Oedipus Doesn't Live Here Anymore, But Dan Evans Does

The creation of Queensland Premier's Drama Award Winner Daniel Evans, 'Oedipus Doesn't Live Here Anymore' combines the drama and horror of an Ancient Greek myth with sleepy Australian suburbia.

'Oedipus Doesn't Live Here Anymore' takes the Greek tale of a man who ends up sleeping with his mother and killing his father, and puts a contemporary twist on it by setting it in modern day Australian suburbia. Daniel manages to recreate this myth by shining a black-light into the bedrooms and basement of the most infamous family in mythology by re-imagining them as the unseen but most gossiped-about family on the block.

Dan Evans and Campbell Newman. © Jessica Bozoky

“I was kind of drawn to the icky factor of it first and foremost…The best part of working with that script was kind of going 'how can you update it or how can you put it into a contemporary context and still maintain all that power and still have the ability to shock us?' And turns out, it does, which is kind of exciting,” explains Daniel.

Daniel was working on 'Big Brother' at the time of writing 'Oedipus Doesn't Live Here Anymore', and was heavily influenced by the savagery of that environment. “I was in this network television world and saw how ruthless that world can be... There's so much savagery in network television so it's kind of like a cathartic experience to go and write a play that was as ruthless as the place I had been working. It was nice to return to the theatre in that way.”

L-R: Dan Evans, Ian Walker, Wesley Enoch and Campbell Newman. © Jessica Bozoky

In this version of the Oedipus tale, Oedipus has left the story and it is told by a group of narrators who talk the audience through what has just happened. “This entire story is given to us and told by a group of four young narrators, who I guess you could say are kind of like our Greek chorus, and they kind of sit around and tell this to us... You kind of rock up to a place where something awful has happened just so you can see. Just like tragic-tourist-porn.” 'Oedipus Doesn't Live Here Any More' explores what happens after the tragedy of Oedipus. “These places that get tattooed with tragedy, and what happens to the community that are left behind after that tragedy happens, is kind of the the departure point.”

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'Oedipus Doesn’t Live Here Anymore' is directed by acclaimed Queensland actor and director, Jason Klarwein. “I've been in and around the room walking back and forth doing some re-writes of particular scenes and there's a definite sense that [Jason has] got a lot of care for it. He obviously has a lot of affection for it and the world I've created, and a huge level of respect,” says Daniel.

Daniel has lived with this play for so long that he was more than ready to pass it on to a new team to breathe life into it. “There's also the benefit that you can sit back when you're not directing and go 'well, we can write these amazing stage directions like a cast moves onto stage and decapitates the head office, the character of layers' and then you can go, 'well, I'm not sure how you're going to do that, but good luck!' It's like your problems become their problems. You can dust your hands off and go, 'bye! Have fun with that'.”

After seeing 'Oedipus Doesn't Live Here Anymore', Daniel hopes that the audience walk away and reflect on how fast we move through tragedies today. “This idea of the 24-hour news cycle is actually becoming more of a 4-hour news cycle where a victim tragedy and tragic event are kind of spun over and out by us so quickly that I wonder what that's doing for our levels of empathy and generosity.”

'Oedipus Doesn't Live Here Anymore' plays Queensland Theatre Company's Bille Brown Studio, The GreenHouse, 23 May – 13 June.