I Promise This Isn’t About You (Even If It Feels Like It Is) review | Melbourne Fringe | Trades Hall

In your 20s, life is all about the drinking, the partying, and the sexing. In I Promise This Isn’t About You (Even If It Feels Like It Is), we are thrown into the deep end of a house party, but we only see what happens in its bathroom. It’s an intriguing concept, using the most private room in a house as the space where secrets and revelations are laid bare turning a place of privacy into one of exposure. At the same time, it allows for intimate and often hilarious glimpses into the chaos and vulnerability that the party hides behind closed (bathroom) doors.

The cast (Mads Lou, Jo Jabalde, Eliza Carlin, Reuby Chip, and Ally Long) have a strong chemistry and their character's shared histories are evident in how they speak and interact with one another. Their energies are complementary, and they move together with an organic ease  culminating in a fully realised friendship group.

Sarah Matthews has written an engaging story, but it feels less concerned with where it’s going than with capturing the messy honesty of what happens along the way, resulting in an experience that comes across as more episodic than cohesive. At times past events seem to be forgotten about in order to get on to the next scene. Characters leave the bathroom in an angry or devastated state, only to return seeming completely fine, and others who are extremely drunk in one scene appear sober a few scenes later.

The final moments focus on a character who has the least impact than any of the five we meet, which fells like an odd way to end things on. Given that this is very much an ensemble piece, it might have landed more effectively by closing with the two housemates who threw the party, particularly in light of everything that unfolded between them and around them that night.

Carly Watson's direction however, does a great job of giving the characters natural emphasis, helping to ground their state of minds and make the performances authentic. This careful guidance ensures that, even with the non-stop rapid-fire and overlapping dialogue, the audience can follow the emotional beats and be invested in the characters’ experiences.

The sound design subtly reminds us that this is all happening at a party, a setting where inhibitions are dropped, people become more daring, or they get drunk and do foolish things. The lighting design also works cohesively, highlighting shifts in mood and steering us through the unfolding drama.

Being in a working carpark, outside noise bleeds into the performance, but with this piece taking place at a house party, the background noise is quite fitting, adding to the intensity and antics that are occurring in the bathroom. While set in a bathroom that is larger than usual, the traverse staging offers a candid environment, being close to the action, and makes the performances immediate and personal.

I Promise This Isn’t About You (Even If It Feels Like It Is) is a revealing exploration of friendship, and the uncertainty and anxiety that comes with life. While the story sometimes meanders, confident direction, a tightly-knit ensemble, and clever design choices turn this bathroom play into a stage of a group of young people trying to make sense of it all, amid the noise, both figuratively and literally, that surrounds them.

I Promise This Isn’t About You (Even If It Feels Like It Is) was performed at Trades Hall between 8 - 16 October as part of the Melbourne Fringe Festival. 

Image credit: Jaimi Houston