Joanne Richards' first play You Can't Tell Anyone takes place at a turning point in a teenager's life: the end of school party, which marks a life transition.
"I find the changes in relationships interesting, I feel that moment is quite poignant," Richards said.
People who have been together for years - perhaps their whole lives - are about to go their separate ways into the future. Some might remain friends; others will not, having only come together because they happened to be in the same classes at the same school. The party will be the last time many of them see each other.
But in this play, it will be no ordinary party.
Gwen (played by Ella Buckley), a driven type-A personality who's been deeply affected by a recent tragedy, is having an end-of-year-12 party at her house with no adult supervision.
Her younger sister Tilly (Emily O'Mahoney) is there and so are some of the people she's grown up with, including jock Luke (Isaiah Prichard), sweet Willa (Jessi Gooding), smart and blunt Kat (Paris Scharkie), flamboyantly gay Benny (Lachlen Houen) and mediocre Jeremy (Jake Robinson).
A surprise guest is Gwen's estranged best friend Nicole (Breanna Kelly), invited by Benny.
"He thought it would be funny," Richards said.
Gwen is insistent they play a game, and the one chosen is Paranoia.
"It's a real game," said Richards, who has played it.
There are various versions - in the one played here, one person whispers into another's ear a "who" question about someone in the room.
It could be fairly innocuous ("Who has the weirdest taste in music?"), controversial ("Who is the prettiest girl in the room?") or hurtful ("Who is the phoniest person here?") - and the other answers aloud with the name of the person they've been asked about.
Then they flip a coin: if it's heads, the question is revealed; tails, it isn't.
Everyone wonders what was asked, if it isn't revealed, or ponders the question if it is, and another person whispers another question.
As answers and questions are revealed the tensions among the teenagers rise.
They begin to wonder whether they are messing with each other, being candid to the point of cruelty, or whether something more sinister, even supernatural, is at work.
Richards, an actor who's worked around Canberra and on TV, was awarded Canberra Youth Theatre's first Emerging Playwrights Commission in 2021, receiving a stipend for and the development and production of a new play.
Richards, 30, looked to the young actors - who are in their teens and early 20s - for contemporary slang and conversation style.
There's a lot of overlapping dialogue and people speaking at once.
"It's how teenagers talk," Richards said.
Ensuring the audience heard the essentials was the work not only of Richards and the actors but of Caitlin Baker, 22, making her CYT directorial debut.
Baker was a Resident Artist with Canberra Youth Theatre in 2022 after taking part in CYT's pre-professional Emerge Company program.
She has directed shows at ANU and been an actor in and assistant on several productions around town.
Baker said You Can't Tell Anyone - which unfolds in one act in real time - was about the period when young people began to "pretend" adulthood and to work out themselves and their identities and values.
"It's about the child we were, the adult we're becoming, and desperately finding a way to make them meet in the middle," Baker said.
She added that it is also about not being too hard on ourselves in the process.
"It's really, really hard to be an adult."
You Can't Tell Anyone is on at the Courtyard Studio, Canberra Theatre Centre from August 10 to 20, various dates and times. Suitable for ages 15+. Content advisory: This production includes adult themes and scenes that may be disturbing to some viewers. See: canberratheatrecentre.com.au.
