When Jada Alberts started working on Saltbush, an interactive theatre experience for children, they sat in the foyer with kids, showing them a map of all the Indigenous countries. “I’d explain that the show they are about to see is about going on a journey across countries, and I’d point out where I come from and where the dancers come from,” Alberts says. “Then we’d walk into the theatre together.”
One day, a child asked Alberts: “But where do Aboriginal people come from?”
Alberts explained they have been in Australia “forever” with ancestors stretching back and back into distant time. “She was very sweet and said, ‘Yes, I understand that, but do you come from a seed?’
“That really stuck with me,” Alberts said. “It made me think there is an innocence in learning. We all experience wonder when we look at the stars for the first time or when we first put goggles on to go underwater. That’s what the show captures perfectly, that curiosity about the natural world and how, if we can stay still enough, we can hear it speak to us.”
Saltbush is a work of theatre and dance that invites children to play on an interactive carpet of light projections that take them across Indigenous countries. Together, two dancers playing young friends and the children in the audience leap from lily pad to lily pad, gaze up at the stars, navigate big cities and breathe in the vast open sea.
The story is narrated by Alberts, an actor, playwright, musician and poet from Yanyuwa, Larrakia, Wadaman, Bardi and Walpiri nations, best known for their performances in the TV series Wentworth and Cleverman. “I’m like a spiritual guide helping the audience and the two friends move between river country, an urban landscape, the desert and the sea.”
In parts of the show, Alberts sings and speaks in Yorta Yorta, accompanying music by Yorta Yorta and Dja Dja Wurrung composer Dr Lou Bennett.
“It’s an incredibly special show,” said Alberts, who has narrated it in 10 different countries around the world since 2010. “It’s always different because of the reactions of the children. We have little babies come and they love it and children between six and 12 get a full experience of it. Adults really love it too.”
Saltbush is an edible native shrub with grey-blue leaves. The sprawling, salt-tolerant herb comes in 60 varieties and can be found across Australia. Used by First Nations peoples as food and medicine, the bush was an apt starting point for the narrative, contemporary painting, dance and music created by First Nations and collaborating Australian and Italian artists.
Through its use of sensor and infrared cameras, Saltbush allows young audiences to interact, play and perform in the show. Wangkangurru visual artist Delwyn Mannix created oil paintings depicting desert snakes and rivers with fish, which were then turned into digital designs by Elsa Mersi and Rossano Monti of the Italian company TPO, which specialises in interactive theatre for children.
“The technology also changes the music, making it louder, or more dense or more sparse depending on what’s happening,” said Niccolo Gallio, the Italian technical producer who runs the sound and visuals for each show.
The lily pads seem to run away, inviting children to chase them and leap on them. In a city scene, the kids rush about dodging cars making loud honking sounds in among sounds of drilling and construction. “The game is to cross the street without stomping on cars or being hit by cars – there are no cars so it’s not dangerous, of course,” said Gallio.
The two young people in the story of Saltbush are played by dancers Jordan O’Davis (Waka Waka, Yaggera, Wiradjuri) and Luke Currie-Richardson (Kuku Yalanji, Djabugay, Mununjali, Butchulla and the Meriam people) with choreography by Tjapukai choreographer Deon Hastie.
“The feeling for me as a performer is a lot of fun and discovery,” says Currie-Richardson. “I’m finding new ways to interact with the kids each day. The show is so beautiful, I cried the first time I saw it. The wonder of it. The kids looking up at the stars! It takes you right back to that childhood place. I’m a sucker for it.”
O’Davis recently shared the stage with a child who lingered for longer than intended. “It was my time to perform, but one of the kids stayed on the floor with me and started to interact with me and I got to dance with the child,” she says. “It was a really beautiful moment.”
“That young child was neurodiverse and had been making noise during the show – that was OK by all of us, we don’t want the kids to sit quietly,” said Currie-Richardson. “We allow them to experience the show and try to get them involved. There is no wrong, we roll with it and let the kids play.”
If there is one message for the kids in Saltbush, Currie-Richardson says, it is that “if we care for country, country will care for us. It’s about respect. The message is more than just that theatre can be fun. It’s about caring for country and for each other.”
Saltbush is on at Sydney Opera House until 17 April.
