Playing as part of Melbourne Fringe Festival, Our Father is a considerably dour effort that takes the Royal Commission into Institutional Child Abuse and turns it into a very human drama. Structured mostly as a series of police interviews of the family of an accused man, there is a simplicity to the narrative that brings the characters and their experiences to the forefront. The mother, in a desperate turn by Sandy Morrison, is a well-meaning denial-case; the daughter, played with aloofness by the writer, Lucy Holz, is too detached to let herself see the repercussions of her father’s actions; and the son, in a melodramatic performance by Will Hall, is angst-ridden and standoffish in his it-should-have-been-me complex. The family is divided and in crisis, brought together only by the police officer, played with warmth by Benji Groenewgan. Continue reading Our Father: Portrait of a Family in Crisis