The content warning prominently displayed outside the Carriageworks theatre in which Ellen van Neerven’s first play Swim is being staged warns that it ‘contains spoken descriptions of child abuse, grooming, domestic abuse, transphobia, homophobia and racism’. The audience thus comes in primed for a grim hour of theatre but, although the play undoubtedly goes to some dark places, it also contains moments of joy and levity.
Swim focuses on E (Dani Sibosado), a transgender Murri person in their 20s. The piece is not quite a single-hander, but Sibosado has to carry the bulk of it and fortunately they give a committed performance, ably supported by Sandy Greenwood in the dual roles of Samena and Aunty. Swim’s framing device is E’s trip to a public pool, which presents an opportunity for reflections on sovereignty, gender, colonialism and their memories of a predatory swimming coach.
This sounds like a lot to cram into a production that only runs for 65 minutes without an intermission, and there is no doubt that the play moves at a frenetic pace. At times, it feels a little disjointed. This reviewer was forgiving of this, however, suspecting it is part of the point. As van Neerven writes in their playwright’s note, ‘this work came from being with my body in water’. Anyone who has spent hours swimming will know the way thoughts drift during the comforting monotony – a monotony effectively captured by E’s metronomic refrain: touch the wall, turn, touch the wall, turn.
Moreover, stream of consciousness seems a particularly appropriate style for a work about swimming. It is hardly a coincidence that “stream of consciousness” is itself a water metaphor; the free association of ideas may be thought to resemble the freedom of the body in water. At least, van Neerven seems to think so, which makes the fact that E’s abuser is their swim coach cruelly ironic – an attempt by Coach to rob E not just of their freedom, but also of the context in which that freedom finds expression.
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In fact, it may be that the organising aesthetic principle of the play is the freedom that fluidity affords in its various forms; gender, memory and the literal fluidity of water being only the most obvious examples. And in that context, the moments of joy and levity seem appropriate. Freedom and fluidity are ultimately irrepressible.
Swim, Carriageworks, Griffin Theatre Company
Writer: Ellen van Neerven
Director: Andrea James
Movement Director: Kirk Page
Set and Costume Designer: Romanie Harper
Lighting Designer: Karen Norris
Composer and Sound Designer: Brendon Boney
Video Designer: Sam James
Cultural Consultant: Lann Levinge
Gender Diversity Consultant: Bayley Turner
Stage Manager: Isabella Kerdijk
Cast: Sandy Greenwood, Dani Sibosado
Tickets: from $37
Swim will be performed until 27 July 2024.
