The Owl & The Pussycat is one of my favourite venues in Melbourne. With its small minimal brick theatre the audience gets to be right in front of the action. There’s nowhere for the actors to hide and their ability to connect with the audience is paramount to their success. Kissing Booth definitely achieves this.
The play starts off with students Sharna and Ingrid running a kissing both on the street for a university experiment. Joined by Ingrid’s friend Ethan, the trio then meets Oliver, who immediately grabs their attention. While it is Ingrid who wins Oliver’s heart, Sharna and Ethan are unable to forget their feelings and spend all their spare time lamenting over the chance that they lost. What starts as a bright, cheeky and snappy story takes a sudden dark turn halfway through. Friendships are torn apart as secrets come out and Ethan and Sharna’s feelings are brought to the surface. The four actors share a real connection and chemistry – a particular pleasure is watching Sharna (Emma Jones) and Ethan (Jake Stewart) who at the start are total strangers connected through Ingrid (Katrina Viva Schooler), but build a charming yet dysfunctional friendship based on their shared obsession over Oliver (Andy Browne).
Jake Stewart has created here a genuinely entertaining, yet heart wrenching piece of theatre. Laden with gleeful pop cultural references and biting dialogue, Kissing Booth was a genuine joy to see.
BY MYF CLARK
