EXPLORATIONS: Wake

In a world where the internet is at everyone’s fingertips and a global pandemic birthed more conspiracy theories and brought others to their peak, Ben Anderson’s Wake feels like it had its debut at the right time.

Using bunraku (a 500-year-old traditional Japanese form of puppetry), Anderson has created a beautiful, hilarious and alarmingly relevant tale of a teenage conspiracy theorist who believes the world is flat, nothing is real, and Santa Claus is a screaming bully in the sky, threatening you with coal if you don’t obey.

Wake is a less of a narrative tale about a lost, brainwashed teen on the internet – as it is more of a reflection on society as whole. Although not directly referenced, the ugliness of the COVID-19 pandemic and the conspiracies that came with it could not be ignored. The water trickles over your feet (“Your feet aren’t wet.”) and eventually reaches your shoulders (“Everything is fine! It’s all in your head!”). Sound familiar? Wake explores not only the downward spiral and obsession with misinformation, it emotionally focuses on the collateral damage of said spiral on the people surrounding them.

Ben Anderson teams with an eclectic team of puppeteers who control the limbs of the amble central characters, thrashing them through the wild seas while singing Enya’s ‘Orinoco Flow’; have them fight the winds to save their loved one from sinking deeper and deeper into existential denial; who act as water, spinning cloud heads and even our very own solar system. There is no external soundtrack with Wake – just the sounds of the puppeteers controlling everything we hear with their own voices (the dialogue, the music, the wind, the birds, the voice of a narrating floating balloon).

Wake is beautiful in parts, confronting in others and puts a spotlight on humanity and it’s fragility. Fear takes us to dark places, and it exposes just how dark these corners can be. It’s dark, it’s light, it’s puppetry and it’s visual theatre. Wake ran from November 28-30. If you missed it, La Mama’s Spring Program is currently running so get on down to Carlton and celebrate some wonderful, thought-provoking local theatre. Midsumma at La Mama also commences January 16th, in conjunction with Midsumma Festival 2023 – a delightful celebration of LGBTQIA+ theatre.

EXPLORATIONS: Wake
La Mama Theatre Courthouse
November 28-30
EXPLORATIONS: Wake
La Mama Theatre – Spring Program 2022
205 Faraday St, Carlton 3053