The Kursk

The loss of submarine K-141 Kursk while on a training exercise in August, 2000 remains a raw wound both for Russian pride and the relatives of the 118 men on board who perished. What sank the boat, and the initial reluctance of the Russian navy to accept help from Norwegian and British rescue teams, are controversial issues to this day. Brisbane playwright Sasha Janowicz travelled to Russia to research the tragedy and the result is this powerful and humane 90-minute play staged by Queensland's Matrix Theatre company under director Michael Futcher.

The play pieces together the awful sequence of events, from one-of-our-subs-is-missing through to the memorial service. Our emotional doorway into this story is through Captain Lieutenant Dmitry Kolesnikov (Edward Foy), who was among 23 sailors who survived the first explosion that rent the 154-metre sub in two. (The sailors' fate was later pieced together from notes found on Kolesnikov's body.) His wife Olga (Julienne Youngberry) anxiously awaits news of her husband's fate and it's through her that we experience the agony of the bereaved, and learn facts such as the large amount of misinformation given out by the Russian media at the time.

Eugene Gilfedder, who has clocked more time on the Queensland stage than just about any other actor, is stately and grave as Admiral Popov, who oversaw Russian rescue attempts. "Nowhere is there such equality as among the crew of a submarine," Popov notes. "We all will live or die." The playwright himself appears in multiple roles and carries great conviction as the story's occasional narrator.

Where the play really excels is in the evocation of the undersea rescue attempts. Futcher uses torchlight, dry ice and an eerie sound score by Luke Lickfold to transport us underneath the icy Barents sea - we're kept near the edge of our seats as submersible vehicles attempt to dock with the fatally wounded Kursk. This is strong stagecraft in a production very much worth catching at Darlinghurst Theatre before its short run is up. Nick Dent