It’s a long way to the top: Johnny Nasser and Mandy Bishop. Photo: Phil Erbacher
David Williamson’s latest play takes a swipe at elites and wannabes. Katie Norrie (Mandy Bishop) doesn’t want a taste of the high life, she wants a seat at the table – or more accurately on the board of an important art institution. When she discovers their kids are at the same school she befriends Catherine (Sarah Chadwick) with a view to inviting her and her husband Charles Mallory (Andrew McFarlane) over to dinner because the pair are a ‘power couple’ and art-collecting heavyweights. Katie’s husband Roger (Johnny Nasser) is not impressed, neither at the massive amount of money Katie is outlaying to impress the Mallorys with the best dining experience ever, nor at the man himself: big banker Mallory refused to give Roger a loan to help his start-up and he hasn’t forgotten.
To make up the numbers, Katie, who has a chip on her shoulder because she wasn’t born into blue-ribbon Sydney, reels in some friends she had dumped – a once-successful film director Ben Gregory (Matt Minto) and his schoolteacher wife Laura (Jo Downing). They haven’t forgotten being dumped. So, blind Freddie could see (though Katie can’t) that the evening may not go exceedingly well.
And of course, it doesn’t. The Mallorys, reluctant to be there at all, are insufferably smug and would have sniggered at the wine choices even if they weren’t terrible anyway (more Chateau Chunder than Margaux). Roger can’t resist baiting Charles, and Ben is still annoyed with Roger. Bishop’s Katie is excruciatingly good as the desperate-to-please Katie and Laura, the only halfway likeable character in the whole play, tries to be a bit of a peacemaker at the beginning. Sarah, it turns out, met Charles when she was a flight stewardess (back in the days when they were called that.)
This being Williamson, there are some terrific one-liners, plenty of digs at the establishment and a few pokes at government. The cast of six are a true ensemble, but, for me, Bishop and Downing were standouts.
It’s called The Social Ladder but it really only deals with a few rungs of that ladder, and those rungs are nearer the top than the bottom. Yes, Ben is out of work – but that’s by choice (he’s had his 15 minutes of fame and he is loath to settle for anything less). Jo is a schoolteacher and passionate about it, too, which is great; and Roger’s business is going very well, despite Charles Mallory. Katie, too, has a job in the Arts that she likes but it isn’t top tier enough for a girl from Engadine. Still, none of these people are on their uppers.
Director Janine Watson moves her very able cast along at a good pace, and as drinks flow and polite facades start to crack, the evening unravels into a night of lies, cover ups and social desperation. To add more fuel to the fire, infidelities are exposed (How the Other Half Loves popped into my head while watching it). Set and costume designer Veronique Bennet has gone to town with a wonderfully colourful set and furnishings, and dressed Katie in something extremely floral, something else for Sarah to be disdainful about (I was half expecting her to describe the décor as ‘insistent’.)
The Social Ladder is not the most hard-hitting of Williamson’s satires – and I’m not sure anybody learnt much about themselves, particularly Charles – but it’s certainly good for a laugh. And a bit of pathos, to – Katie is the only character who evokes a little bit of sympathy from us, thanks to Bishop. But as the playwright himself observes, human flaws are part of what makes us human!
The Social Ladder runs for 1hour 50 minutes (including interval) and is at The Ensemble until 14 March
Tickets: $46-$119
More’ https://www.ensemble.com.au/shows/the-social-ladder/
