Fearless Conversations: Shared stories and the future of the arts in South Australia

Our state has a proud history of pushing boundaries in the arts – now industry experts say we’re on the brink of an exciting new era that will transform the stories we tell.

The real test for Australian drama will be “the next plays – the plays that come after your story,” says Flinders University drama professor and theatre historian Dr Chris Hay.

That means authors from diverse backgrounds writing works which progress from sharing past First Nations or migrant experiences, or life as a queer or disabled person, to create new stories which look forward and deal with different subjects and genres from a fresh perspective.

Authenticity and Identity on the Australian Stage was the subject of the final panel in this year’s Fearless Conversations program, which also featured Noongar actor and writer Carissa Lee, Tutti Arts creative director and disability advocate Gaelle Mellis, and frequent State Theatre Company director Nescha Jelk.

Authors such as Michelle Law, whose play Single Asian Female was recently directed by Jelk, had spoken about how not everything she writes is taken directly from her life, but it was obviously informed by her lived experiences.

“As companies and as institutions we have to support those artists through to the play that has nothing to do with their cultural identity – but is written from that viewpoint,” Dr Hay says.

“That’s what we are hoping to see across the next couple of years: That these amazing breakout hit plays, that have really activated cultural context, are followed up by genuine investment in what else this person has to say.”

Juanita Navas-Nguyen, Fiona Choi and Elvy-Lee Quici in Single Asian Female by the State Theatre Company. Picture: Matt Byrne

This needed to be matched by a shift in the approach to casting productions.

“A couple of decades ago the vogue term in the theatre industry was ‘colourblind casting’ … this idea that we should be blind to any kind of difference,” Dr Hay said.

That meant that a role should be open to persons from any sort of diverse background, including race.

“Pleasingly, what we have moved towards … is what artists like Suzan-Lori Parks, who is a great American playwright, call ‘colour conscious casting’.

“Folks of diverse identities come to us with unique powers. If we can position those in interesting ways within our work, then we open out all these different conversations about seeing things differently, about experiencing the world differently.”

Dr Hay said recent international TV series and films where artists of colour or other diverse identities had occupied central roles “have made people experience the past differently”.

“I think Bridgerton is the obvious example there.”

Dr Hay said the Australian stage was starting to cast actors beyond the characteristics of their own identity.

“In the previous decade or previous centuries, you would see characters of diverse identities – but that was the extent of their characterisation,” he said.

“What we are seeing now … is that people are transcending those identities and it’s not the first character note.

“You don’t open the dramatis personae and it says ‘Asian character’ or ‘gay character’. It’s just a character, who happens to have various identity positions that intersect in interesting ways or that can make for interesting dramatic situations.”

On Australian screens, Indigenous culture and characters had begun to appear in genre films and series, such as science fiction in Cleverman, horror films like The Moogai, and the vampire series Firebite.

Lee, who is also the editor for Indigenous X and First Nations editor at The Conversation, says the way to build on this is simply to “tell more black stories”.

“Organise ways for mob (First Nations people) to work in cross-cultural collaborations, where people can learn together,” Lee says.

“Having to be cast as the noble savage, the victim … these kinds of old tropes are really injuring.

“We need … to find the stories that are important to us, and we are (then) able to have those honest conversations and say, ‘This is what we really want to say’. That’s the question that a lot of theatre companies are starting to ask: What are the stories you want to tell?”

Rob Collins as Tyson in Firebite, which was shot in Coober Pedy. Picture: Ian Routledge

Nescha Jelk recently directed State Theatre Company’s production of the hit play Single Asian Female, written by Michelle Law, the child of migrants from Hong Kong and Malaysia.

“Never before have I had people coming up to me, telling me how much that play meant to them personally,” says Jelk.

“Asian Australian artists and also just audience members … had been hanging out for this play to come to Adelaide.”

Jelk, who is also co-founder of RUMPUS theatre and one half of the two-person company Tiny Bricks, says this is because different cultural groups wanted to see their stories represented on stage.

