Woman holding a a black chicken. They both look towards the camera.Still Life with Chick­ens is com­ing to Welling­ton this month after sea­sons in Auck­land and Palmer­ston North. A sim­ple sto­ry about an old­er woman dis­cov­er­ing a naughty chick­en invad­ing her gar­den it becomes a beau­ti­ful and fun­ny play about lone­li­ness and the resilience of com­mu­ni­ties.

Actor & pup­peteer Haanz Fa’avae-Jackson answered some ques­tions about the show.

“The cast con­sists of one actor, Goret­ti Chad­wick, who plays the role of ‘Mama’, and there’s me, the chick­en pup­peteer. Still Life With Chick­ens was writ­ten by D. F. Mamea, and direct­ed by Fasitua Amosa.” In 2017 Still Life with Chick­ens won the Adam NZ play award and the Play­mar­ket Best Play by a Pasi­fi­ka Play­wright. “This show was inspired by D. F. Mamea’s moth­er, who just loves her gar­den. Every morn­ing, she would bring her pump­kin out­side, so it could enjoy the day along with her — and she’d take it back inside with her at the end of the day. The fam­i­ly had watched their moth­er con­tin­ue this rou­tine, and realised that Mama need­ed some­thing to love — so they got her chick­ens. This show plays on lone­li­ness, and we get to watch this 80 year old woman find joy in the small­est things, after all her chil­dren have left home to live lives of their own. “

“I hope it reminds [the audi­ence] that our elder­ly aren’t around for­ev­er. They raise us, teach us all we need to know to ven­ture this world and to chase our dreams. Yet when we do end up becom­ing inde­pen­dent adults & chas­ing our dreams, we leave them, and we don’t ful­ly grasp how much it affects them until we of course expe­ri­ence it our­selves in the for­mi­da­ble future. They’re our trea­sure of today, full of sto­ries and mem­o­ries, and I hope this show inspires our audi­ences to pay more fre­quent vis­its to their par­ents & grand­par­ents.” Fa’avae-Jackson sug­gests an inter­gen­er­a­tional vis­it to the the­atre. “Of all the audi­ences we’ve had so far, the elder­ly have been the best. Meet­ing them after the show and just see­ing the com­pas­sion in their eyes is just gold.  It’s both heart­warm­ing and hilar­i­ous. A def­i­nite tear jerk­er. The show is just under an hour, so it’s a com­fort­able length to enjoy.” Suit­able for ages 10 years old and up. “A love­ly show the whole fam­i­ly could enjoy.”