Sydney Reviews

Before the tons of fun avalanches on the audience – the fissures of fun and hairlines of hilarity already evident in the opening minutes of McGuffin Park – one of the actors explains that the term McGuffin refers to an arbitrary goal for a main character to pursue … "Why is our play called McGuffin Park? There’s actually multiple reasons for the title. But one of the reasons is because we are trying to say something about self interest getting in the way of altruistic intentions.”

McGuffin Park sure says something about politics, democracy, and community, and self interest getting in he way of altruistic intentions, and says it with comedic clarity with an ensemble of five actors presenting a myriad of archetypes in a riotous romp through a small town’s mayoral election.

The spring in Sam O’Sullivan’s script never waits, it runs one step ahead, as we follow in the dance between two prime candidates, Fiona and Jack, as they vie for the leadership role.

Jack is well travelled, a school teacher who has political ambition and is a member of a major political party. Fiona has stayed in the community all her life and runs the highly successful local bakery. She is independent of party politics.

Is McGuffin Park melting in the dark, all the sweet, green icing flowing down? Has someone left the cake of democracy out in the rain? Has Fiona the recipe for democracy to be sweet again?

Idealism and compromise, individualism and the community, pragmatism and progress, the petty and the primitive, accountability and caveats, are all part of the recipe of this remarkable production.

McGuffin Park is a playful, joyous show, foaming like a wave beneath our knees, given tender breeze by a quintet of players that deliver highly energetic ease.

Eloise Snape, Shan-Ree Tan, Lizzie Schebesta, Thomas Campbell and the incomparable Jamie Oxenbould are exemplary in this excellent production directed by Mark Kilmurry. Unmissable.