The Poppy Seed Festival returns to Melbourne for its second year, opening with Fleur Kilpatrick's Blessed, a modern retelling of the angel Gabriel's visit to Mary informing her that she is to be the mother of Jesus. While her previous work, The City They Burned, successfully re-imagined the story of Lot and the fall of Sodom into contemporary times, in this production there is too much effort in pushing the religious undertones, whereupon I felt the authenticity of what Kilpatrick is attempting to create gets blurred.
The story follows Maggie and Grey (Olivia Monticciolo and Matt Hickey) who after years of no contact are reunited in Grey's grimy and shabby home. These are people who are from the lower end of the socio-economic spectrum, living in community housing who are struggling to make ends meet with low paying jobs.
