Samson Alston and Tom Kelly star in risque play The Credeaux Canvas
Most people shy away from public speaking let alone be naked on stage for more than 20 minutes. So spare a thought for one actor who is starring in his most challenging role yet — a play produced and directed by theatre legend Les Solomon of Narrabeen.
Central Coast
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“If I’m going to start (acting) I might as well go all the way” — Samson Alston has landed his first professional leading role and the character would challenge actors twice his age.
But the 17-year-old, who turns 18 on Saturday, not only accepts he will be naked on stage for more than 20 minutes, he embraces it.
“It’s a freeing experience,” he said.
“I feel free and I feel relaxed. It’s going to be a new experience for me.”
The Credeaux Canvas centres on the lives of three Gen Ys who hatch a plan to dupe a wealthy art connoisseur into buying a forged painting, purportedly by French artist Jean-Paul Credeaux.
The play, by Keith Bunin, is described as a window into the disillusionment of entitled generation Ys in the early 2000s and is laced with humour, sexual tension and a very unusual nude scene.
Alston, of Umina Beach, was invited to read for the role and said he was two months into the project before he was formally offered the lead part of Winston, a bisexual genius artist.
Alston said he was also able to recruit fellow coastie Tom Kelly who will perform the alternate role of Winston’s roommate Jamie, who has been disinherited by his wealthy art-dealing father who’s death sets the pair and Jamie’s girlfriend (played by Rachel Marley) off on their audacious plan.
Kelly will also understudy Alston should the need arise.
The play is being produced and directed by Australian theatre legend Les Solomon of Narrabeen.
The play was initially rehearsed over Zoom meetings and is set to become the first professional production to premiere in Sydney after lockdowns crippled the live entertainment industry.
Alston said people were desperate for live theatre.
The play opens at the El Rocco Café and Theatre in Kings Cross from July 23 with social distancing measures in place including a limit of 24 audience members who enter and exit through separate doors after temperature checks and hand sanitiser.
A gifted surfer who spent a year living in Bali, Alston has chosen to pursue a career in acting and after a trip to New York has been studying under renown drama coach Sheila Gray who invites him at 3.30am Sydney time to join some of the world’s best young actors for a weekly online class.
But Alston said he was stoked to be performing in front of a live audience.
“The best way to learn is to do it,” he said.