faces of a lot of diehard McLeod's fans' faces but, at the same time, I think I probably gained some new fans, too."

More than 10 years after she quit popular Australian TV series McLeod's Daughters, Chappell is still best known for her time on the show but she's spent much of the last few years working in theatre and writing her own material.

There's been Don't Hold Your Breath, about sibling rivalry; On/Off about two small-time cabaret singers with big dreams and bigger issues; a TV series called Extreme Therapy with a shrink who's crazier than her clients, and the retro/sci fi play Bad Day Insurance.

Now there's Fred, which she says is a black comedy about survival, cannibalism and icecream. Deidre lives alone and is struggling to pay the bills while mourning the death of her cat. Then two handsome salesmen knock on her door and she lets them inside, not knowing they have a hidden agenda and a taste for the macabre.

"My writing tends towards black comedy with a hint of absurdism. I like exploring the peculiar magic of everyday life and I am not afraid of darkness because we all have dark and light within us. I've done a lot of navel-gazing during the last 25 years and I know myself quite well and I'm happy to write from all aspects of my psyche.

"I'm quite eccentric and I am more comfortable with letting people see that now than when I was younger. I embrace that and I guess that shows in my writing. It's very cathartic."

Fred tested Chappell in ways she never imagined. She wrote it quickly while somewhat distracted by trying out a new stage-writing software program and conversing with a plumber.

"I looked down at what I'd written and thought, 'oh, this is odd but it's not too bad actually' and just followed my muse. At one point, I got up and pressed my head against the window when I realised I'd written a character that was well, I'm not going to say ..."

Six hours later, she emailed the script to a Sydney theatre she thought might be interested in staging it. The next morning, theatre management replied they did indeed want it.

Chappell searched for a director and finally found Australian Chris Stollery who reluctantly agreed to her stipulation that not one word of the script could be changed. Usually rehearsing a one-person show is as much about reworking and refining the script as it is about where to stand and how to deliver the lines.

"It was about taking a risk and backing myself," she says.

"Usually I don't write like that; I edit and edit and edit, but Fred was the exception.

"There were times when I did feel that I had bitten off more than I could chew. I'm not used to failure and a couple of days before opening night, I looked at myself in the mirror and thought, 'I don't know if this is going to work' and it was an unusual feeling."

But Chappell persevered, even when she fell the night before opening and had to spend hours in a hospital emergency room when she should have been resting in preparation. She says she was too tired and "zonked" on painkillers to look at any reviews but was stunned when friends read them to her.

While she returns to Australia after Fred to perform Bad Day Insurance, she hopes to be back later this year with On/Off which she wrote around the same time as the other plays.

Theatre preview

What: Fred starring and written by Lisa Chappell
Where and when: The Basement, April 8-24.