Concrete Playground

It's a familiar tale: a pregnant girl and her boyfriend, still almost kids themselves, running away from home and family to escape punishment for their forbidden love. With not much knowledge, few skills and a fledgling dependence on each other, they attempt to learn what they're missing and raise their child in a harsh and unforgiving world. Here, however, the couple are four centuries into the future. The community that they have been forced to flee has retreated into the Australian desert, due to climate change, and has reverted to traditional Aboriginal practices in order to survive. In short, this play is an Aboriginal, post-apocalyptic Romeo and Juliet — with child.

An unconventional storyline demands an unconventional form, which this production has done exceptionally well. In a blend of theatre, dance, video, shadow-making, object design and music, the fractured, imperfect and multidimensional culture which this couple shares is richly presented. Rather than being a random collection of media, this is a powerful and representative blend of contemporary Indigenous and mainstream cultural and artistic forms. Windmill and Big hART, the two companies involved in this project, have deeply engaged with two Indigenous communities in the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) lands, and it shows. The Aboriginal dances, songs, shadow-making and sand paintings are presented by both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal performers with great skill and sensitivity.

Don't let this make you take Nyuntu Ngali too seriously, however. Much of the performance will leave you unsure of whether to laugh or cry. The child is named Petrol, both literally for his addictive smell, and as a means of exploring whether it is really Aboriginal culture or contemporary white culture which is more obsessed with this black, liquid gold.

Nyuntu Ngali is a rare find: a truly cross-cultural production which communicates and celebrates contemporary Indigenous culture as powerful, playful and multifaceted. The performers and those who have worked behind them are incredibly generous, and I'd suggest taking them up on their offer.

Image by Tony Lewis.