★★★★★
LUKE by Angus Cameron is an extraordinary queer Australian story premiering at Red Stitch Theatre in Melbourne. Trust me when I say you want to be part of the crowd that can say they saw it first, because I have a feeling this provocative new work is going to become an important part of Australian theatre history.
Beginning in 2007, LUKE follows an unlikely trio: Chris, a fresh high school graduate, and his two older teachers, Damon and Olena. What begins on one fateful night, where performance and memory become increasingly difficult to separate, ripples across the next two decades.
As we move between past and present, Cameron carefully unpacks the ways our memories shift, our perceptions change, and the power dynamics of one moment can continue to shape lives long after it has passed.
What I love most about LUKE is that it refuses to make things easy. It is playful one moment and deeply uncomfortable the next, constantly forcing us to question what we think we have seen and how quickly we are willing to accept something at face value.
Director Iain Sinclair brings Cameron’s courageous vision to life with both tenacity and tenderness, allowing the audience to sit with the contradictions rather than neatly resolving them for us.
Red Stitch’s wonderfully intimate theatre places us directly inside Olena’s anachronistic living room, where there is nowhere to hide. Every micro-expression is visible, and every inflection of the voice carries weight. The cast rise beautifully to this challenge.
William Lonsdale brings an extraordinary complexity to Chris, capturing both the naivety and trepidation of a fresh high school graduate before gradually evolving the character across the decades. Subtle changes in his voice, posture and physicality speak volumes as Chris grows into a more confident and mature version of himself.
Olga Makeeva is equally compelling as Olena. There is a wonderful authenticity to her performance, bringing Olena’s playful, practical and at times confronting personality vividly to life.
Dion Mills is outstanding as Damon. His ability to dance between convincing and uncomfortable scenes creates exactly the atmosphere LUKE needs. Watching him move seamlessly from silly games of reciting Shakespeare to confronting conversations creates the confusion and unease the audience needs to reflect on the message of the play.
Nathan Burmeister’s set cleverly uses every inch of the space, transporting us through different periods while maintaining a comforting familiarity. I particularly loved the nostalgic nods to Russia that Burmeister imagines for Olena’s living room. Reinforced even more by the costumes evolving with both the set and the characters’ mindsets.
Seamless sound design by Ethan Hunter and smart lighting by Niklas Pajanti complete the transformation, creating spaces that feel a million miles away from Dandenong Road.
Director Iain Sinclair, quoting F. Scott Fitzgerald, reflects on the ability to hold two opposing ideas in our minds at once and still function. LUKE is a powerful embodiment of this idea, refusing to give us a simple answer or tell us what to think.
Instead, it asks us to sit in the discomfort, look a little closer at the stories we tell ourselves and question how quickly we make assumptions about others.
I hope to see this work grow far, because this is exactly the kind of theatre that deserves to be part of the conversation. Provocative and thought-provoking, LUKE stirs the pot in just the right way.
LUKE is presented by Red Stitch and runs to 11 October 2026. Red Stitch Actors’ Theatre, Rear 2 Chapel Street St Kilda East Vic 3183.
Tickets are available here.
Website: https://www.redstitch.net/luke-2026
Socials: https://www.instagram.com/redstitch/
Photo credits: Cameron Grant
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