Back to Bilo

If you think your vote doesn’t make a difference, you need to find out about the Nadesalingam family – and this world premiere of a new Australian play for Brisbane Festival at QT is a good place to start. This is a story whose ending was uncertain right up until just weeks before opening night. Priya and Nades separately fled war-torn Sri Lanka and painful pasts, risking their lives to come to Australia as refugees. They married in Queensland country town, Biloela, settled into the community, made friends, and started a family. But their new life was shattered by a dawn raid that started a four-year living hell of detention. But their friends in Biloela – mainly local women – joined forces to campaign to bring the family ‘back to Bilo’. While the Morrison government procrastinated and assured the public that they would be safe to return to Sri Lanka, the family’s suffering was ignored, and one of their young children was admitted to hospital suffering tooth rot and malnutrition – a shameful indictment of their treatment in detention.

The story may be complicated by politics, past and present, but the simple heart is the compassion from the Biloela community, some risking their jobs to be part of the ongoing campaign – people power in action. This theatrical piece is about the power of a rural community, but also the strength of a collaborative theatrical community. The story is brought to the stage by an impressive team. Written by Katherine Lyall-Watson from Belloo Creative and produced by Performing Lines, this play is the result of years of research and cooperation between the creative team, the Nadesalingam family, and the people of Biloela. From a concept by Matt Scholten, Belloo Creative was enlisted for their experience of making Queensland-based work using verbatim scripts. Back to Bilo is based on extensive interviews with the Biloela community. Hopefully this can form part of the healing process for the family and Biloela citizens too.

Also involved are Dramaturg, Kathryn Kelly, and Director, Caroline Dunphy, who have helped shape the raw material with the performers – a fabulous group of actors, starting with Leah Vandenberg as Priya and Matt Domingo as Nades, who bring the couple’s warmth and humour to the stage. These are not TV soap opera characters: they are complicated humans who have experienced trauma in their past, but who retain hopes and dreams. Leah trained in Perth at WAAPA but is also a Master of International and Community Development, and Matt is a qualified medical doctor! I really enjoyed their performances and I hope it won’t be too long before we see them both back on the stage at QT. To create the Biloela community we have experienced and versatile QT performer, Liz Buchanan, with two performers making their QT debuts, Sarah McIntosh and Erika Naddei. This trio emit the heart of the Bilo community, while also multi-tasking to play many supporting characters in politics and the media. I thoroughly enjoyed all the performances – although I would have preferred to see Leah and Matt dedicated to Priya and Nades (however, Leah’s Peter Dutton was hilarious, and Matt did make a convincing ScoMo). A nice touch was the Asian-infused soundtrack, with music composer Menaka Thomas also playing a role as Uru, a version of a Hindu/Buddhist goddess, who presides over the events, giving strength in the darkest moments.

Also helping to bring the story to the stage are: set and lighting design by Govin Ruben; costumes and props by Keerthi Subramanyam; sound design and composition by Guy Webster, with sound realiser Brady Watkins; video design by Mic Gruchy; Biloela video content Shaun Charles; Tamil consultants Vashini Jayakumar and Sudhesh Somu; and assistant director Janaki Gerard.

The verbatim technique may jar at times, leaving less room for dramatised character conversations. Combined with the extensive use of video clips, this can make the piece feel like a mini-doco. As the writer has pointed out, this is a theatre piece, not a six-part TV series, so it tells what it can of the story in 70 minutes. But what the theatre can often achieve over TV and film is an immediate engagement of hearts and minds. In a scene where candles are passed out so the audience can participate in a vigil for the family, I heard many tears being shed across the packed auditorium.   

Many of Back to Bilo’s creative team are making their debuts with QT, on this Queensland-based story, which is what I personally long to see in the programming for Brisbane Festival. The Festival’s outgoing Artistic Director, Louise Bezzina, can be proud that this production is part of her creative legacy.

Find out more: queenslandtheatre.com.au/plays/back-to-bilo

Beth Keehn

Photographs by Morgan Roberts