HUBRIS & HUMILIATION

About the show

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a down-on-her-luck mother (who has just lost her home to a shady online suitor) must send her only son to Sydney to find and marry a wealthy man. Jane Austen’s drawing rooms and country estates are switched out for the dizzying dancefloors and leafy avenues of post-plebiscite Sydney in Lewis Treston’s outrageously funny Hubris & Humiliation. This laugh-out-loud comedy is a kaleidoscopic pastiche of Jane Austen’s writing and an outrageous satire of life and love in the Emerald City’s pumping gay scene. Elliott, a naive wallflower from the Sunshine State, spends all his time pining for his best friend until he’s unexpectedly packed up and shipped off to his fabulously wealthy uncle’s Kirribilli mansion to pick up a few dating tips, and bag the man of his (mother’s) dreams. A series of increasingly ludicrous and high-stakes events take Elliott and his stowaway sister Paige from the rainbow mile, all the way to Berlin, and back again in a high-camp exploration of love, family and commitment. Helpmann Award-winning director Dean Bryant returns to STC with a hilarious cast for this fantastic and boisterous tale of one man’s search for his other half, and himself. It’s Muriel’s Wedding-meets-Kath & Kim with all the queer fabulousness of Priscilla Queen of the Desert, topped off with a twist of nineteenth century charm.