The winner of the 2022 Silver Gull Play Award gets a belated airing (it was programmed in the KXT 2023 season … then wasn’t), courtesy of New Theatre.

Xavier Coy, a Sydney-based writer living with Bipolar disorder himself, compresses the deep depressions and manic highs a person might experience over a few days into the space of just one – from pills at breakfast time to the prospect of rather more pills (and bottle of tequila) before bed. At 90 minutes, Fighting is quite a rollercoaster ride.

Jay James-Moody in Fighting. Photo © Chris Lundie

He (Jay James-Moody) works in a mobile phone franchise but our subject’s major relationship is with the voices in his own head, represented here by Sophie Highmore (who ranges from optimistic to hypomanic) and David Woodland, who voices the cynical, self-destructive side of the equation.

They shadow him constantly, like angels on his shoulders, as he navigates the day’s pressure points: selling phone plans to strangers; an accidental meeting with an old flame; a dinner date with possibilities.

Coy (also directing) packs a lot of ups and...