Boy meets girl, Boy loses girl, boy becomes bird.
Act one begins in the small country town of Tullamana where a farewell party is being held for Lester and Evelyn (Evie) at the Mud Bath Hotel. Lester is leaving to sign a recording contract with the business conglomerate “B.I.G.” and Evelyn is to be his manager. The board of business conglomerate “B.I.G” are up to their ears in insider trading schemes and decide to set Lester up to be their much needed share market disaster. He is seduced by B.I.G.'s sensual PR girl Miss Yahwhohow , taken to the city and given a ridiculous image - the Birdman. Meanwhile Evelyn goes home heartbroken. B.I.G.'s plan falls apart however after an environmentally aware radio station puts the Birdman into the top twenty. Fearing their share price will increase, the conglomerate sacks Miss Yahwhohow and publicly ridicules the Birdman. With the help of his father Lester eventually fakes his own death, while snaps out of her torpor and decides to become someone.
Act two opens five years later. Evelyn is now a major TV personality with her own current affairs show and Miss Yahwhohow has become wealthy by founding a quasi religious “birdcult” dedicated to the worship of the supposedly dead Birdman!. Using money from the birdcult, Miss Yahwhohow has bought control of B.I.G . She then outlines how B.I.G will demolish Tullamana to build a casino over Tullamana’s mud baths. In desperation Lester writes to the producers’ of Evelyn’s show and is invited to appear on it. A week before the town is demolished, Evie and Lester meet to see if they can find a way to defeat B.I.G. In a climactic “Evelyn at Nine”, Lester dons the old Bird suit and rises from the dead in front of a shocked Bird cult. Miss Yahwhohow who is now proved to be a fraud loses all her money and ownership of B.I.G is transferred to Lester. He and Evelyn then make up for lost time.
[Source: John Field website]
2001: Bondi Pavilion, Sydney; 3-14 July
