The curtain had scarcely come down on Noises Off! when similar merriment and madness ensued at the Glen Waverley Campus with a triumphant production of Peter Shaffer’s celebrated farce, Black Comedy. Directed by Head of Student Theatre Marcus Pinnell, the infectious charm of this play lies in its brilliant mix of physical comedy and witty dialogue, highlighting deception, social pretensions and like all good farces, the absurdity of human behaviour under pressure.

The pressure in Black Comedy notably arrives when struggling young sculptor Brindsley Miller ‘borrows’ his absent neighbour’s expensive furniture without permission to impress his guests, but just as they arrive, a power cut plunges his apartment into total darkness. The delicious conceit of the situation is the inversion of reality: the stage is fully lit when the characters are in total darkness, and the stage goes dark when the lights are restored. As the characters fumble through the dark, confusion escalates…

Patrick (Year 11), who played Brindsley, says the added difficulty of pretending to be in complete darkness ‘meant no looking other actors directly in the eyes, no avoiding obstacles, no looking away from where you'd already decided to go... essentially, ignoring every basic instinct!’ Just one of the many challenges of practical comedy.

Keira (Year 12), who played Brindsley in the alternate cast, agrees: ‘Some parts were painful - throwing myself down the stairs, running into walls and a lot of falling on knees, but thankfully, there were no lasting injuries, which was reassuring for some of my teachers who saw the show!’

The pay-off beyond the pain, of course, was the audience response. ‘My favourite part was seeing the performance come to life when we finally put it on stage,’ says Annabel (Year 12). ‘I remember being perched on the couch as Miss Furnival and listening to the audience crack up over jokes we had heard numerous times during rehearsals. The atmosphere was electric.’