The National Folk Festival is not really about theatre but it certainly can throw up some beauties. Wayang Kelly turns out to be one of these. Indonesian shadow puppets work very well for the story of Ned and the mingling of Australian and Indonesian music is not nearly as difficult to the ear as one might have assumed.
Ned’s independent attitudes have much in common with those of the Indonesian puppet narrator, Semar, who has come looking for a god or a hero in this Australian foreign place that Ned lives in. He is supported by supreme god Bhatara Guru and joined by the Celtic Amergin and the Aboriginal Wanjina.
The world is that of the wayang, but the story is Ned’s, so Semar questions while Ned narrates.
One of the joys of this show and one that sent me back to see it again, despite a two hours running time, is that the arrangement of the performers and of the shadow screen is such that the audience is behind it, watching all the detail of musicians and puppeteers. The shadows are picked up by a camera on the other side of the screen and projected onto another screen at the side.
Thus the audience is able to watch the shadow show and the backstage antics, which at times come close to those in Michael Frayn’s Noises Off. Puppeteers are not above scrabbling for the needed puppet in a mounting pile, nor do they hesitate to snap briskly at an assistant who is a little slow at finding what is needed. This, and the occasional good humoured banter when there is a mistake, drives the performance along in fine style.
It is fascinating to see the Australian images adapted to the wayang style. Ned and his band remain European, if somewhat Egyptian in their frontality, but the women such as Ned’s sister Kate are rendered in spindly Wayang fashion. Ned’s presence is always a dignified one, however, and the story, with occasional bits of comic relief like the Indonesian-style Mrs Byrne darting about as she spies on the troopers, takes his history seriously. The coaches, the horses and the Glenrowan train fly in and out so fast it is hard to spot detail but the Kelly helmets are as iconic as ever.
A fabulous piece of fusion.
Alanna Maclean
