By Jennifer Beasley.
The mutability of time and space is recreated in this extraordinary meta play that intertwines and merges four Larrakai mothers, Country, The Dreaming and Dream.
You don’t often see the playwright also directing their play, but Jada Alberts (Brother Wreck) has done an incredible job. The play Black Light, is both a homage to their upbringing in the lands of Darwin/Larrakai Country, and a love letter to their maternal roots. Indeed, it is difficult at times to separate between that love of Country and female stewardship, such is the fusion presented by the four powerhouse women who occupy the stage for its 90-minute run time.
Black Light is also a clever play on words, referring to the ‘Black Light’ or ultra-violet light used to detect invisible strands.
The premise describes a world on the brink of disaster, as lights flicker, sirens sound, and the three generations of four First Nations women; Elder Nan racked by dementia and played convincingly by Trisha Morton-Thomas (and I commend the power of her acting), alcoholic and sarcastic Aunty acted by the luminous Rachael Maza (Radiance), her fractious and work driven avoidant sister Mum and also acted by real life sister Lisa Maza (Hide The Dog), and granddaughter Bub, who is grappling with her own inner demons dealing with an abusive father and a mother, Evelyn, who has gone missing, presumed dead.
Tahlee Fereday (Videoland) acts convincingly as Bud, a young aboriginal mother whose relationship with her female partner has ended. It must have been a slap in the face that the partner, Bec, has moved onto a man, yet interestingly, Alberts has decided not to explore the emotional impact of this, nor the character arcs of the older sisters.
Instead, in this Meta play that centres monologues and soliloquies, we enter Nan’s world. She is an Elder, a steward of the Country and Sacred Knowledge. Infused with Indigenous mysticism, the Colonial concept of time and space is rejected, the trauma and hardships spat upon, as Nan states to her daughters and granddaughter that ‘Country is magic and magic is love.’
Placed on a stage designed by the wonderful Dale Ferguson, that beautifully encapsulates the timeless beauty and unknowingness of Australia, with a huge duck egg blue backdrop that flows seamlessly onto the floor, and rocks, ageless, timeless, that semi-circle the right side of the stage, Nan commands at the outside dining setting with gentle beauty underneath a verandah. This spectacular set is perfect for this play. It doesn’t state the exact place or time, yet it can be either the eternal sky, the endless sea, or the unknowing expanse of night. Brilliant.
Using the props of a wheelchair and a 4-wheeled walker, Nan’s deteriorating condition hits both the women present and the audience. The flickering lights and power blackouts give clues to her health, this last bastion of Sacred Knowledge.
I must admit I was deeply affected by Morton-Thomas’s performance, with my own mother in palliative care, and although this play speaks of Black motherhood, the themes of love and stewardship remain the same.
Dramatic lighting shifts the day/night sequence yet holds the play when it needs that dream quality, is done to perfection by Jenny Hector (Miracle, Madelaine), with striking sound by Kelly Ryall (Animal, More Than This), who never disappoints.
This play can be interpreted in many ways. I felt that Nan was in Dream, that somnolent state that is both mystical and the result of dementia, as the impending disaster is both the cyclical nature of Indigenous mutability of space and time and heralds not only the advent of Colonial Ingress, Nan’s degeneration and future loss, but also the transference of Knowledge, the fierce determination to listen to Country, watch the Brolga’s and the slow shift of land which speaks of now and not-now, and time as fluid as the actors flowing across the stage.
This surreal feeling seeps throughout the play, as the sisters snipe back and forth, Bub constantly goes off stage to tend to these invisible children, yet all the while Nan conjures these ghosts- her Kin, lost children (including Mum, Aunty and Bub) and an age that roils under the baking soil.
With evident anger, Mum and Aunty, ‘love drunk on rage’, criticise the colonial imprisonment where they are not allowed to be ‘black on the inside,’ before Aunty addresses the audience, her anger Nan’s anger, her voice the heritage of a ravaged people, where linear time, trauma and alcohol have been fostered upon them.
My companion said she felt attacked by this monologue, which points to the extraordinary power of the speech. I could only concur with the playwright, as the tendrils of my Bunurong and Booandik (Bungandidj) tribe mix with colonial DNA, but causes me to wonder, how do you find peace between lineal and cyclical time?
We can only wait for time, under the glorious blue Australian sky.
A standing ovation and well worth viewing and kudos to Associate Director Jessica Arthur, Assistant Director Tomas Parrish-Chynoweth and Dramaturg Keziah Warner for their amazing input. It takes a lot of passionate people to get a production up to this level. As well Voice and Text Coach Suzanne Heywood who helped make this play sing. Excellent.
Black Light is playing at Malthouse Theatre, 7:30pm until 7th March 2026.
Image: Pia Johnson
