SICK of going to the cinema to watch three hours of Marvel CGI and mind-numbing explosions in Hulk smash the Multiverse?
Well, Sparkbird could be the answer.
The play harks back to the golden era of romcoms in the 90s and early noughties.
A time when fiction was more character driven and intimate, and took some risks.
“When Harry Met Sally to me is one of the great romantic comedies of all time and I think part of what makes it so successful is that it’s not necessarily trying to fit in the box of romantic comedy but instead very neatly attempting to answer the question, ‘can a man and a woman ever be just friends?’” says Sparkbird co-writer and performer Sophie Strahan.
“I think there’s something interesting about the fact that only during the filming of it was it decided that Harry and Sally were actually going to get together. It doesn’t pre-empt its ending.”
• Sophie Strahan and Ethan Gosatti during rehearsals for Sparkbird.
Sparkbird follows couple Chelsea Walker (Strahan) and Melvin Scott (Ethan Gosatti) as they sift through their fractured relationship, trying to figure out what went wrong and why it was so much fun. In the spirit of When Harry Met Sally, Strahan and co-writer/director Lucy Wiese toyed with the genre and took some risks.
“I think the way we play with perspective is what sets our work apart,” says Strahan.
“We show the same scenes, the same moments from this relationship from two different perspectives.
“I took on Chelsea’s perspective and my co-writer Lucy Wiese took on Melvin’s.
“We wrote completely separately at first and then worked to stitch the two different perspectives together.”
The clash of perspectives raises interesting questions about how people interpret the same set of events. Each person has their own account of reality and there is no definitive version (oops, we’re getting back to the Marvel multiverse).
Sparkbird isn’t a philosophical treatise, but an entertaining break-up play incorporating stand-up, sitcom tropes and more.
“Chelsea remembers their fights as comedy skits,” says Strahan.
“Melvin recalls romantic moments in the style of a sitcom. It gets very silly and bizarre but then we come back to these very serious, grounded moments, where the characters are forced to consider the part they are playing in their relationship falling apart.”
Sparkbird is the official debut of No Small Dinosaurs, a theatre collective formed by Strahan and fellow WAAPA graduates Wiese and Jade Patching in early 2025. The collective aims to showcase small stories that mean a lot.
An early version of the play was at last year’s Fringe World, but this is the full-blown debut with the collective.
“The play doesn’t favour one side, but instead acknowledges that we are all having different experiences and all trying our best,” Strahan says.
Sparkbird is at DADAA, 92 Adelaide St in Fremantle from February 5-9 as part of the Fringe World festival. For tix and more info see fringeworld.com.au.
by STEPHEN POLLOCK