Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu (Wrong Skin) single work   musical theatre  
Note: The Chooky Dancers and Elders from Elcho Island in collaboration with Nigel Jamieson. Co-commissioned by the Adelaide Festival, the Malthouse, Darwin Festival and the Sydney Opera House and produced by Performing Lines, with support from the Bundanon Trust.
Issue Details: First known date: 2010... 2010 Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu (Wrong Skin)
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'Wrong Skin is a story of forbidden love and clan loyalties, which explores the pressures faced by Australia's remote Indigenous communities, determined to maintain their identity and culture while finding a place for their children in the contemporary world... [The] Chooky Dancers and other performers explore their take on the perennial story of Romeo & Juliet' through a fusion of Yolngu dance, Chooky disco dancing via Bollywood, and home grown digital footage shot on mobile phones and projected with the latest video technology.

'Set around the extraordinary outdoor Saturday night disco on Elcho island - where the Chooky dance style was created - Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu explores what happens when half the population is under 20, and over 22 different clans' are represented in the Elcho Island community. Source: http://www.australianstage.com.au/ (sighted 21/09/10)

Production Details

    • Her Majesty's Theatre, Adelaide, for the Adelaide Festival of Arts 2010, 11 -14 March 2010.
    • Malthouse Theatre, Southbank, Victoria, 18-28 March 2010.
    • The Playhouse, Darwin for the Darwin Festival, 27-28 August 2010.
    • Sydney Opera House, Sydney, 2-12 September 2010.

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

Works about this Work

Yolngu Zorba Meets Superman Jessica De Largy Healy , 2013 single work criticism
— Appears in: AnthroVision , vol. 1 no. 1 2013;
'This article concerns the creative ways in which some Australian Indigenous groups are engaging with online interfaces to display select images of their culture to a worldwide audience. The Yolngu of North-East Arnhem Land, in the Northern Territory of Australia, have recently started filming themselves with camcorders and mobile phones to broadcast images of everyday activities, ceremonies, community events, music clips, short fictions and political statements on content-sharing platforms such as YouTube. Through the analysis of a recent internet phenomenon, a dance performance called 'Zorba the Greek Yolngu Style', I examine the ways in which online indigenous media practices challenge existing stereotypes about “traditional” cultures and give rise to new self-authored forms of public visibility.' (Publication summary)
Kiedy człowiek jest żółwiem Teresa Podemska-Abt , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: Przeglad Australijski 2011;
New and Liquid Modernities in the Regions of Australia: Reading Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu [Wrong Skin] Denise Varney , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australasian Drama Studies , no. 58 2011; (p. 212-227)
'Story-telling, autobiography, documentary and musical theatre are some of the ways in which Indigenous artists and theatre companies critique decades of invasion, dispossession, misrepresentation and silencing. Since the 1960s, Indigenous theatre and performance have represented diverse urban and regional perspectives on important historical and contemporary issues - especially the Stolen Generation, deaths in custody and land rights. These issues relate to the forced removal of "light-skinned‟ Aboriginal children from their families from the late nineteenth century until the 1970s, the disproportionate number of Indigenous deaths in police custody relative to the Indigenous and non-Indigenous populations, and Indigenous claims for the recognition of prior occupation of the land and the award of Native Title. More recently, the impact of British nuclear testing at Maralinga in outback South Australia is explored in a new work, Ngapartji Ngapartji, that situates Indigenous experience within the wider context of the bombing of Hiroshima and the Cold War-led nuclear arms race of the 1950s and 1960s. Maryrose Casey and Helena Grehan have published thoughtful and challenging essays on the new political and aesthetic terrain uncovered in this performance. Ngapartji Ngapartji's linking of Maralinga and Hiroshima signifies a shift from a national to a more global perspective that is also reflected in the multi-cultural characters and cast. Critiques of the policies and practices of successive state and national governments give way in this work to a more international perspective reflecting the globalising forces of the contemporary era. The recent engagement with the global intensifies in two new Indigenous works at the 2010 Adelaide Festival: Tony Briggs' The Sapphires, a multi-cultural cast play which tells the story of an Indigenous "Motown‟ singing group that entertains the troops in Vietnam in the late 1960s, and Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu [Wrong Skin], which deals with global entertainment culture including hip-hop and Bollywood. By drawing out the global influences in Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu [Wrong Skin], this article discusses the issues of modernity, digital media, globalisation and identity in contemporary Indigenous theatre that look beyond the nation to the new horizons of the global.' Denise Varney.
Performing for Aboriginal Life and Culture : 'Aboriginal Theatre and Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu' Maryrose Casey , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australasian Drama Studies , no. 59 2011; (p. 53-68)
'Since colonisation, the tensions between the intentions and meanings of Indigenous performers and the cross-cultural framing and reception of their performance have been part of the complex relationship that exists between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples in Australia. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Indigenous-controlled performances drawn from their own historical cultural practices were a focal point of cross- cultural exchange and engagement. Within the colonial exercise, the Euro- Australian and European attitudes towards, and framing of, these performances as a lower form of practice were an important part of containing and colonising Indigenous cultures and the land. Since the 1970s, there have been many transitions and movements shifting the terms of reception and providing the basis for a more respectful engagement with Indigenous performance. However, the notion that Aboriginal historical practices represent primitive or simple cultural forms has continued as traces in the reception of performances that draw on traditional pre-contact practices.' Maryrose Casey.
A Moving Experience Doris Slabb , 2010 single work correspondence
— Appears in: Koori Mail , 6 October no. 486 2010; (p. 25)
Wrong Skin for Chooky Dancers Margaret Smith , 2010 single work review
— Appears in: Koori Mail , 8 September no. 484 2010; (p. 53)

