The Age of Bones

The rhythms of the sea pervade this tender but critically astute denunciation of one of our Immigration Department’s most shameful decisions – the jailing of 60 or more young Indonesian boys for working on asylum seeker boats. Darwin based playwright and poet Sandra Thibodeaux identified with the pain their mothers must have felt, especially when she realised their mothers thought their boys had been lost at sea.

“I headed off to Nusa Tengara in eastern Indonesia with the aim of meeting some of these boys and their families. They were extremely poverty-stricken, living in tiny besser block homes with no running water and no electricity.”

In collaboration with creatives based in Indonesia and Australia – and using an eclectic combination of styles and media – Thibodeaux has reached across cultural and theatrical borders to devise a performance that not only expresses the anguish felt by the grieving parents and their boys, but also exposes the stubborn inhumanity of the Australian officials who upheld their incarceration.

Directed by Iswadi Pratama and Alex Galeazzi, the production takes place on a stage set with three sailboats. On the central and largest of these, the sail becomes the screen for multiple projections behind which wayang puppets are expertly manouevered. Together they take the audience from a lonely island somewhere in Indonesia to stormy seas – and an ocean floor inhabited by threatening sea creatures that are used to create the beautiful metaphor that tells the story of one boy, Ikan, and his frightening experiences “Down Under”.

His Australian ‘captors’ are scuba divers, his only friend a hammerhead shark, his defence lawyer a white pointer shark, and the judge who hears his case, an octopus, all of which are doubly portrayed via shadow puppets moving in shimmering ocean depths and intricately designed head-dresses worn with balanced aplomb by the performers.

The story is narrated by an old man of Ikan’s village who has spent his life on the seas. Deri Efwanto creates this character with engaging intimacy and humour. He speaks slowly, patiently, setting a background that encompasses the simplicity and austerity of village life and its dependence on the sea.

Iman Setia Hagi, a young student from Lampung, plays Ikan, finding at first the lazy unwillingness of a 15 year old – and later the fear and distress of being held captive in a foreign land, bereft of his only possession – his shoes – which contain his mother’s mobile phone number.

Kadek Hobman is mesmerizing as both the Hammerhead Shark and the Octopus Judge, his lithe, athletic movement and expressive eyes giving depth to the characters and the head-dresses that he wears with poised confidence.

With Ella Watson-Russell (the Lawyer and the White Pointer Shark) and Mohammad Gandi Maulana, Budi Laksana and Imas Sobariah playing the supporting roles, Ikan’s story unfolds in a combination of images and symbols that are perceptive and yet unsubtly telling.

Though Thibodeaux admits that it is never possible to make theatre quickly enough to achieve the immediacy necessary to effect change, her work is nevertheless poignant and relatively hard-hitting. The image of the immigration officials as nasty, ‘bubble-headed’ divers unable to respond effectively in court is a stark metaphor that is chillingly effective.

Carol Wimmer