“Nothing is broken”, is a line from one of Rachel High’s poems, projected on the flowing, fabric backdrops of the No Strings production, High, and it captures the theme of this show.
High highlights Rachel High’s remarkable journey as the first person with Down Syndrome in Australia to graduate from university, but it is not one, sweeping, soaring rise to triumph. Instead, it is a patchwork of reflections, arranged in a 50-minute performance that kaleidoscopically reassembles itself into a variety of different patterns with each twist of the script.
Indeed, a casual viewer might struggle to see the whole, such is the disparate array of patches being sewn together in this account of slowly, resiliently overcoming one obstacle, one set of low expectations, and one need for perseverance at a time.
The confronting reminder, courtesy of Rachel’s birth notice, that people with Downs Syndrome were previously referred to as Mongoloid, drew a gasp from the audience as the memory of that term of “otherness” hung in the air for long moments that felt like minutes.
But I am not broken, remains the defiant and triumphant theme as we stagger through the tapestry of vignettes, some played for realism, some in a dreamscape of fantasy, while others in the lofty realms of poetry complete with occasional, self-effacing lampoonery. Director, Lisa K Lanzi, says High has abstract play-offs between fantasy and reality, with writer, Sharon Mascall-Dare, drawing on themes of loneliness, connection, joy, and frustration, all swirling about within Rachel’s “imaginative, revealing and intangible private world”.
With the story based on Rachel’s upbringing in rural South Australia to her pursuit of higher education and acting at Flinders University, she remains at the centre of our attention, albeit with more diminutive theatrical demands. Instead, with Rachel’s story as the foundation, Fig Kershaw and Kathryn Hall, act as the busy, creative Pucks, wisping each story and scene to life. And, for this reviewer, Hall’s mischievous presence will be remembered fondly for many years to come, especially whenever a dragon gets mentioned! Similarly, Quinn is another fellow story conjurer on stage, largely guiding and attending to Rachel before transforming into a self-obsessed lecturer who can hardly see Rachel from her own inner world of waxing lyrical about Hitchcock and the need for fear in film to give stories meaning. Intriguingly, High’s eventual utterances in class are eloquent and brightly juxtaposed by shining a light of clarity into the spiral of jargon emanating from the crazed professor.
If you attend this production expecting the “norm” of linear narrative, you might be tempted to declare it “broken”. But it is not. It is a rare, valuable journey into a rich reflection of life through the eyes of someone who belongs to a group within society that is often written off as one-dimensional. Hmm, perhaps something is broken and that something is our set of assumptions and our willingness to bestow low expectations upon people living with disabilities. As we dare look down from our towers of presumption, this play might just invoke a sense of needed vertigo!
High, by No Strings Theatre Of Disability, runs until August 31, 2024, at the Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre.