The Institute Building — North Terrace’s oldest cultural building — is the ideal location for this show. Entering through the giant wooden doors of the Circulating Library feels like being transported through time. The walls are lined floor to ceiling with vintage books, creating a cosy, slightly mysterious atmosphere that sets the scene for storytelling.
We’re seated in a semi-circle. In front of us, to the left, is a desk and laptop. To the right, an assembly of electronic equipment. On a table in the centre sits a doll house, its facade covered with small, square pieces of white fabric. All elements help stitch together the story of one family and its roots using spoken word, soundscape (played and sung live by Jack Brett), projections, and miniature tableaux revealed room by room as the narrative unfolds.
Casey Jay Andrews, multi-award-winning UK writer, designer and theatre-maker, is familiar to local audiences, with A Place That Belongs to Monsters winning the 2023 Adelaide Fringe Best Theatre Award. She returns to Adelaide for the Australian premiere of Oh My Heart, Oh My Home after playing to full houses in Edinburgh and Washington DC. The work asks some significant questions. How do we cope when it’s the beginning of the end? How can we reconnect with what’s already gone?
Andrews, with irresistible passion and openness, introduces Freddie, a young woman who is travelling back to the home of her grandparents — a place bursting with happy childhood memories. Grandpa Howard and his Scottish terrier Otto now live alone in the house where “the treetops touch the stars”, and it’s here that an encounter with the Leonid meteor shower sets in motion events that unearth a secret. It’s a little show about very big ideas. Leading us through constellations one minute then back to solid ground the next, Andrews uncovers the power of “being in the presence of something vast” and the joy to be found in the simple moments of a life.
At any moment, we’re perched on the precipice of change. Our safety is fragile. In Howard’s messy study, council project notes hold more meaning than mere physical relics of his much-missed wife. They’re a glimpse of the “collected tapestry of the town’s memories”. Oh My Heart, Oh My Home is a window into a world and a captivating view into the cosmos beyond. Precious things could be anywhere, you just need to know what you’re looking at.
This perfectly polished piece of theatre is an engrossing, thought-provoking jewel that will change your view of the night sky.
Oh My Heart, Oh My Home is showing at the Circulating Library (at State Library) at The Courtyard of Curiosities at the Migration Museum until March 16
Read more 2025 Adelaide Fringe coverage here on InReview