REVIEW: Contemporary New Work, CONVERTED! Uses Music And Humour To Shine A Light On The Conversion Camps That Targeted LGBTQI+ Youth

Wednesday 8th January 2025, 7pm, The Rebel Theatre, Dawes Point, Sydney

Vic Zerbst (Book, Lyrics and Music) and Oliver John Cameron’s (Lyrics and Music) CONVERTED! premieres as part of The Australian Theatre for Young People’s contribution to Sydney Festival. Originally conceived prior to legislation barring conversion therapy in four Australian states being bought into law, this work uses humour to highlight practices that are sadly still legal in parts of the Australia and in other countries.

The premise of CONVERTED! is that Mr and Mrs Doctor (Nat Jobe and Helen Dallimore) have been running the “Fix Yourself!” summer camp for teens with low self-esteem for years.  As a new camp season starts, high school counsellor Ms Newsome (Cassie Hamilton) recommends that the socially awkward seventeen year old Maya (Megan Robinson) under the guise of helping her make friends and gain confidence.  Eager to please her favourite teacher, Maya enters the camp with blind faith that the eager adults only have her best interests in mind, dismissing the warnings of fellow camper Bone (Teo Vergara), a teen that has experienced the camp before.  With inspiration drawn from the peppy American Summer Camps, Zerbst and Cameron’s musical has Mr and Mrs Doctor use pseudo clinical jargon to mask the real intentions of the camp activities, offering comically cringeworthy attempts to make the teens into something they are not. 

Director Hayden Tonazzi takes Zerbst and Cameron’s work and leans into the satire with the adults being absurd characters that have definitely drunk the Kool-aide while the children vary based on their personal journey of becoming comfortable with their own identity and realising that the Camp is trying to supress their natural nature.  This is supported by Savanna Wegman’s set and costume design that uses a curtain of tie-dyed camp shirts to reinforce the setting and a stage that draws on the idea of a gymnasium, repurposed for the camp setting.  While Wegman gives each of the teens and the camp councillors Ms Newsom and Silent Greg (Ashley Garner) a look that reflects their personality while not being too overt, they have gone hilariously over the top with Mr and Mrs Doctor’s costumes with denim on denim and absurd makeshift robes out of repurposed bedding. 

As the camp leaders, Nat Jobe and Helen Dallimore are ridiculously over the top.  While Dallimore plays Mrs Doctor with a seriousness that hints at a fear that the fraud will be found out, Jobe presents Mr Doctor with a delightful naivety that extends to the nuances of his facial expressions.  Cassie Hamilton expresses Ms Newsome’s earnestness to please as she tries to convince herself that the camp philosophy has changed her life and that Maya should follow in her footsteps. 

As the central teens, Megan Robinson and Teo Vergara deliver the strongest performances with solid support from Redd Scott and Melody Kiptoo as Denver and Sammy.  Robinson ensures that Maya echoes Ms Newsome’s earnestness to please as she grapples with a teen crush on her teacher and a newfound connection to camp-mate Bone.  Vergara delivers a strong but vulnerable Bone with compelling dramatic expression and captivating clear and strong vocals.  As Denver, the non-binary teen that just wants to be left alone, Redd Scott has a quiet reserved presence that alludes to much more going on in the teens head than he wishes to share.  As the girl that Mr and Mrs Doctor can’t get to respond to any images or ideas of people, Melody Kiptoo conveys Sammy’s progression from confusion to realisation that she is asexual with subtlety and sincerity. 

In terms of being a new musical, CONVERTED! contains easy pop style music which is paired with Jeremy Lloyd’s choreography that is balanced to reflect the comic nature of the work.  Zerbst and Cameron have delivered some strong ballads that allow the teens to express their concerns and desires, interspersed with the absurdity of the activities that Mr and Mrs Doctor have devised to ‘convert’ the teens into ‘socially acceptable’ heterosexual and binary people. 

CONVERTED! is an amusing work that will naturally sit differently depending on the viewer’s life experience.  It allows people to feel seen while also highlighting that the laws banning conversion therapy and camps needs to be expanded to all states and territories in Australia and beyond. 

https://atyp.com.au/ATYP-productions/converted/