With Adam Fawcett leading the charge and renowned for works like Elegy, Men on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown and Become the One, Lab Kelpie’s latest production, Every Lovely Terrible Thing, arrives with lofty expectations.

Fawcett’s penchant for exploring queerness and trauma with a blend of domesticity and humour, promises work that is deeply passionate and deeply personal.

Lab Kelpie’s Every Lovely Terrible Thing. Photo © Pia Johnson

The production, directed by Justin Notts, kicks off with an eerie tableau: Cooper and their grandmother Jerica (Megan Jones), draped in satin robes and sheet masks, lounge in the glow of their television screen. The arrival of Cooper’s parents, Charles and Phoebe, triggers muffled commotion, followed by the unexpected return of the prodigal daughter, Brit.

Meanwhile, in the shadows, a mysterious figure in a cowboy hat brandishes a shotgun. Tension mounts and a gunshot pierces, signalling the onset of a drama-filled evening.

In classic melodrama fashion, there are plenty of explosive confrontations (fly-screen doors slamming shut; cutting remarks dispatched). In this production, this is balanced by the familial tenderness of laundry folding and cold glasses of Milo guzzled on plastic chairs. Cooper, played...