Rebecca Gethings, Blair McDonough,
Jessica Gerger, Andrew Robb &
Tom Sangster in The Vegemite Tales
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Even the title is a clever piece of target marketing. The Vegemite Tales is an immediate call to London’s huge community of temporary and permanent expat Australians that long for a taste of home, so to speak. However, those unfamiliar with the tangy Aussie breakfast bread spread (it’s a bit like marmite) need not fear, since the title is the only place that it actually gets mentioned. But the cult play, that now finally makes it to the West End’s Venue after kicking around the London fringe since 2001 in various incarnations at the Baron’s Court, Old Red Lion and Riverside Studios, is culturally specific in other ways, too. This is a parallel linguistic universe in which the opening of beer cans is always toasted with the exclamation, “Up your bum!” and the men speak of wanting “a good root,” but they’re not talking about fillings in either case. Melanie Tait’s genially observant comedy is constructed with a loose-limbed, shambling charm that, like the happy-go-lucky Aussies it pulls together as flatmates in Hammersmith, puts the accent—in every sense—on the coarse rather than the sophisticated. It has an air of gentle amiability, however, that suggests that the author has come not to criticise or satirise her six country mates’ baser concerns—plus a solitary European she places amongst them, an unconvincingly bisexual waiter called Gio—but to offer them up instead as types with which the audience can identify.
It’s no surprise that the programme reveals that Tait is currently developing a TV series around the play now. There’s a sitcom quality to both the situation and the comedy; no wonder it has been compared to Friends. It plays effectively to a similarly enjoyable laughter track of recognition, with an occasionally inserted drama to give its character studies a little more weight.
But that’s not the only weight gain that occurs here: Australians arriving in London, we’re told, succumb to a phenomenon known as the Heathrow injection, in which “the chicks put on a stone, and the guys lose all their muscle tone.” So says jobless, muscle-less Eddie, who sleeps on his surfboard in the lounge since he can’t pay the rent for a room, has gone without sex for eight months, two weeks and three days, and turns cartwheels, literally, when he finally gets a date.
Then there’s Sam, the longest-serving resident of the house who’s been there for seven years, but is now yearning for home and his former girlfriend Kate whom he left Australia to get over. Fearing that life is passing him by as adult responsibilities can be so easily avoided in London, he says, “None of us take anything seriously—we just coast along in this country”.
Dan coasts in and out of bed. He’s the house stud, but he’s also yearning for something more concrete and tries to establish it with 21-year-old virgin Maddie. Two more women complete the household: uptight aspiring actress Jane, and Gemma, who’s an artist but works as a receptionist and discovers she’s pregnant.
They’re a likeable bunch, and likeably portrayed by a strong ensemble of actors, most of whom have been in earlier incarnations of the play: Andrew Robb’s Sam, Tom Sangster’s Eddie, Jessica Gerger’s Gemma, Andy Leonard’s Gio and Sarah McGlade’s Maddie are accordingly all very comfortable in their characters’ skins. Neighbours star Blair McDonough and Rebecca Gethings seamlessly join them as Dan and Jane respectively.
The Vegemite Tales
By Melanie Tait
Directed by Bill Buckurst
The Venue