Jesikah is a troubled teenage girl who wants to be successful in a band or as an actress, but she is unaware of her limitations and arrogantly believes she knows better than the adults around her.

She is the title character in this new play by young, but quite experienced, playwright Phillip Kavanagh which was commissioned by the State Theatre Company of South Australia under its State Education program.

Kate Cheel (Hedda Gabler, Brief Encounter) plays Jesikah and it is to her credit that I didn’t recognise her in the role; she is a convincing teenager, though it is hard to warm to a character who is deceitful, a liar, bitchy and nasty, even to her closest friend. Cheel captures the multi-faceted complexity of Jesikah and, at different times, she is heart-broken, a bully, a friend, confused, lost, optimistic and vitriolic.

Elizabeth Hay is Denise, the loyal, sweet but dim friend; a role that’s a little too stereotypical and American in its almost television-sit-com characterisation. The teenage audience members I spoke to also couldn’t understand why she was dressed in a soft, pink, fluffy outfit that perhaps suited the ’60s more than now; if Jesikah is about the media pressures on the modern generation, then it seems an odd costuming choice.

Hay shows her versatility when she plays Jesikah’s mother and her drama teacher, and any inconsistencies in characterisation lie more with the script than the performer.

The staging of Jesikah relies on the teenager presenting herself to a camera as if she were recording on YouTube or an internet chat site. Upstage we see a large screen view of  what she records, but the screen did not, in fact, add to or enhance the performance. Towards the end of the play, the repetition of talking to the camera became tedious; the kind of inane material people record on the internet – such as speaking in bad accents, acting out home-made scripts or verbally attacking others – doesn’t make for engaging theatre.

Theatrical teenagers can behave atrociously to their peers and adults, but some of the scenes lacked credibility: Jesikah isn’t cast as Macbeth, she lies about her teacher, visits her teacher at her home and is then re-cast in the title role. The final scene is melodramatic and unsatisfying, making it is very hard to feel anything for any character.

Cheel and Hay are a talented duo; I hope we see more of them in future productions and that the State Theatre Company of SA continues to promote new works and new directors. Cheel’s performance of Jesikah is powerful in showing her frustrations with life that lead her to self-harm, but the fact that she seems to be doing it for effect and to manipulate others adds a level of confusion in the play and diminishes our response.

Is Jesikah a victim of some terrible social pressure to excel or is she just a girl behaving badly? And, more worryingly, after seeing this play, are we concerned?

Jesikah is playing at the Adelaide Festival Centre’s Space Theatre until May 31. It will also tour metropolitan Adelaide and SA regional centres.