Tie me kangeroo down sport...

A night at the theatre last night to see the one-man-show stage adaptation of Bill Bryson’s Down Under. I’ve never been to a one man show before so I didn’t know if one chap on stage could hold my interest. I needn’t have worried. Steve Steen was superb, mastering a veritable smorgasbord of accents as he took us on a journey from Perth to Sydney by train then up the Gold Coast on the road. The show finished as Steen travels from Darwin to Alice Springs to gape slack jawed at Ayers Rock.

It did strike me that for Steen who plays Bryson and a host of other characters including snotty hotel workers, horrendously racist train passengers, Captain Cooke and a Korean Croc, that this show must be a very lonely experience. He held us in rapt attention for a couple of hours and deserved his applause, but he’s a very lonely figure on the stage. Everything rests on his (admittedly extremely talented) shoulders. What if he forgets his lines? What if, as he did last night, he suddenly gets a frog in the throat? Who does he pop to the Garrick’s Head for a pint with after a successful show? Is this the theatrical equivalent of being a photocopier repair man – travelling for hours on the road to work his magic and then disappear, in solitude once again? Well, without the constant threat of paper jams of course.