This semester’s JUTE Actors Studio end of term performance is Cooked by Kathryn Ash, directed by Amber Grossmann. Co-produced with Overall Arts.

When: 7.30pm Friday 28 and Saturday 29 November
Where: Bulmba-ja Arts Centre, 96 Abbott Street

Genre: Contemporary drama / dark comedy
Setting: Regional Queensland, present day
Length: Full-length (approx. 1h45mins)

Overview

Cooked is a dramatic comedy about five young survivors of a freak lightning storm in a small Queensland town. A year after the event, the “Electric Five” are brought together for a glossy television documentary meant to celebrate their healing and resilience. But what unfolds is a savage, layered unmasking of trauma, power, and manipulation in a community struggling with heartache and the rise of a religious cult movement exploiting them.

At once heart-breaking, hilarious, and unnervingly relevant, Cooked explores what happens when a tragedy becomes a public spectacle and survival becomes a brand. Through Gothic, multi-layered storytelling that shifts between a media circus, psychological realism, and eerie mysticism, the play electrifies the tension between lived experience and the truths we tell ourselves about ourselves.

Content warning:

Cooked contains strong language, mature themes concerning religion and spirituality, reference to drug use and excessive alcohol use, references to weather event trauma, grief, death, and loud noises associated with extreme weather.
It also includes discussion of underage sexual exploitation.
Recommended for mature audiences aged 15 years and over.