Asylum
'At every level, the execution of the play is first rate. Sometimes clever, sometimes truly inspired.'
Chris Boyd, Herald Sun, March 2007
Winner of the 2005 Wal Cherry Play of the year Award; 2007 Victorian Premier's Literary Award Shortlist.
It is 1993 and the four-year protection visa bestowed upon Chinese students by the Australian government is soon to expire. Yu Siying is a Chinese student who has contracted HIV in Australia. Afraid of China's judgement, Siying has one last chance to claim asylum: psychiatrist Lally Black. Finding herself enticed into an imagined China, Lally is forced to acknowledge the threads that run between complacency and brutality as the gulf between her and Siying widens.
Asylum explores our confusion when we are called upon to consider the cruelties of life in a distant and mysterious country.
Asylum is a challenging and timely piece which uses innovative theatrical elements such as disjointed time sequences and puppetry to explore themes that are complex, shifting and with many shades of grey.
Asylum isn't a piece exploring the plight of asylum seekers; at its core, Asylum uses humour and satire to reveal the tangle of red tape when bureacracy struggles to manage process against political and cultural difference.
'Kit Lazaroo's Asylum is a wonderful script with hints of Kafka and Calvino, a deserving winner of the 2005 Wal Cherry Play of the Year.'
Martin Ball, The Age, March 2007
'The cast knock themselves out.'
Bill Perrett, The Sunday Age, March 2007
