Lately I’ve been thinking about risk. When existence is a series of calculated guesses based on empirical evidence, where does risk sit in the idea of progression or preservation? By that I mean, when is risking something, really the only way to ensure your own survival?

While on one side of town, the Sydney Theatre Company looks at the effect of and issues surrounding money in “MONEY SHOTS” – the other side of town we have an Indie company (IPAN) in an Indy space (New Theatre) tackling the less glamorous world of refugees. It never ceases to amaze me that the independent sector is fueled by a desire to face ideas of moral, social, political significance.

We all cling to something.

Some of us cling to money, or hope, or religion, or security, or predictability, or family, or status, or vanity, or stubbornness, to love, to power, to things, to land, to suffering, to hate, to work, to influence, the past, to horror. But what if all we had to cling to was the promise that if we dare to leave our home – we will find safety and security? How long would it take for our focus or passion or belief to fade? What are conditions that erode the human spirit – and what are those that inspire us forward?

Lucky is an ambitious project – in scale of execution and in concept and in theme. Director, Sama Ky Balson has dreamed big – live sound, a new international script, aerial work, a meaty subject. Sometimes the story is a little soggy and repetitive and skims over the surface of the horror of displacement and facing the unknown. It is a very poetic presentation of a very brutal and physically devastating situation. Some of the text weighs down the overarching mode of performance – and it seems that the physical is where the story sits most authentically, most comfortably. Sometimes language is an impediment. Awkward. Stilted. Sometimes the voices are disconnected to the language – and works sound like impersonation lost in the translation. Performances are sometimes too introspective – the tone of conversation too dreamy – too even – like a meditation. And perhaps meditation is the aim?

My favourite moment of this piece happens only 7 minutes before the end – when dual male voices sing whilst we watch bodies fall and rise. We see flesh float. We hear sound swell. And feel the fragility of life, of hope – but for a brief moment.