26/06/2025
Theatre review by arts editor Sarah McNeill
Never Have I Ever
Black Swan Theatre Company
State Theatre Centre
Closes July 6
Podcaster, author and playwright Deborah Frances-White is firmly entrenched in social commentary through her podcast The Guilty Feminist and her book, Six Conversations We’re Scared to Have.
Though born in Queensland, Frances-White now lives in England and her first play is set in a trendy boutique London restaurant – the perfect setting for a drunken middle-class debate about privilege, social equity, wokeness and British politics.
Never Have I Ever is named after a popular English drinking game. It is an age-old theatrical conceit to bring people together over food and drink to open up debate.
On a stunning set by Bryan Woltjen that captures perfectly the particular style of chef Jacq’s (Emily Rose Brennan) dining concept, she and her partner Kas (Deep Sroa) are preparing dinner for their final guests – long-time friends Tobin (Will O’Mahony) and his wife Adaego (Ratidzo Mambo). Tobin had invested in the restaurant and Jacq and Kas must now confess they’re bankrupt and the restaurant must close.
Carefully and deliberately reflecting diversity, Jacq is a white working-class Londoner with a large chip on her shoulder, Kas is a quiet underachiever, a “brown” man who sits uncomfortably on the fence of racial divide; Adaego is a proud black woman who has made a career of it and Tobin is a white, successful hedge fund manager.
Although the four have been friends since university, there seems to be little affection between them and they quickly descend into vitriolic, occasionally funny banter on wokeness and ethical investments, designed largely to bring down the rich, white cis man. As Tobin, Will holds his own in this game of verbal destruction. He walks a fine line of intelligent superiority and childish sensitivity, even eliciting some sympathy given that the recipients of his wealth are so damned ungrateful!
But as the debate descends into a deep moral question in the vein of the 90s film Indecent Proposal, the foursome become increasingly unlikeable and the dilemma begins to leaves us, the audience cold as the play grinds towards an ambiguous end.
It is clear that playwright Frances-White has lived in England long enough to write in a particular style of bourgeois brash English, but while director Kate Champion extracts committed performances (despite some wayward accents from the women), the Australian cast never quite captures the essence of a Londoner’s posturing pitch and pace.
Never Have I Ever has some very funny moments, and it is written with a specific voice that speaks directly to a particular audience invested in socialist, woke debates, but one that stops short of eliciting any empathy for these superficial people.
Photo caption: Four disparate, unlikable friends play the game Never Have I Ever: Will O'Mahony, Ratidzo Mambo, Emily Rose Brennan and Deep Sroa.
