The Freshblood Festival 2021 | Vena Cava Productions

This weekend I had the pleasure of viewing some of the performances for Vena Cava Productions’ Freshblood Festival. Vena Cava is a QUT student-led production company that focuses on new work by young Brisbane-based writers and performers. The Freshblood Festival allows a platform for emerging artists to showcase and workshop their work in a professional capacity. Each performance I viewed was written by current QUT students and alumni. I must admit that I was blown away by the level of professionalism that was showcased in this festival, and I hope that I will be able to get to the festival again next year.

It’s always a pleasure spending my weekend immersed in the arts, and this festival was a great way to get my own creative juices flowing. Vena Cava Artistic Director Georgia Carrigan and General Manager Kian Dillon let me know that the theme of this year’s festival is non-traditional theatre and spaces. The space occupied was a working art studio inside an old industrial building, and I was just obsessed with this space! It permeated each piece with a grungy aesthetic that added something completely different to these performances than I imagine a traditional theatre space would. Over the day, I viewed eight performances, each very different from each other, which highlighted the emerging talent in Brisbane’s art industry.

Monster | Zara Chandler

Monster by Zara Chandler was a short theatrical piece about inner demons and the moments that shape a person. The concept was fascinating, but I felt that more workshopping could make this play hit harder. There were some very strong moments in the script, such as the lesbians with internalised homophobia from society denying their legitimacy and their families thinking men can “fix” them; and the toxic masculinity that disables a man from healthy grieving. However, some of the scenes didn’t sit well for me, such as the son’s anger toward his drug-addicted mother. While warranted to feel anger in that situation, I did feel that a comment about the mother always having a new guy in her room verged on victim/slut shaming to me. I feel that this scene would have been stronger without this moment. Regardless, I really enjoyed the direction of this piece and was disappointed that I couldn’t attend the evening performance as there were some cool moments involving torches that I imagine would have looked like a monstrous breathing mechanism.

Eat the Motherf**king Rich | Virgo Nash

I loved the direction of Virgo Nash’s script, Eat the Motherf**king Rich! The set was so simple but super effective! The script featured several inter-connecting stories that were funny and light-hearted at times while still touching on some important issues. I liked the reference to Oedipus early in the play because it helped tie together all the stories and created some interesting food for thought. Although the Oedipus reference was specifically linked to a certain storyline, I suppose that I understood it on another level altogether by focusing on the concept within Oedipus Rex of free-will versus fate and the idea of cyclical tragedy affecting a family (or in the case of Eat the Motherf**king Rich, a whole class of society). Patterns are always repeating themselves in society, and while the elite maintain a position of power, it is challenging for the lower classes to extend themselves past cyclical patterns. There were a number of great actors in this piece; however, Mia Chisholm absolutely blew me away! I didn’t catch the name of her character, but she was so emotive and genuine that at times I forgot she was acting.

The Only Kind of Soulmate | Fliss Morton

The Only Kind of Soulmate, written and directed by Fliss Morton, was one of my favourite performances from the festival! The acting, script, and use of space was exceptional! I really lost myself in this script and found it very relatable. Overall, the script struck me as a ‘coming-of-age’ sort of story that followed two feminist besties as their relationship begins to fall apart. When all they have is conversations about is hating men and relationships, what do they have in common when one of them changes their stance on this? Is she giving up her values or is this just a part of growing up? Also, I loved the topics that they discussed for their ‘podcast’ including diving “tits first”* into queefing and self-love. Best friends Rosie and Lulu were played by Annabel Gilbert ­– who was very busy performing in three separate plays: The Only Kind of Soulmate, Despondency, and Wilson and West – and Sophia Hodych. They had such dynamic chemistry that I wouldn’t doubt if they were off-stage besties too.

*Quote: ‘The Only Kind of Soulmate’ by Fliss Morton

Wilson and West | James McDougall

Wilson and West by James McDougall was a painfully awkward family drama, but in a good way. It made me laugh a lot! It was very well acted and I think the simple set worked well for this piece. I particularly enjoyed Ella Dickson’s performance as the posh mum who is sassy and always finds a way to get her way; she really brought to life the phrase ‘if looks could kill’.

QUT Aca-demics

A cappella group, QUT Aca-demics, performed a soulful set of seven songs, each performed beautifully. The setlist was a combination of sacred, classical, pop, R&B, and jazz music, which really showed off the groups’ versatility. One song sent goosebumps all over my body as I listened to their perfect harmonies that blended so concisely that it was as though the group morphed into one voice, without a single voice dominating over the others. The group sung a rendition of Charlie Puth’s Attention and I have not been able to get it out of my head and have been singing it continuously for the past two days! There were several soloists and I particularly appreciated two: Jemima Moore and Ryan Perez. Moore performed a beautiful solo in the group’s version of Ultralight Beam and her vocals edged on spoken song in a way that I felt was appropriate for the song. Perez was the final soloist before the ensemble performed one last song and he was electric! As he was singing “let’s get lost tonight” I felt myself becoming lost in his voice. Overall, I loved listening to this group for their short performance. I bopped, I vibed, I goose-pimpled. The performance ticked a lot of boxes for me and made me seriously miss being in a choir.

Despondency | Joshua Bell

Despondency by Joshua Bell was another one of my favourite performances from the festival. The script follows the friendship of Brooke, Laura, and her boyfriend as they navigate themes of fatal secrets, friendship, guilt, grief, and words unspoken. Bell’s script was very powerful and the three actors in this piece did a great job of bringing to life the realistic emotions that the above themes bring about. Nadia Chapman’s performance as Brooke almost brought me to tears as it was full of such raw emotions.

Physical Harm & Heights | Rosebird Collective

The Rosebird Collective performance of Physical Harm & Heights was probably my favourite use of the space. I felt that these collage theatre piece really accented the site and worked really well with the grungy aesthetic of the building. The piece was hard-hitting and focused on moments that break and shape people and how they share those experiences with their friends, hopefully learning to heal in the process. The performance incorporated elements of dance and physical theatre to create an impactful piece that left me thinking about the moments that have broken and shaped me. Between each performance piece at the festival there was a short break for the stage crew to reset the space and I was particularly grateful for that time following this piece because I definitely felt that I needed some time to consider the impact that challenging moments have had on my own life.

A Friend of Dorothy | Arina Dara

A Friend of Dorothy was such a wonderful way for me to finish my festival experience! It was so funny and a great queer take on the rom-com and musical form. Arina Dara, who both wrote and starred in the piece as Penelope, totally blew me away! She had a mind-blowing voice and exceptional comedic timing! The script follows Penelope, a queer woman, who is trying to determine whether her crush is also queer. What follows is a hilarious, along with warm-and-fuzzy, performance with some wonderful songs and excellent performances. The phrase ‘a friend of Dorothy’ made me laugh so hard in this musical context because I’ve always thought that Wicked would have been 100x better if Elphaba and Glinda had been queer lovers. I feel that through the character of Cindy, Dara’s script also touched on something that I know I have personally struggled with in the queer community where there seems to be less acceptance towards bisexuality because if you aren’t gay then you must be straight. Overall, this performance was just so wonderful and I would love to see it workshopped into a longer piece!

Keep an eye on Vena Cava Productions’s Facebook page for more details on how to buy tickets and support young independent entertainers. They have one more mainhouse production in 2021 (Wattle Brush) which will show from mid-late November.