REVIEW: The Heartbreak Choir - PIP Theatre

The Heartbreak Choir

Presented by: PIP Theatre

Written by: Aidan Fennessy

Date attended: 18 September 2026

Directed by: Sherryl-Lee Secomb

Produced by: Deidre Grace

Stage Manager: Courtney Farrar

Music Consultant: Jacqui Hall Cuny

Set Design: Regan Henry

Sound Design: Hannah Page

Costume Design: Bill Haycock

Lighting Design: Noah Milne

Composer: Bradley McCaw

Ignite Choir Director: Harmony Wollett

Photography: Kris Anderson (Images by Anderson)

“A choir is not a choir until someone listens.”

I’ve been in enough choirs to understand that it's not just about the music; it's about the people. Week after week, this random collection of voices starts to form a community. That's why the fracture at the centre of The Heartbreak Choir is painful even before we know its cause. Five people have left their old choir over a matter of conscience, but they still need somewhere to belong.

Regan Henry’s set in PIP Theatre drops us into a rural service hall with an upright piano, bulletin board, rusted chairs, toilet door, portrait of Queenie Elizabeth II, and a tiny wall heater valiantly warming only one square metre. I know this room. I’ve rehearsed in this room. Heck, I’ve nibbled on a stale biscuit in this room.

Five oddballs make up the new choir after ditching the town’s original group over a moral dispute. The old choir still rehearses at the church, leaving this tiny town with two choral groups now eyeing the same festival performance. Barbara (Catarina Hebbard), a psychologist and chronic worrier, opens the show fussing over chairs while casually crop-dusting the empty hall. Assini (Brightholly Nininahazwe) is warm, pregnant, and hilariously blunt. Mack (Gemma Galley) is loud and capable of manspreading wider than I’ve ever seen any woman. Her daughter Savannah (Micheal Enright) uses sign when words become difficult. Totty (Deidre Grace) is a complete goober who says whatever comes to mind.

“What should we sing? Nothing that involves testicles.”

Their rehearsals feel like old gal pals catching up over coffee. The ensemble slips easily into that familiarity, with half-finished thoughts bouncing around the room. But every so often the conversation catches. Certain names land awkwardly. Subjects are dodged. Something sour sits underneath the banter... The second act takes a substantial turn from the fart jokes of the opening. Director Sherryl-Lee Secomb plants enough unease beneath the comedy that the later revelations feel like the floorboards finally giving way, not a different play suddenly taking over.

Deidre Grace gets some of the biggest laughs as Totty (short for Charlotte, which is a whole convo of its own). Seemingly bogan yet wealthy and hopeless at reading the room, Totty also keeps the choir afloat. She sorts the logistics, chips in generously, and keeps arriving with food nobody has the heart to tell her is awful. Grace delivers the killer one-liners with total sincerity, blissfully unaware of how funny Totty is.

For me, Gemma Galley is the production’s strongest performer. Mack has the volume of someone who has never worried about being overheard, reacting first and filtering thoughts later. The character is basically a megaphone with a big heart, especially where Savannah is concerned. Their exchanges are affectionate and often wordless (who needs words when you’ve got a mum who can read your mind?). Beneath all that bluster is a mother ready to go full mama bear to protect her child.

Micheal Enright’s Savannah may be the quietest person in the room, but they’re constantly worth watching. When anxiety hits hard, speech can become difficult, So, much of Enright’s work lives in the body, the signing, and small reactions on the sidelines. Then Enright sings “Sing About It”, and that gorgeous voice comes pouring out. I love how Enright portrays a quiet demeanour without implying passivity. Savannah has humour, strong opinions, and a stubborn little streak beneath all those gothic layers. For Savannah, music is the language of comfort, unlocking thoughts and feelings that conversation might otherwise lock away.

Brightholly Nininahazwe (the most amazing name) plays Assini with a lovely steadiness. A Zimbabwean doctor waiting for her qualifications to be recognised in Australia, she’s heavily pregnant and deeply religious. Assini is warm, practical, and has a way of saying exactly what she thinks before anyone has time to brace for it. Nininahazwe delivers those one-liners with a poker face, making them even more hilarious for us. But when the room starts tying itself in moral knots, Assini cuts through the noise with a calm clarity that the others often lack.

The arrival of local cop Peter (Bradley McCaw) changes the temperature in the room. Recently widowed and raising his withdrawn teenage son Beau alone, Peter joins his wife's old choir to keep her close through the music she loved. What he doesn’t realise is that the group knows something about her past that he does not. Peter starts off with an awkward stiffness (his audition for the Brisbane Lions war cry is definitely memorable), but McCaw gradually lets the strain show. He is carrying grief, parenthood, police work, and a son who barely wants to speak to him. How much should he tell Beau? Can he leave the badge at the door when the people involved are those he loves? And can he open up to his wife’s best friend without falling apart?

Benjamin Cole’s Beau has strong “please stop trying to make me talk about my feelings” energy. Dragged into choir life by Peter, he keeps the adults at arm’s length. But as his mum’s story comes into focus, the resistance loosens and anger seeps in. When Beau eventually adds his own voice to the choir, it doesn’t fix anything, but he is finally willing to let these people in.

Barbara (Catarina Hebbard) is the quiet engine of the choir. She runs rehearsals, chooses the songs, checks on everyone, and remains neutral towards the members who stayed behind rather than treating the split like a small-town civil war. Hebbard gives her a wonderfully recognisable kind of anxious competence, always tending to the room and the people in it. As Caro’s best friend and practically an auntie to Beau, she’s carrying grief alongside information that isn’t entirely hers to share. Hebbard is at her best when Barbara is finally left alone with feelings she can’t redirect towards somebody else. Her panic attack, played against the uncooperative little heater, is painfully convincing.

Bill Haycock’s costumes sketch each personality quickly, from Savannah’s gothic layers and Peter’s police uniform to Assini’s bright patterns and the choir scarves. One of the simplest details became one of my favourites. That tiny heater, already hanging over proceedings like the saddest sun imaginable, starts to feel connected to Caro. A patch of warmth in the room. A presence that isn’t physically there. Once I noticed it that way, I couldn’t stop seeing her in it. I totally get symbolism.

Jacqui Hall Cuny’s music consultation and Hannah Page’s sound design keep the songs rooted in this scruffy room. McCaw’s original composition brings that idea home in the finale. The Ignite Choir, led by Harmony Wollett, emerges from the shadows and joins the cast onstage, their voices suddenly blooming from what had been a small, fractured group. McCaw accompanies at the piano as the song swells around him. “You are the voice coming through the darkness” could hardly find a more fitting home.

Writer Aidan Fennessy described The Heartbreak Choir as a celebration, and I understand what he means. Not because these people have fixed everything. Some wounds remain open. Some questions don’t receive satisfying answers. The celebration is that they come back. They drag out the crappy chairs. And they sing.

As someone who understands the need to belong to a group, this show gets me. Music can’t undo what happened in this town, but for a couple of hours in a rural hall beside one determined little heater, it gives these people somewhere to put their voices.