A new play about Julian Assange, Truth is an intelligent, thoughtful and unsettling work

Truth, the new play from writer-director pair Patricia Cornelius and Susie Dee, dives headfirst into the contentious world of Julian Assange. It offers us a nuanced portrait of the WikiLeaks founder who transformed from hacker wunderkind to global lightning rod.

An apt celebration of the significant body of work from the acclaimed duo, Truth opens nearly 40 years after the pair created and performed their first collaboration, Lilly and May.

Assange rose to global prominence by publishing classified documents that exposed government secrets and surveillance programs. He became both a celebrated whistleblower and a controversial figure in debates about transparency and national security.

Truth unravels the threads of his story.

A complex legacy

The work is set in a spare, black-box space, characterised by Matilda Woodroofe’s bureaucratic brutalist design.

A backdrop of hard mesh enclosures and scaffolded structures evokes a monotonous line of outdoor exercise yards or prison cells. This is flanked by colourless filing cabinets, 80s-style laminated brown desks and office chairs on wheels. A giant LED screen crowns the structure.

The ensemble (Emily Havea, Tomàš Kantor, James O’Connell, Eva Rees and Eva Seymour) weaves together key moments in Assange’s life, revealing the complex legacy of a man whose actions have both championed and challenged modern democracy.

Speaking in chorus at times, the actors perform multiple versions of Assange and other characters. They are journalists, whistleblowers, narrators, and include the key figures of Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning.

Characterised by Cornelius’ trademark rapid-fire dialogue, the text is tightly calibrated with smart, sparse, dry comments that, at times, comically undercut our Australian sensibilities. As one character says, “the worst thing to be in this country is too smart”.

The ensemble is physically dynamic and vocally strong. They have a particular choreographic fluidity. A spaciousness and attention to timing allows each performance to land. This is a testament both to Dee’s sharp, contained direction, and a terrific and youthful ensemble cast who deliver sensitive and energised performances.

From geek to advocate

The play moves chronologically through Assange’s life. We begin with the rocky early years marked by the dissonance between his sharp intelligence and reputation as computer nerd. We witness his arrests for hacking. We follow his evolution from awkward geek to outspoken advocate for free speech.

The play is grounded in comprehensive research, and solo moments featuring Snowden and Manning serve as poignant interludes to the fast-paced narrative of Assange’s life events.

I am struck by the way the work unsettles my preconceptions. The small, stark image of a naked Private Manning in her isolated cell is particularly raw and affecting – but is juxtaposed on stage against Assange’s dubious behaviour towards two young women in Sweden.

The show clips along, all the while unfolding a nuanced consideration of the complexities of reported narratives and the myriad ways in which journalistic narratives are influenced – and controlled.

The delivery to the audience is largely direct-address. This risks becoming tedious, but Cornelius’ intelligent style and the ensemble’s strong performance carries through.

The LED screen is used to great effect. The video design (Meri Blazevski) shifts through rainstorms of binary digits, to list of early Assange manifestos or leaked stories, to pixellated images of actors’ faces as teenage gamers.

In a long and shocking sequence, we witness drone footage from the Afghanistan war logs accompanied by the chillingly dispassionate commentary of the operators.

Often, the screen becomes a surface for live video feeds which work to personalise or disembody characters, functioning variously as narrator, witness, and surveillance device. Transitions between closeups, documentation and stark data both drive and complicate the storytelling.

Kelly Ryall’s composition and sound design – often paired with the pulsing or flashing giant texts on the screen – is a retro-electronic tapestry of victory chimes, synthetic bleeps and Pac Man pings. It is all underscored by deep digital tones and rapid analogue tapping of keyboards.

A long artistic relationship

This is an intelligent and thoughtful show that manages to be both complex and entertaining. The play is particularly salient given current global events, challenging us to consider the scale of what we’re up against, how long we should remain silent, and what power – if any – we have to effect change.

In an era of heated debate about transparency and fake news, Truth emerges as a vital and edgy work in the capable hands of two highly respected theatre makers.

The work is testament to the longevity of an artistic relationship between two older women that carries decades of embodied knowledge.

Despite the persistent ageism in Australian theatre that often equates “urgency” exclusively with youth, this work reminds us older artists can and do challenge and disrupt – and bring a special and necessary currency to our cultural life.

Truth is at Malthouse Theatre, Melbourne, until March 8.

Kate Hunter does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.