The Islander - atyp

The Islander - atyp

Myth, music and the making of a world

Written by Amy Draper, Finn Anderson and Stewart Melton, The Islander is a contemporary folk musical about Eilidh, a young woman living on a remote island whose lonely existence is disrupted by the arrival of a beached whale and a mysterious stranger, Arran. As their friendship develops, Eilidh encounters a hidden community, ancient mythology and a different understanding of humanity’s relationship with the natural world. Beneath its folk-music surface, the work explores belonging, loss, environmental destruction and the possibility of transformation.

Director Hayden Tonazzi stages atyp’s production in the round inside The Popsy Studio, with musical direction by Lauren Shaw, choreography by Bree Tipoki, and performances by Georgia Laga’aia and Ellie Chan (swing performer onstage for Rebecca Ordiz on the day saw the show). The company consulted with Satiu Studios and Samoan storyteller, producer, and creative director Gabriel Faatau'uu-Satiu and “a new version of Islander was born, one that speaks to Australia's multicultural reality and to our place in the Pacific” (Hayden Tonazzi, directors note in program).

I had the privilege of seeing the original production at the Paines Plough Roundabout at Summerhall during the Edinburgh Fringe in 2019. It was a striking and affecting piece of theatre, not least for the ingenuity of its live looping technology. Two performers, armed with loop pedals and their voices, conjured an entire island community and its surrounding landscape. The theatrical machinery was exposed, and rather than diminishing the illusion, it became part of the wonder. We watched the world being made before us: voices accumulating into harmonies, rhythms and soundscapes that carried the storytelling as much as the text itself.

atyp takes a different approach. The conceit of live sound creation is established, but much of the process is shifted away from the performers and into the tech box, with the musical director, sound designer and stage manager incorporated into the construction of the sonic world. The performers still sing and create sound, but the balance between live looping and more conventional performance has changed.

There is a rationale for this. Tonazzi has explained that the decision was deliberate, following conversations with the writers about the way he felt live looping can interrupt dramatic momentum, particularly towards the end of the work. The intention was to retain enough visible looping for the audience to understand the conceit while allowing the dramatic action to flow more freely.

It is a legitimate directorial consideration.

As I can’t unsee an alternate production, I found myself wondering whether in reducing the visible mechanics of sound-making, something essential to the work’s theatrical identity is lost. The tangibility of the island: wind, waves, wildlife and the voices of a community emerge from the performers’ breath, creating an interconnection before our eyes and ears. A mysterious world emerges where boundaries between the “real”, supernatural and mythic are less certain.

There is considerable heart and sincerity in atyp’s performances. Laga’aia and Chan approach the material with evident commitment and verve as they create a community in crisis. There is considerable energy on stage, at times I wanted less from the performers, not more: less insistence, less illustration.

The production introduces a Pasifika cultural frame, including a section delivered in Samoan and Pasifika costume references for Arran, while leaving the original text largely intact. This brings a sense of locality to a work that originated in the northern hemisphere. Its concerns about disappearing species, threatened territory and the fragility of island communities resonate strongly in the Pacific, where the effects of environmental change are an immediate reality for many communities. The cultural framing offers an opportunity to encounter familiar themes through a different lens, and the relationship between Pacific cultures and the ocean provides fertile ground for a production concerned with humanity’s place in the natural world.

The Islander contains a rich mythic framework: Arran belongs to a hidden community connected to whales, and her arrival challenges Eilidh’s material understanding of the world. The story asks us to consider ancient knowledge, interconnectedness and the possibility that humanity is part of something larger than itself. Recontextualisation need not require wholesale rewriting, but I wanted to experience a more profound conversation between the cultural perspective and the work’s existing mythological and musical architecture.

There is much to value in atyp’s ambition to take on The Islander. Its ecological concerns, its invitation to look beyond the material world and its celebration of our mutuality with nature feel especially pertinent now. The Pasifika framing opens possibilities for a new conversation with the work, while Laga’aia and Chan bring heart and burgeoning talent as musical theatre performers.

Perhaps the most valuable outcome is the reminder that stories travel, that myths can find new homes, and that theatre can help us see the world, and our place within it, differently. But it also raises a question: as we look to other cultures and traditions to expand our theatrical horizons, how much more might we gain by investing in the development of our own stories, our own mythologies and the distinctive voices of the artists who tell them?

Review by Kate Gaul

Image by Robert Catto