Reconciliation seems a distant dream play as Strindberg’s relocated classic reopens old wounds.

Octagon Theatre, Perth

February 14, 2014

“You think my womb is your land-grab?” screams a white woman to the black man with whom she’s just spent her virgin night. If she carries his child, that might be his one and only way of reclaiming his ancestral home, taken generations back by her father’s family. As an isolated incident it may seem a far cry from Miss Julie, August Strindberg’s 19th-century play of repressed sexuality and class warfare, but apart from the added issue of colonialism, Mies Julie, Yaël Farber’s startling contemporary update is true to its roots and the best, most searing version of the play that I can recall.

Farber’s startling production comes to the Perth Festival trailing a string of five-star reviews garnered since its Baxter Theatre Company premiere in Cape Town back in 2012, but this electric shock of a staging is more than capable of standing behind every one of them. The focus on the land issue and right of title lies at the heart of the director’s vision. It’s the festering sore that lies beneath the veneer of reconciliation in modern day South...