HUBRIS

Ever since Heather Mitchell took on the role of Ruth Bader Ginsburg in 2022, I've missed the production. I was never in the right place at the right time. Finally I managed to catch up with it at the State Theatre in Perth and it was absolutley worth the money.

It's a clever biographical piece of writing by lawyer/playwright Suzie Miller about RBG and Heather Mitchell puts on a virtuosic turn playing not only Ginsberg from age 13 to 87 but also all the other characters including three presidents - Clinton, Obama and Trump. 

For those of you haven't seen it or don't know much about RBG she was a lawyer who dedicated her life to fighting for gender equality (don't say 'sex equality', the judges will focus on the wrong thing, she was told) and civil rights. She was the second woman to be appointed to the US Supreme Court in 1993. The great tragedy of Ginsberg's story comes at the end. There was the hope that she would resign while Obama was in office so that he could appoint an equally skilled and rights-oreinted female judge but Ginsberg was determined to stay on in the belief that Hilary Clinton would be elected president. Of course, that didn't happen and although she tried to hang on to the end of Trump's first presidency, she couldn't - leaving a vacancy for him to fill. And clearly it wasn't going to be a gender-equality-oreinted woman. In the play, Miller gives her the argument that she produced some of her best minority judgements during this latter period but that's hubris at it's worst. An Obama appointed replacement might have been even better.

Heather Mitchell brings this brilliant woman to life with great skill and is a joy to watch. One of those rare productions where an Australian audiences leaps to their feet to give her the reward she justly deserved.



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