A masterful collaboration from Western Sydney-based playwright S. Shakthidharan and Belvoir St Theatre’s Artistic Director, Eamon Flack, the internationally-acclaimed Counting and Cracking is an epic tale following a Sri Lankan-Australian family across the span of 50 years, four generations, and two continents – featuring 19 performers from six countries.
It’s been five years since the play made its five-star debut at the stately Sydney Town Hall for the 2019 Sydney Festival, leaving an indelible mark on the theatrical landscape. Since then, it has toured internationally to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and on to the UK; won several prestigious awards; and spawned a companion piece in The Jungle and the Sea. Following its Melbourne premiere and before it heads to New York for its US debut, Counting and Cracking has mounted a highly anticipated return Sydney season. The expansive new staging at Carriageworks reunites some of the original company to reprise their roles, alongside new talents.
It would be easy for a show that has picked up so many accolades to become too aware of itself, perhaps seeking spectacle and opulence over its original integrity when given the opportunity to develop further. But this ambitious iteration, reimagined in the understated warehouse space, retains its humble heart – employing the theatrical form with a lived-in, child-like sense of wonder to tell a global tale of love, conflict, identity and refuge.
...It’s a performance that can only be described as a gift.
Three deluges of water mark the beginning of this story, as 21-year-old Siddhartha (the charming Shiv Palekar), bare chested and dressed in a white veshti, symbolically submerges his head in the Georges River to complete the last rights for his Amama (grandmother). He doesn’t understand what’s going on – because even though he’s a Tamil Sri Lankan man with a Singhalese name, he doesn’t speak either language. He much prefers the salty breeze that surrounds his place in Coogee to the smell of curry leaves at his mother’s house in Pendle Hill.
His mother Radha (the commanding Nadie Kammallaweera, as seen in Wakefield and Bump) fled Sri Lanka in 1983 when her husband, Thirru (Antonythasan Jesuthasan) was presumed dead during the devastating events of Black July. Radha hasn’t spoken to her son about what happened or that the events coincided with the loss of her beloved grandfather, Apah (Prakash Belawadi). Unbeknownst to her son, she keeps Apah’s ashes in a tupperware container under her bed, unable to completely reconcile with the conflict that forced her to abandon the warmth of their family home in Colombo. Instead, she focuses on the mundanity of everyday Australian life: downing glasses of wine after a long day at work, berating her son to pick up his cricket gear, and enlisting his neighbour to install her new air-conditioner.
Their small world is turned upside down when Radha receives a call from her old friend Hasaanga (Sukhbir Singh Walia), a journalist from Colombo. The call plunges her into the buried memories of her past, the choices that she made, and the decisions that were thrust upon her.
It is rare for a play like this to have the longevity to continue to develop beyond its debut season, but it is evident that having the opportunity to iterate and refine this project across multiple venues has only made this production better.
Unfolding across three acts and several key historical periods, the script gently introduces the audience to a complex, multi-faceted political climate in which the personal and political are deeply intertwined. Shakthidaran’s ear for dialogue is masterful – lengthy scenes navigate multiple languages (with translations) and educate the audience on Sri Lanka’s complicated and divisive history, all whilst steadily escalating the tension. The conversations are comfortingly familiar, effectively emulating the circular dynamics of large, extended South Asian families with many big personalities. There is a rhythm to this brand of chaos that is intoxicatingly immersive.
Dale Ferguson’s set and costume design (with support from cultural advisor, Anandavalli) complements these distinctive rhythms, transforming Carriageworks’ Bay 17 into a typical Sri Lankan courtyard catwalk, complete with deep red concrete steps, a traditional iron gate, and outdoor areas to wash your feet. Set pieces (carried on by the ensemble) and dated signs hanging from rusted pipes seamlessly transport the audience through time and space. The inviting space is brought to life with incense, smoke, and emotive music from a trio of live carnatic musicians. The warm sigh of Kranthi Kiran Mudigonda’s violin, the soothing whistle of Venkhatesh Sritharan’s bamboo flute, and the steady beckoning billow of Janakan Suthanthiraraj’s mridangam (and percussion) are stirring emotional devices in pivotal moments of love, conflict, surrender and sorrow.
The clever staging of this show is the perfect playground for a solid cast. As Apah, the charming aristocrat, the Helpmann Award-winning Prakash Belawadi is regal, inspiring and articulate. He commands the show's most politically-charged dialogue with a gusto and clarity that is critical to its success. Radhika Mudaliyar debuts as young Radha, previously played by Helpmann winner Viashnavi Suryaprakah (Nayika: A Dancing Girl). She fills the big shoes with ease, bringing a soft confidence to Radha's wisdom and determination. Where Apah is the intellect and young Radha the might, it is the older Thirru (played by France’s Antonythasan Jesuthasan) that will stay with my heart for some time. He imparts a deeply vulnerable, embodied desperation into Thirru’s plight for safety, forgiveness and justice that I (as a woman of South Asian descent) hadn’t yet witnessed from a South-Asian man on a mainstream stage. It’s a performance that can only be described as a gift.
Shakthidaran and Flack’s collaboration extends to the production’s directorial choices, where Flack’s signature minimalism is maintained. In some of his other work, this approach has tested the limits of the audience's imagination, but here, it is strikingly apt. There is an unguarded wonder to the direction of this production that could one day be studied as integral to Australia’s theatrical canon (in the same way that Kip Williams pioneered cine-theatre, or how Suzie Miller mastered the one-woman show).
From slip’n’slides that represent the ocean to bottles of water that symbolise waves, to people-held doorbells and curtains, rain sounds from shaken rice, woman-made drills, and a striking visualisation of Villawood Detention Centre (with the crowded arms of refugees hanging through the bars of the iron gate at the center of the stage), the imaginative use of people as props mimics the role people play in the fabric of a nation. It calls on the audience to awaken their imaginations and invest in the joyful expression of live theatre. These elements make the experience of theatre incomparable to any other medium of storytelling, and this production has conquered them.
It was a joy and a privilege to be invited to witness the return season of Counting and Cracking ahead of its New York debut (in partnership with the Public Theater, of Hamilton fame). As this is a strictly limited season, I urge you to buy your tickets quickly, because this will definitely sell out.
Time Out tip: The show runs for a lengthy 3 hours and 30 minutes, with two generous intervals. We suggest eating beforehand. The wonderful Colombo Social has popped up in the Carriageworks foyer, in partnership with social enterprise Plate It Forward. Book ahead for their $60 four-course, pre-theatre set menu or grab takeaway Briyani in the interval (my partner highly recommends the Goat Biryani, one of the best he’s ever had!).
Counting and Cracking is playing at Carriageworks, Eveleigh, until July 21, 2024. Tickets range from $39-$95 and you can snap them up over here.
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