Grounded
written by George Brant
“Director, Victor Kalka has given us a version [...] that has wisely put very few barriers between the page and the heart.””
When an ace F16 fighter pilot unexpectedly falls pregnant, her career in the sky ends. Upon returning from leave, she is reassigned to operate military drones from a windowless trailer outside Las Vegas, sitting in the desert in Nevada whilst hunting terrorists in Afghanistan - fighting a war and still returning to her family each night. As the pressure to track a high-profile target mounts, the boundaries begin to blur between the desert in which she lives and the one she patrols half a world away.
written by George Brant
directed by Victor Kalka
with Alice Birbara as 'The Pilot'
Robot Sparrow Theatre Company, Sydney Fringe Festival 2016
“With great sophistication and professionalism, Alice Birbara’s performance is close to perfection, absorbing the audience into the pilot’s inner self, into the anxiety and imbalance of a disturbed world. Patches of dazed lines, trembling tears, screams and fatal breakdowns make for a heart-breaking, yet strangely beautiful, tragedy of identity-lost. Watching Birbara’s performance is like observing a musician composing symphony.”
