GOD by Ferdinand von Schirach and translated by David Tushingham. Lexi Sekuless Productions, with Rare Bird Ensemble, at The Mill, Dairy Road, Canberra, November 26 - December 18, 2025
Reviewed by Frank McKone
Dec 5
CREATIVES & COMPANY
Cast
Rachel Gärtner: Heidi Silberman; Ms Biegler: Alana Denham Preston
Dr Keller: Maxine Beaumont; Dr Sperling: Timmy Sekuless
Bishop Thiel: Richard Manning; Professor Litten: Helen McFarlane
Chair: Jay James Moody; Council Associate: Sarah Hartley
Contingency and understudy for Dr Keller: Chipz Jin (playing Keller 230pm & 730pm 13 December)
Production Team
Writer: Ferdinand von Schirach; Translator: David Tushingham
Director and Designer: Lexi Sekuless
Sound Designer: Damian Ashcroft; Costume Designer: Annette Sharpe
Shadow Costume Designer: Nicola Vavasour
Lighting Designer: Andrew Snell; Scenic Painter: Letitia Stewart
Set Builders: Revive Canberra
Production Stage Manager: Bea Grant
Deputy Stage Manager: Paige MacDonald
Assistant Director: Eli Narev
Photographer: Daniel Abroguena
Producer: Lexi Sekuless Productions
Principal Sponsor: Willard Public Affairs
By Arrangement with International Performing Rights Ltd
GOD asks the first question: when death knocks on your door, would you call the butler and tell them to let you out into the void?
But then a second question arises, since you and the butler are members of society. What if the butler is afraid of being charged with a criminal act?
The drama is set in what seems to be Germany where a law has been passed to allow the butler to open the door, but only if they are a doctor qualified to judge whether you are of sound mind, but not of sound body – and so agree you would be better off dead.
But a 55-year-old woman has appealed to us to allow her to call death in, despite being sound of both mind and body. This is because she had suffered for many months with her husband while he was dying in hospital, where his butlers, the doctors, finally agreed to stop trying to ‘save’ his life; and she, his literally ‘other half’, cannot live without him. A court has rejected her application as ‘unconstitutional’.
We, no longer a mere audience, sit on the official Council (like the Australian Capital Territory Appeals Tribunal) to hear the woman’s lawyer and a series of expert witnesses for nearly two hours (including a 20 minute tea break), before submitting our votes for or against her request.
The effect is dramatic, to say the least, as we bit by bit realise that our vote in that last ten minutes is not playing out a game of theatrical fiction.
Last night the 35 people voted 19 in favour, 15 against with 1 abstention. On other nights, I’m told, the balance of votes was quite different, in different directions.
The value, in fact I would say the importance, of presenting this play is to marvel at the author’s amazing capacity, through the medical, social and religious ‘experts’ he creates, to takes us through something like the last three thousand years of the development of Western Philosophy, to the point where we feel sincerely that our decision is for real.
Then we realise how high is the quality of the directing and the acting on everybody’s part to shift our experience beyond mere observation and thinking about the issues, into a state of personal decision-making as we submit our votes (of course, recorded privately by the Council clerk, with only the numbers each way announced).
This is certainly my kind of theatre, becoming one in a tradition at The Mill Theatre, and definitively not to be missed – I say even if I am a generation older and biassed by my approaching the time I may decide I need the law to be on my side.