An Apocalypse Theatre Production
Asylum: Program 2
The first reading, 63 days (writer, Christopher Bryant, directed by David Burrowes, and readers, Emma Harvie, Eddie McKenna and Samantha Ward), makes effective use of positioning to emphasise its theme. The three readers stand facing the audience: at the centre is Arman the internee, to the left the speaker representing current and conflicted community views of “asylum seekers” and a third speaker on the right represents the government’s official view. While the focus shifts from left to right and back again, Arman, the man, as opposed to that distancing “asylum seeker”, lies curled on the floor grimly battling hunger, rendering both the rather self-satisfied community discussion and the pompous officialese of government policy makers irrelevant in the face of his suffering. Arman who fears imprisonment and torture should he return to his own country, and who is refused entry to another country which interns him indefinitely, chooses to exert the only freedom left to him, that of choosing to die horribly from starvation after 63 days.
A similar theme is presented in Day 48 (written by Cybele McNeil, directed by Charlotte Bradley, and readers, Firdaws Adelpour, Sopa Enari, Jen Gardner, Nadim Kobeissi and Bianca Kostic-London), the third presentation, but placing the emphasis differently. In this reading, a centrally positioned reader appears to be on trial and although not charged with a crime he is being held in indefinite detention. Again official business, this time the management strategies of an off-shore company, is conducted from right to left and back again, obviating his existence as an individual, reducing him to an object. However, the inner life of this “no one” reveals him to be a sensitive, artistic individual who values his country’s proud and rich Persian past but is forbidden to voice respect by a repressive regime. As an internee, he is completely denied the opportunity to put his case, to explain what he “sought” in becoming an “asylum seeker”. He can speak only through denying himself sustenance.
By contrast, Why We Run (writer, Tasnim Hossain, director, Dino Dimitriadis), a monologue (read beautifully by Emma Harvie), engages the audience through the lively and reflective voice of Hind, a young Palestinian-Syrian refugee. Hind is taking part in a highly publicised relay race across the desert to raise consciousness about the plight of Syrian refugees. In the course of her training she meets a young Australian aid-worker who has stepped in at the last minute as a replacement runner, and as they train Hind talks to him about the things that matter to her, most importantly, the sad circumstances of the camp children. She remembers her own Syrian childhood and childhood friend, and through this gives the audience insight into the loss of the familiar, what was the once assumed future of a very able young girl. However, Hind’s most important observation and relevant to her personal effort in the publicity relay, is the ease with which negative acts, such as those of the Islamic State, garner media attention while the plight of thousands of refugees requires an “event” to keep them in the public eye.
Such a spontaneous but horrifying “event” is the focus of the last reading, Flying Fish Cove (writer, Hilary Bell, director, Dino Dimitriadis, and readers, Firdaws Adelpour, Camilla Ah Kin, Nadam Kobeissi, Abi Rayment and Pearl Tan). Composed entirely of the words of witnesses to, and commentators upon, the sinking of a boat off Christmas Island, in which 48 asylum seekers, including children, were drowned, this short piece is deeply affecting. The devastation of the witnesses as they look out beyond the audience at the struggle of human beings to survive the shipwreck renders public opinion and policy alike totally irrelevant.
We, however, are not forced to stand by helplessly while our government continues to uphold policies that submerge humane values beneath a flood of alarmist rhetoric. Unlike the asylum seekers of these powerful readings, we have a voice.
Asylum: Program 2
In Program 2, the Apocalypse ensemble continues to closely examine the issues through the presentation of different perspectives, probing uncomfortable spots in the national psyche and questioning the versions currently offered as “truths” to the community.
One reading to savagely attack the often proffered “truth” that catastrophes are in “the natural order of things” is the fable Missy and her Master (writer, Elias Jamieson Brown, director, Dino Dimitriadis, readers, Camilla Ah Kin and Tom Conroy). A self-centred elderly woman disinterested in her neighbour’s overtures of friendliness, content with her trance-like existence, and obsessively fond of her house-bound cat, is roughly shaken up when Missy discovers her “natural order” (a highpoint in the reading) is quite different to the order opposed by her “owner”. But Missy’s perceived “natural order” proves to have some drawbacks also.
From fable to apparent folktale, Pari Gol (writer, Amir Mohammadi, readers, Ah Kim, Debbie Zuckermann, Kostic-London) is a story of the barbe bleue genre with traditional folk characters. The young innocent, Pari Gol, is married to a rich man who already possesses two wives, one dominant, the other sniveling, a lazy son and a put-upon servant. The kindly Pari Gol is mistreated by the wives, the son attempts to seduce her and Pari Gol’s altruistic attempts to treat the servant as an equal are used by the jealous wives to cast doubt on the fathering of her newly conceived child. Enter the cruel Mullah who has no hesitation in condemning the girl to an enforced abortion and then stoning. So where is the folk ending in which Pari Gol is saved by the faithful servant, who is really a prince under a spell? In fact, as this is reality in Afghanistan where the most brutal expression of misogyny is an institutionalised practice, the servant has fled and innocence and kindliness are sacrificed to preserve the power of the old order. However, she is not without defenders as the Afghani writer, Amir, is her witness.
