Written by Keir Nuttall and directed by Simon Phillips with original music and lyrics by Nuttall and Kate Miller-Heidke, Bananaland is a love letter to live music and the arts inspired by the origin story of The Wiggles as well as by Miller-Heidke and Nuttall’s personal experiences in the music industry.

Kitty Litter. Photo © Darren Thomas

It is 2022, the arts landscape has been decimated by the pandemic, and 21 year-old idealist Ruby Semblance (Max McKenna) is the creative force behind Kitty Litter – not a band, she claims, but an ‘Onstage Conceptual Art / Music- Oriented Happening’.

Along with her big sister Karen (Georgina Hopson), her wellness-obsessed lover Seb (Joe Kalou), intense former fan turned bandmate Ex (Maxwell Simon) and silent, poker-faced musicians Terri and Terry, Ruby has played five hundred shows in four years. Unfortunately, Kitty Litter’s theatrical protest rock is not for everyone. They have only one loyal fan.

When they find themselves playing to a full house of kids and parents one Sunday afternoon in Goondiwindi, they discover that their song Bananaland (an appraisal of Clive Palmer’s foray into politics) has been mistaken for a children’s song and...