What if there’s enough love to go around?

The way stories can bridge the gap between opposing worldviews, opinions and politics fascinates me. It is the nuance of a personal story that lets us empathise with each other and which holds the potential to expand someone’s perspective. “Monogamy Musings” attempts to encompass this. Contemporary, cutting-edge and aimed at entertaining honest conversations with the audience, we seek to encourage one another to think in nuance as opposed to absolute truths and move towards sincere, open dialogue.

The play follows three characters as they navigate their individual experiences and beliefs around relationships. Far from being moralistic, this play invites the audience to question their own wiring and beliefs about platonic, romantic and sexual love. What do you do when you are happy in your relationship and you fall in love with your partner’s friend? How many relationships do we have space for? What can love look like? What if there’s another way relationships can be beautiful?

The story of these characters is close to my heart both from the perspective of non-monogamous themes, as well as staging queer stories. As a bisexual storyteller, I am longing to see more of these stories on stage.

Lemon Meringue invites you to dive into this poetic, dreamlike, messy world: Explore the dynamics and gritty reality of interpersonal relationships with us. The risks. The dreams. The desires. Burning like wildfires in the night. And perhaps we might discover a way beyond this ever spinning circle? A hope for the true and beautiful.

Anny Leigh Ackermann

Lemon Meringue Theatre was born in the rehearsal studios of Queen Margaret University, while we worked on our final year project. This project then evolved into our debut production: Monogamy Musings.

The collaboration and creative synergy created on this first project inspired us to continue working together and reached out to the brilliant Dracume Theatre, who adopted us as a part of their company.

Giulia Pizziol
Anny Leigh Ackermann
River Raiola
Steph Hume

Anny Leigh Ackerman’s meditation on relationships; whether platonic, monogamous or the exciting possibilities that lay beyond, is a taut and exceptionally crafted movement piece. Her direction, writing and sound design blend clever dialogue and a rhythmic energy the three actors never let slip.

Steph Hume glides about the stage with grace that can morph into a frenetic panic and back again, addressing the audience with questions about the boundaries of our relationships. ‘What if love isn’t limited?’

Ben Robert Cunningham is given the hardest task, that of embodying the neurosis around defending monogamy, at times in scared and pleading tones. A mark of his craft is he carries this off and hints at hidden depths.

River Raiola completes the three-hander, their role mingles interactions between the others excellently; but also sums up the feelings of being an unintentional third-wheel.

The performance doesn’t have a linear plot or concrete answers, it doesn’t have to, ideas such as these work in the abstract, allowing an audience to project their own ideas onto the figurative performance.

Almut Echtler’s costumes are understated and authentic, the clothes of real people. Jack Read’s lighting design gave the set varied dimensions coupled with Archie Sorensen’s sound design that pulsed with a matching intensity. Giulia Pizziol’s design ensures all the elements of the show come together seamlessly.

Monogamy Musings has been developed by Lemon Meringue Theatre & Dracume Theatre. Much attention and thought has gone into the production with an after-show exhibition with talking points and interactive elements, aptly called ‘The Messy Middle’. It felt at times we were witnessing a show that may develop further and change shape – that’s an exciting stage for a theatre group to be in, far too often new theatre plays it safe or relies on old ideas. We look forward to what the company does next.

Simon Jay @NDSreview (Neurodiverse Review)

Monogamy Musings 2024 Team members:
Production Team
Anny Leigh Ackermann – Writer/ Director/ Sound Designer
Giulia Pizziol – Producer/ Set Designer/ Production Manager
Jack Read – Lighting Designer
Almut Echtler – Costume Designer
Archie Sørensen – Sound Designer
Katie Edmundson – Stage Manager
Louis Higgins – Head of Marketing
River Raiola – Dramaturg
James Wood – Producer
Carla Watson – Production Photographer

Cast
Steph Hume – Eleanor
River Raiola – Sam
Ben Robert Cunningham – James

… But they are fluid, and flow into each other.

What I love about the play is its fluidity and its focus on emotions and relationships that refuse to be put into a box. For this reason, the three circles appeared. The circles function not just as a representation of the three kinds of love, platonic, romantic, and sexual, but also as a set of rules from which the director and actors built the movement of the story, rules that can be broken, or remade through the characters’ journey.

From this idea of fluidity came the marble texture: although marble is stone and thus immovable and solid, the colouring reminds one of the sea, with its ever-changing patterns.

One of the few aesthetic references in the script was the presence of glass pots, each filled with a different colour which should not mix to make brown. Pink and blue mix to make purple, and so, the three main colours were established.

My overall aim was to create a realm undefined, a dreamy mind palace in which all the rules but in question… but at what cost?

Giulia Pizziol

Lighting is a powerful tool in telling an audience how to feel about a character. I wanted to approach each character with a sense of neutrality so that the lighting didn’t perceive anyone as a villain. I also had a great time playing around with fun colours to express moments of joy and complicated emotions.

Jack Read

The main aim of the costumes for Monogamy Musings was to add a more naturalistic element to an otherwise rather dream-like staging that doesn’t necessarily suggest any specific space or time.

The costumes are kept within a similar colour palette as well as within the overall colour theme of the show. It is the shapes and silhouettes of the individual costumes that aim to underline each character’s personality and what they represent in the pondering of the connections, overlaps and differences between platonic, romantic and sexual relationships.

Almut Echtler

Many of the songs in the show were chosen during the writing stage of the play, the lyrics acting as a continuation of the poetry and themes. Some personal favourites of the writer, the songs also aid in situating the play in a tangible time and space, contrasting the abstract, dreamlike staging. The sounds embedded into the show, create a soundscape drawing on the natural elements, adding nature sounds and associations of lightness and emotion, while the synthesiser sounds create an eerie, atmospheric feel.

As the sound is so integral to the play, it was incorporated into the rehearsals from the beginning, while constantly evolving.

Anny Leigh Ackermann & Archie Sørensen