The 2007 Griffin Stablemates season culminates with the world premiere of Jonathan Gavin’s eagerly anticipated new work, Tiger Country, which weaves blacker than black comedy into the dark and twisted world of the Unwin family.

The play follows the three Unwin brothers and their other halves over Christmas, as the secrets that have kept the family together start threatening to tear it apart.

Howl, the youngest, is dealing drugs again. His wife, Rachelle, tries to keep track of her son, who has an unhealthy attachment to firearms. Eddie is home from a stint at Silverwater and his teenage wife is about to give birth. Chuckles is five hours late for Christmas lunch.

“The play’s effect relies on the audience not knowing very much about it when they come in,” Jonathan tells SX.

“We’ve certainly tried to make the play as funny as possible so that the blacker elements of the comedy are more powerful and hit harder when they come through.”

Tiger Country is a play Jonathan never imagined he would write.

“It took me a long time to come around to the idea of writing it because, while it is a comedy, it does have some dark ideas in it and, as a writer, my first thought is usually making work that goes out into the world and makes it a better place,” he says.

“I never in a million years would have thought it was the sort of play I would ever write. But having embarked on it, I think what we’ve come up with is certainly going to provoke a whole lot of thought and conversation from the people who see it, and that’s a good thing for a play to do.”

Indeed Jonathan has crafted a fable for our times. Tiger Country is set on the fringe of Sydney, where the city bleeds into the bush.

“It definitely plays on the idea of Australian mythology,” he muses. “The reason it’s set during the holiday period is because that’s the time of the year when families tend to come together, but also because it’s a period of heat and humidity and bush fires.

“The image I worked on was a crucible – tightly confined with a lot of heat, volatile elements being combined to ignite and explode.”

As one of Griffin’s resident playwrights, Jonathan understands how privileged he is to have his work consistently produced in Sydney’s wildly competitive theatre market.

“With Stablemates, there are only four shows a year so it’s incredibly competitive to get in,” he says. “And you have to understand that each space has its own demographic and a different agenda.

“We live in a time when the future of theatre is uncertain. People need a reason to go to the theatre. So the question becomes: ‘Why does this story need to be a play?’ There has to be something elemental to the story that requires actors to perform it in front of a live audience. More and more the theatre is the place where the tribe gathers to understand who they are.

“So the stuff that gets me going as a writer is really deep, elemental stuff – issues of ideology, issues of love, issues of self-understanding.”

Tiger Country by Jonathan Gavin, SBW Stables Theatre (10 Nimrod Street, Kings Cross) until December 22. For bookings call 1300 306 776 or visit www.griffintheatre.com.au. 

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