Review: SUDS' Alice in Bed — Tell me a story, bring me the world

Alice may have been in bed, but this show was up and at 'em.

Graphic design by Annabelle Radford

CW: discussion of suicidal ideation and mental illness

A girl trapped in her bed, smoking, subdued by drugs, sunken into a depressive malaise that prevents her from getting out of bed. Directed by Mary Franklin and Assistant Directed by Amelia Vogelsang, SUDS performance of Alice in Bed explores a more literary side to the sad girl trope. The opening tableau portrays Alice (Zahara Jithoo) slumbering as her nurse (Lily McGuinness) tends to the room, tidying shelves and straightening table pieces. The lighting, designed by Luna Ng, gives an impression of a cramped, dim den where Alice lives out her days, aided by onstage light sources that draw the audience into her private chambers.

The play begins, and we are privy to Alice’s intense illness: she suffers a depression so debilitating she cannot get out of bed. Her outbursts are quelled by drugs, as visits from her father and brother addle, and she contemplates suicide and exhaustion after a life from which genius is expected of her. Once a bright young girl, she is called on by women in the American literary tradition, Emily Dickinson and Margaret Fuller, along with characters from 19th century opera and ballet, in a dream sequence that makes up a large part of the play. Alice discusses the stifling nature of healthcare in the Victorian era, referring to the lives of Dickinson and Fuller throughout as they lament their missed opportunities.

The play is by nature referential, which sometimes left the audience behind in its specificity. A few playgoers didn’t realise that the two female characters that appear for a tea party were figures of Victorian womanhood until they were released into the foyer where the chalkboard lists cast and characters. The production remains an ode to women’s resilience and quiet genius nonetheless.

Particular mention must be made of Zahara Jithoo’s incredible performance. Often delivering monologues while lying in bed, a challenge to any performer, she still captivates the audience, transporting them into the past, present, or wherever her character dreams of. Jithoo was the driving force of the play, portraying mental illness with sensitivity and dignity. Her interactions are laced with sadness, exhaustion, and a brilliance that exemplifies Sontag’s work.

At times the stage was crowded with characters, particularly during the tea party sequence in which Alice is joined by Dickinson (Gemma Hudson), Fuller (Zara Podmore), and two ‘exemplary angry women from the nineteenth-century stage’. Myrtha (Danny Cabubas) is a ghost who floats around the stage offering quips about revenge and the forest. Kundry (Claire Hwang), another ghost, lies asleep for most of the scene, protecting Alice from her mother and speaking of the shame she endured from the men in her life. Her random effusions — often dazed mumblings about the Pope or other such miscellany — were enjoyable and humorous interludes. Despite the crowding representative of Alice’s addled mind, each actress offered a unique performance that carried an otherwise abstract scene.

The set, designed solely by Mali Lung, artfully evoked the literary tradition, with the infamous cellar poles transformed with pages from books and creeping vines, a motif which continues to the back wall of the stage. Pages dance across the scene as if caught by the wind, making Alice’s imagination and intelligence manifest. These pages even spill into costuming, impressively designed by Victoria Gillespie and Hunter Shanahan, with a delightful newspaper-clad corset and, more broadly, period-accurate silhouettes on a surely limited budget.

Sound design, by Nicola Weiss, incorporated classical music from 19th century ballets and was a valuable accompaniment to a number of scenes, however, the score occasionally competed with the actors. I would have loved to see this more seamlessly worked in but understand that The Cellar has faced extreme technical problems of late.

Overall, the production wove the story of a depressed woman into an odyssey through time and imagination. The audience left with a profound appreciation for the inner lives of women, and the comfort that literature can evoke.