In the modern classic Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? actors Kat Stewart and David Whiteley show audiences a marriage from hell.
As the middle-aged Martha and George, they invite a younger couple over for late-night drinks, at the same time serving up a dissection of their partnership, along with some humiliation and very black comedy.
The real-life theatre couple promises three hours of onstage savagery isn't as challenging for their relationship as one might imagine - Stewart explains the tension between their characters falls away as soon as the makeup and costumes come off.
"There's no time, you've got to sleep, get the kids to school the next day and go back to normal life," Whiteley says.
Another real-life couple, Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton famously starred in the celebrated 1966 film version, prompting widespread speculation they didn't have to act much to portray their tumultuous relationship.
Stewart and Whiteley became a couple while working together during the early days of Melbourne's Red Stitch theatre, with Stewart returning to the ensemble for Virginia Woolf.
Red Stitch first staged the Edward Albee masterpiece at its 80-seat theatre in late 2023 - a stage the size of a bathmat, according to director Sarah Goodes.
It sold out before opening night and garnered rave reviews, so for the first time in 23 years, the company decided to re-stage a production in a commercial venue, the 1000-seat Comedy Theatre.
For both actors it's the biggest audience they have performed in front of and Whiteley described the preview performances as one of the strangest experiences of his life.
"Wonderful and terrifying and strange all at once," he told AAP.
"Just like the play," added Stewart, who said the script has acquired a deeper meaning for her in middle age.
"It is fundamentally a love story, that love is imperfect, life is imperfect, it's full of disappointments and missed opportunities," she said.
"But you want to grab the hand of the person next to you when the plane is hurtling down."
With Australia's commercial theatre scene long dominated by musicals, the hope for backers GWB Entertainment and Andrew Henry is audiences can find room to see the classics of modern theatre.
The success of Death of a Salesman starring Anthony LaPaglia, which played in Melbourne and Sydney to rave reviews, is a recent example of this kind of project.
The key is to entice audiences with a great play and recognisable actors, according to GWB executive producer Rob Brookman.
"We want to be doing more drama on a commercial scale, we want to work with high-profile artists and we want to do great productions," Brookman told AAP.
Goodes would like more larger-scale independent productions developed outside the state theatres - a kind of Australian off-Broadway.
"It'd be great if we could have that here a bit more, so artists have more an opportunity to work and much larger audiences have the opportunity to see to see their work," she said.
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? opens Wednesday and runs until July 21.
Australian Associated Press