The very short reading Meena (writer, Noelle Janaczewska, directed Kate Gaul, reader, Suz Mawer) bears witness also to the suffering of mothers who must wait and wait upon the response of an all-powerful government. When will her son be released? What is his crime? Why is he imprisoned? Where is justice? And in responding to her anguish, it is well to be reminded that nobody is invulnerable. As I Could Be You (writer, Hoa Pham, director, Jane Grimley, readers, Kirsty Kiloh, Joanna Jaaniste, Alice Keohavong, Barton Williams and Zohab Khan) emphasises, there are many peoples who have found both their pleas and their protests ignored in our lucky country. Set in the contemporary Maribyrnong Detention Centre, this reading raises the ghost of Australia’s chequered past. The spirit of a grief stricken woman, distractedly passing between German and English, haunts the centre which in the 1950s housed migrant workers. Enticed to Australia by government propaganda as a means of increasing population and decreasing national vulnerability, many were accommodated on this site in the infamous Nissen hut.
To recall, a Nissen hut is a semi-cylindrical structure, made out of corrugated iron and uninsulated, the largest, 20 metres long. The large huts were divided into four cabins with a different family living in each quarter. The cabins were separated by a flimsy partition that allowed families no privacy. Each cabin consisted of two rooms with a bed in each intended to house two adults and possibly a child, but were often home for a family of seven to nine people. There was no private kitchen, laundry or bathroom as these facilities were communal. Many of the “displaced”, as they were called, were contracted to live in these “hostels” for two years and to work at any job allotted them regardless of their actual skills.
Our expedient and punitive past contains many instances – including the internment of German and Japanese during the war – in which complex human situations are treated as logistical problems to be solved by the most pragmatic approach. Behind this particular barbwire we find a Sri Lankan, still detained after six months, a young student from Vietnam arbitrarily arrested as she returns from her part-time job late at night, and Con, a Greek, who stoically accepts his fate as a deportee because after all he has committed an actual offence. So who can we blame for tolerating the fact that “asylum-seeking” is treated as a crime? Meet Pam, of Woolworth’s deli in Self-Service (writer, Rachel Brown, director, Dino Dimitriadis, reader Jan Barr in a stand-out performance). She’s ridiculously funny, she has attitude to technical change in the food retail industry that strikes a sympathetic chord in the audience, she makes fun of acronyms and pompous OH&S policies, and she’s not racist. Not in general, but when Pam has to train Abdul Rasheed, an Afghani refugee, her inability to “manage” the girl becomes apparent and resentment of difference surfaces. She can change however – begrudgingly.
Can we as a nation? The typically pragmatic approach we have taken is based upon finding a solution for groups labelled in various ways, “enemy aliens”, “displaced persons”, “economic refugees” and “illegals” and as a consequence the most effective of the readings were those monologues which highlighted the dreams and hopes of the individual seeker after succour. Bread and Butter (written and directed by Melita Rowston, reader Josipa Draisma in another stand-out deeply and moving performance) is the voice of Maryam formerly from the dangerous environment of Kabul, and now a resident of Marrickville, a location she notices and appreciates. She has retained the vivid memory of making naan with her mother and the process of bread making – the alchemy of flour, water and salt – has become the means through which she soothes her anxieties when she is unable to sleep. Having settled into her new country thankfully, her happiness is completed when she is offered a traineeship at a bakery. She relishes having her own home space, her own things, her independence and apparent safety. But when Australia deems Kabul “safe” for asylum seekers to return to after US forces withdraw from Afghanistan, Maryam’s frail happiness is again threatened. How can Australia deem Kabul safe: for a woman on her own in particular or for any individual? How does a government have the arrogance to believe it can measure safety?
Dino Dimitiriadis must be congratulated on bringing this complex and compassionate response to a most urgent issue of social justice to the public. While theatre is not either able to provide or implement solutions to the asylum seeker question, Asylum does what theatre can do best: places the audience in other people’s shoes and prompts questioning of current “acceptable” attitudes. The sincerity of the project is evidenced by the artists involved waiving their fees so that ticket sales can be donated, in full, to the Asylum Seekers Centre in Newtown & the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre (asrc) in Melbourne.
theatre@ssh.com.au