Simple details in the play, like the ritual of taking shoes on and off, made audiences from similar Asian backgrounds feel as if they were being seen.

“But for Single Asian Female … to be such a national groundbreaking work in that way, in the 2020s, is really a sign that there’s a lot further to go, when you think how long Asian-Australians (have been here),” Jelk says.

“In the last 10 or 20 years we are seeing more different voices being at the forefront of telling those stories.

“We are seeing more diversity in our playwrights, in particular, being able to write stories of other lived experiences which haven’t been on our stages … and being able to tell those stories with that authenticity.”

Breaking the barrier of fear among audiences

Fear of disability had led to its continued under-representation on the Australian stage and screen, says acclaimed theatre designer, creative director and disability advocate Gaelle Mellis.

“There have been studies done that (found) more people fear disability than they do death,” Mellis told this year’s final Fearless Conversations panel. “Most Australians will spend seven or eight years with an impairment. You may be non-disabled now, but you are probably very unlikely to get through your whole life being a non-disabled person.”

Mellis, who lives with a disability, has also created designs for mainstream productions for more than 25 years and most recently won a 2020 Ruby Award for the SA arts sector and the prestigious 2020 Australia Council National Arts and Disability Award for an established artist.

Last year, Mellis was appointed as the new creative director for Tutti Arts, which works across multiple art forms to promote the professional development of artists with a learning or intellectual disability.

Set and costume designer Gaelle Mellis. Picture: Brenton Edwards

She says Australia is only just beginning to bring the work of disabled performers to mainstream audiences.

“We don’t have disabled people getting into our training institutions. We need to address that. They’ve got to come through different pathways, and we really need to support those different pathways. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been told over the years, ‘Why would you train disabled actors? There are no roles for them’.

“Disabled people (characters) were often played by non-disabled people and were often a metaphor to drive the story. Often we are there to teach someone else a lesson.”

Mellis says that under-representation establishes “damaging cultural norms” that perpetuate the exclusion of disabled people.

“To not see yourself tells you that you are not part of society, that you are not valued, and that you are ‘other’,” she says.

“I know of an eight-year-old child that was so disturbed and upset that they had never seen an adult character with their impairment type on TV – she didn’t think she’d live to be an adult. That’s why it’s really important.”

Representation on stage and screen was only one aspect of the need for change. Disabled people needed to be present everywhere from the creative process to the boardroom, Mellis said.

“The biggest topic of discussion in the film industry is diversity,” she says. “We can be very proud here … that the South Australian Film Corporation were the first to release their 10-year diversity strategy, so they are really committed to systemic change, not token things. It is so exciting.’’

Pandemic created new arts pathways

Covid changed the way the performing arts industry had to deliver content and how audiences consumed it, creating new paths which will continue to affect the way Australian stories are conceived and presented.

Live streaming, YouTube videos and interactive online projects might not replace post-pandemic theatre performances, but would continue to augment the experience, say this year’s final Fearless Conversations panellists.

“I hope that people continue to create content that can be delivered on multiple platforms, in multiple ways,” says Tutti Arts creative director and disability advocate Gaelle Mellis. “What Covid meant for some disabled people was they could actually access stuff like they hadn’t been able to before. “Bring on a bit of innovation, and do it differently.”

Flinders University drama professor Dr Chris Hay said Covid lockdowns had also created “a democratisation of content creation”.

“Everybody was reduced to the same thing: the national theatre was having to upload things to YouTube, and so was your teenage kid in his bedroom. Equally, they could both be seen by the same people. That really showed us that gatekeeping organisations have lost a bit of their power in this world,” he said.

“That’s exciting, because it means that things get seen, produced and disseminated in ways that bypass structures that have historically not allowed for diverse viewpoints or other intersectional identities to be as represented.”

He hoped that would continue to allow for a more democratic approach to content creation.

Director Nescha Jelk said pandemic innovation had also enabled greater access to work for regional communities.