Pre Paradise starts with geometry, a mathematical encoding apparently reducing the real world to angle, line and intersection. But in this world not even Euclidean figures are neat and pure and their apparent, unarguable certainty is an initial metaphor for the murkiness of widely received truth. Pre Paradise takes its title from Rainer Werner Fassbinder's play of the Moors murders, yet it's mostly based on an earlier Fassbinder work, the delightfully titled Blood On A Cat's Neck . Throughout runs an interrogation of the banality of commonsense. Children need corporal punishment.
Submission is beautiful.
The Fassbinder adaptations and interpolations result in a text that allows for much play, but remains loose enough to prevent any imposed meaning. You may take from this experience what you like - and there is much to choose from. Urban Theatre Projects' Manufacturing Dissent is also a group-devised show from a young cast, broadly dealing with political theatre and Australia's increasingly strident response to refugees. It's in difficult territory - political theatre working from the position that political theatre is a bit of a wank. Yet the earnestness of much of the show results in diminishing impact.