Even in the criminal underworld, it’s the women who get left to clean up the mess made by the boys.
A meeting goes wrong. A bloodbath ensues.

Who ya gonna call? Sophia (Alice Livingstone) and Erin (Alisha O’Brien), professional crime scene cleaners with a difference. They arrive before the police and take care of the evidence: the incriminating fingerprints, the tell-tale arterial sprays and pools of blood, the spent bullet casings. Even the bodies.

But this particular job comes with complications, the most obvious being that one of the dead gangsters (Brendan Kater) isn’t any of those things. Happily, Sophia has a number she can call, albeit reluctantly, in just such an eventuality.

Enter Ferryman (Sonya Kerr), a specialist in disposing of the more troublesome details.

Alice Livingstone and Alisha O’Brien in Next to Godliness. Photo © Bob Seary

Winner of New Theatre’s 2023 Silver Gull Award for new writing, Alastair Brown’s black comedy inserts the notion of “women’s work” into the male-dominated world of cinematic gangland violence. It also makes a playful connection between the present and the ancient past, in the form of three reanimated corpses (Jessica Carter, Sophie Newby and Harrison Collis-Oates) who function as a kind of Greek chorus, commenting on the action from beyond the grave.

Director Madeleine Withington keeps things moving across the production’s 80 or so minutes, and the three central performances are strong enough to carry us through the occasional flat spot. Livingstone and O’Brien establish a convincing working relationship, negotiating the grimly practical business of their trade with an air of professional competence that contrasts strongly with the male-generated carnage all around them.

For all its heightened, Tarantino-esque vibes and handfuls of red confetti (nice touch), the play is not entirely divorced from the realities beyond its blood-smeared set. Our cleaners may operate in an exaggerated cinematic underworld, but the gendered division of labour they expose is recognisable enough. The men make the mess; the women are expected to deal with the consequences. As Withington observes, when things have to get bloody, it’s “best ask someone who menstruates”.

Next to Godliness. Photo © Bob Seary

Tom Bannerman’s design adds another layer of visual unease. Large, opaque window panels slide back and forth, repeatedly concealing and revealing the action. The effect creates a sense of shifting perspective, at times recalling the famous Jaws/Vertigo dolly zoom, and gives the production a suitably unstable visual frame.

It’s an effective production overall: darkly funny, occasionally overextended, but carried by committed performances and an enjoyably warped premise.

Next to Godliness plays at New Theatre, Newtown Sydney until 31 October.