Hear ye, hear ye! Hold onto thine breeches for thou hast entered the realm betwixt and between ‘man’ and ‘woman’, where “Italian boy girl w$%&!s”, “breeches girls”, libertines, homosexuals, and other ne’er-do-wells that flaunt society’s patriarchal and heteronormative expectations linger and fester.
Okay, okay — I’ll cool it with the awful Shakespearean.
Gull - or - The Most Lamentable Comedie Called Love (henceforth referred to as Gull) is playwright Glace Chase’s 2025 Adelaide Fringe comedy offering a refreshingly bold and queer twist on Renaissance and Restoration theatre.
The fineries of these eras are all here; the costumes pull you from your seat and immerse you into the world. Flowing, elegant, and bright, they are nothing short of beautiful — watching them sway as actors move across the stage is nothing short of bliss.
The costumes perfectly symbolise what kind of person each character wants and expects themselves to be — or is.
And that is the heart of Gull: identity, whether that be sexuality, gender, or gender-nonconformity, is questioned throughout. The repressive and conformist nature of the patriarchy is jabbed at — and, importantly, shown to affect everyone negatively without equivalising that effect broadly. Gull highlights this, poking fun at the Renaissance tradition of cross-gender casting brought about because of institutionalised misogyny, and the later Restoration tradition of the “breaches role”, in which a woman played a man on stage.
Gull is immeasurably funny. Barely a moment passed in which the audience didn’t laugh at the antics on stage — many of which are instances of sexual activities and most, if not all, are vulgar in spirit if not practice.
Dialogue, infused with a healthy dose of Early Modern English (think Shakespeare), is well-paced, witty, and delightfully lampshades itself and its influences through the occasional fourth wall break. This wit works in tandem with the actors’ movements wonderfully; you can’t help but laugh. When Chase isn’t trying to be funny, the dialogue here is introspective and flows like poetry — sometimes it is poetry.
Of course, the strength of a script is little without a talented cast to execute it. Here, students from the Flinders Drama Centre have brought Gull to life. I honestly can’t point to a singular standout performance; each actor embodies their character perfectly.
Shardae Santos imbues Beau with an aura of smug confidence fitting of the character’s role in embodying their new gender, whereas Isiah Macaspac portrays a romantic and paradoxically timid yet forward Shin, who revels in wanting to die a romantic death (like in Romeo and Juliet).
Hannah McGrath’s boisterously overconfident Seely is perfect — her ‘crash outs’ are simultaneously hilarious and pity-inducing. Alexander Karytinos’s Moll is somehow both the funniest and most heartbreaking character here, and Karytinos’s expressions and exquisite voice control sell the character in both monologues and ensemble scenes.
Abigail McDougall’s Andra is both measured in a stereotypically ‘wife-y’ primness and a subversive wittiness; highlighted by all her interactions with the ensemble cast. McDougall’s scenes with Liam Hennessy’s Earl — played duplicitously and powerfully in every sense of those two words — can’t be described as anything but masterworks. All the actors are lords over their own bodies and expressions, and to see them sell their characters’ growth throughout is nothing short of mesmerising.
Of course, there are some reasons not to see Gull — although they are solely to do with content and not quality. There are depictions of rape, and while they are presented ‘comedically’ and with purpose, you can’t help but feel the harrowing weight of the action depicted. That is the point, I suspect. But if you come in not expecting it, you might not have the best time.
Despite that, Glace Chase has crafted a wacky, wonderful, provocative and downright absurd at times romp that everyone must see for themselves.