Wages of Fear

What price would you accept for a job that could get you killed? Wages of Fear, a play directed by Gorkem Acaroglu and adapted by Shane Grant, asks that very question whilst delving into themes such as masculinity and loyalty. Based on the 1950 novel by Georges Arnaud, this intense and suspenseful thriller performed at Metanoia Theatre follows a group of four European men desperate to get out of the isolated town of Las Piedras.

Set in post-war Latin America, the men were originally lured to the town by an oil pipeline project, but find themselves stranded once the work’s completed. When a fire breaks out at an oil well, the oil company offers them $1000 each to drive two trucks holding nitroglycerine 300 miles to the fire, the only way to extinguish the flames.

The trucks aren’t union authorised and the roads are in terrible condition, the slightest bump could cause the trucks to explode. The men take on this dangerous job knowing it could kill them, but also believe it could be their only way out of the dead-end town. This high-pressure situation reveals the true characters of the men as their sanity becomes increasingly fractured.

This adaptation takes on the ambitious story and executes it well. The ferocity between two of the truck drivers, Gerard (Greg Ulfan) and Johnny (Ange Arabatzis), is extremely captivating. Ulfan is truly scary as Gerard’s sanity declines more and more. The clever set design creates a great backdrop; the truck is almost a character in itself.

The play takes a while to get going. The 1.5 hour production could’ve been condensed so that there wasn’t as much build up to the truck journey, or the story could’ve been fleshed out more and included an interval between acts. Particularly distracting was the over-exaggerated slow motion movements by background characters, taking the focus away from the characters that were speaking. However, the small cast succeeds in keeping the suspense and intensity bubbling away throughout the entire production.

Wages of Fear tells the story of vulnerable people risking their own lives to escape their current situations, a theme still prevalent in today’s society.

Wages of Fear
Metanoia Theatre, 270 Sydney Road, Brunswick
Till Thursday, 29 June 2025
metanoiatheatre.com/event/wages-of-fear