The graduating class of JUTE’s Actors Studio Pathways program will take centre stage this month as JUTE Theatre Company, in partnership with Overall Arts, presents Cooked, a gripping new work by award-winning playwright Kathryn Ash and directed by Amber Grossmann.
Tickets are on sale now for Cooked, which will premiere at Bulmba-ja Arts Centre on Friday, 28 November, and Saturday, 29 November.
A dramatic comedy set in a small Queensland town, Cooked follows the “Electric Five” – the survivors of a freak lightning storm that claimed the lives of 17 young locals. One year on, the survivors are brought together for a glossy television documentary intended to celebrate resilience and healing. Instead, the cameras uncover something far more unsettling: fractured truths, media manipulation, spiritual unrest, and the rise of a cult-like religious movement feeding on the town’s grief.
JUTE Executive Artistic Director Chris Kohn describes Cooked as a hearty serving of heartbreak and hilarity and an unnervingly relevant reflection of contemporary Australia. Blending psychological realism, media satire and eerie mysticism, Cooked examines faith, delusion, trauma, and the narratives communities construct to make sense of catastrophe.
“Cooked dives into what happens when personal tragedy becomes a public spectacle and survival becomes a brand,” Mr Kohn said. “This work digs into the fault lines beneath a community in crisis – the stories we cling to, the ones we rewrite, and the ones that refuse to stay buried.”
Kohn said his close collaboration with director Amber Grossmann (founder of the emerging youth theatre company Overall Arts) has brought the production to life through an exceptional ensemble of six early-career performers, all graduates of JUTE’s Actors Studio Pathways program.
“Together, the characters create a vivid cross-section of young regional Australians – from Max, searching for meaning in the storm’s aftermath, to Wiggy, whose dark humour shields deep physical and emotional scars. The cast is extraordinary. It’s a beautiful example of JUTE’s pathways program and the magic that happens when young artists are supported to step into their power,” she said.