— Review of Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu (Wrong Skin) Nigel Jamieson , 2010 single work musical theatre
Can't Touch This 2010 single work column
— Appears in: Koori Mail , 8 September no. 484 2010; (p. 1)
'...Those sensations from Elcho Island in Arnhem Land, The Chooky Dancers, are in Sydney this week to perform their new theatre/dance production Wrong Skin at the Sydney Opera House...' Source: Koori Mail no.484, 8 september 2010
A Moving Experience Doris Slabb , 2010 single work correspondence
— Appears in: Koori Mail , 6 October no. 486 2010; (p. 25)
Performing for Aboriginal Life and Culture : 'Aboriginal Theatre and Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu' Maryrose Casey , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australasian Drama Studies , no. 59 2011; (p. 53-68)
'Since colonisation, the tensions between the intentions and meanings of Indigenous performers and the cross-cultural framing and reception of their performance have been part of the complex relationship that exists between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples in Australia. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Indigenous-controlled performances drawn from their own historical cultural practices were a focal point of cross- cultural exchange and engagement. Within the colonial exercise, the Euro- Australian and European attitudes towards, and framing of, these performances as a lower form of practice were an important part of containing and colonising Indigenous cultures and the land. Since the 1970s, there have been many transitions and movements shifting the terms of reception and providing the basis for a more respectful engagement with Indigenous performance. However, the notion that Aboriginal historical practices represent primitive or simple cultural forms has continued as traces in the reception of performances that draw on traditional pre-contact practices.' Maryrose Casey.
New and Liquid Modernities in the Regions of Australia: Reading Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu [Wrong Skin] Denise Varney , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australasian Drama Studies , no. 58 2011; (p. 212-227)
'Story-telling, autobiography, documentary and musical theatre are some of the ways in which Indigenous artists and theatre companies critique decades of invasion, dispossession, misrepresentation and silencing. Since the 1960s, Indigenous theatre and performance have represented diverse urban and regional perspectives on important historical and contemporary issues - especially the Stolen Generation, deaths in custody and land rights. These issues relate to the forced removal of "light-skinned‟ Aboriginal children from their families from the late nineteenth century until the 1970s, the disproportionate number of Indigenous deaths in police custody relative to the Indigenous and non-Indigenous populations, and Indigenous claims for the recognition of prior occupation of the land and the award of Native Title. More recently, the impact of British nuclear testing at Maralinga in outback South Australia is explored in a new work, Ngapartji Ngapartji, that situates Indigenous experience within the wider context of the bombing of Hiroshima and the Cold War-led nuclear arms race of the 1950s and 1960s. Maryrose Casey and Helena Grehan have published thoughtful and challenging essays on the new political and aesthetic terrain uncovered in this performance. Ngapartji Ngapartji's linking of Maralinga and Hiroshima signifies a shift from a national to a more global perspective that is also reflected in the multi-cultural characters and cast. Critiques of the policies and practices of successive state and national governments give way in this work to a more international perspective reflecting the globalising forces of the contemporary era. The recent engagement with the global intensifies in two new Indigenous works at the 2010 Adelaide Festival: Tony Briggs' The Sapphires, a multi-cultural cast play which tells the story of an Indigenous "Motown‟ singing group that entertains the troops in Vietnam in the late 1960s, and Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu [Wrong Skin], which deals with global entertainment culture including hip-hop and Bollywood. By drawing out the global influences in Ngurrumilmarrmiriyu [Wrong Skin], this article discusses the issues of modernity, digital media, globalisation and identity in contemporary Indigenous theatre that look beyond the nation to the new horizons of the global.' Denise Varney.
Kiedy człowiek jest żółwiem Teresa Podemska-Abt , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: Przeglad Australijski 2011;
Last amended 26 Oct 2010 14:26:40
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  • Elcho Island, East Arnhem Land, Arnhem Land, Top End, Northern Territory,
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