REVIEW: Dear Son - Queensland Theatre

Dear Son – Queensland Theatre

Bille Brown Theatre

Based on the book by Thomas Mayo

Adapted by Isaac Drandic & John Harvey

Directed by Isaac Drandic

Photographed by David Kelly

Dear Son is not a lecture, not a spectacle, but a warm, open hand. Built from Thomas Mayo’s collection of letters between First Nations fathers and sons, this stage adaptation celebrates masculinity in all its complexity: tender, flawed, funny, proud, aching, resilient. On stage, Isaac Drandic and John Harvey translate that spirit into theatre without losing the intimacy of the page. These letters still feel “handwritten”, even as they become spoken aloud, shared in a circle, carried between the other men present.

The Bille Brown Theatre is the perfect home for this story. I love the closeness of the space (it’s such a different feeling to QPAC as you’re not watching from a distance, you’re right there with them). Kevin O’Brien’s set places us inside a relaxed, familiar gathering point: a cookhouse with sandy ground, a large tree looming over the space, and a screen at the back that helps guide us through the shifting stories. Words are projected from above and across the back wall — sometimes poetic, sometimes contextual, and sometimes confronting. When discriminatory or derogatory words appear while the men face us, waving, it lands quietly… because it’s not shouted. It’s just there, the way it can be in life.

And then we’re invited into the rhythm of the piece, the men taking turns to share their stories, swapping roles fluidly, stepping forward then returning to their activity. It becomes a theatrical yarning circle, where the collective matters just as much as the individual. And what a cast to carry it.

Jimi Bani is magnetic, that rare kind of performer who makes storytelling feel as easy as breathing. He can have you laughing in one beat, then quietly devastated in the next, without ever pushing for emotion.

Waangenga Blanco, as both performer and movement director, brings a his physical language to the production. The sea-faring section in particular is stunning: layered movement, chanting, intensity that builds like weather rolling in.

Trevor Jamieson adds a gorgeous musical thread to the show. His guitar work and singing have this calming, human warmth and when others join in harmony (“Some days are better than others, my friends”), it becomes one of those simple, soulful moments that sneaks up on you.

Kirk Page anchors the whole room. There’s a steadiness to the way he delivers text, like he’s speaking from a lived place, not “performing” it, and that restraint makes the tender moments land even harder.

Aaron Pedersen brings a rawness and emotional immediacy that cuts straight through. There’s something unguarded in his energy, like the words matter right now, not as a memory, and that urgency adds weight to the stories that sit in anger, regret, or deep love.

Importantly, the humour is real too. Dear Son isn’t heavy for the sake of it — it understands that laughter is part of survival, part of family, part of being together. The “shorts and thongs” story is a delight, and the bike-riding scene is great (the kind of comedy that feels shared, not performed “at” the audience). Those lighter moments they support the deeper themes, the way they do in real life.

Design-wise, the production is beautifully cohesive. David Walters’ lighting shapes the space with gentle shifts that feel like memory moving — warm, dusk-like glows and cooler tones that settle over heavier moments. Craig Wilkinson’s video design is used with intention to guide, enhance, and challenge us. And Wil Hughes’ sound design wraps around the performance subtly, supporting the emotional undercurrent without ever drowning the words.

What I appreciated most was how unforced it all felt. The men project strongly, yet there is no theatrical excess. It is storytelling. It is listening. It is men speaking truths that perhaps have not always been given space. And just when you think the emotional arc has gently settled, Dear Son offers one final, deeply personal gesture. In the closing moments, the five actors step forward not as characters, but as themselves. One by one, Jimi Bani, Waangenga Blanco, Trevor Jamieson, Kirk Page and Aaron Pedersen share brief reflections about their own fathers, their own sons, and the families who continue to shape them. Family photographs appear behind them as they speak, quietly anchoring the evening in lived experience.

After seventy-five minutes spent carrying the words of others, this final act of self-disclosure dissolves the line between performer and person, between letter and life, reminding us that these stories are not confined to the page or the stage. They are ongoing and real.

By the end, what lingers is not one particular anecdote, but the sense of having been invited into something shared and sacred. Dear Son reminds us that masculinity can hold softness. That love can be spoken plainly. That healing is rarely tidy or complete, but a practice carried forward, generation by generation.