_{Cover Image: A group of pre-teen competitive dancers are plotting world domination. Photo by Stephen Heath Photography.}

This WAAPA production of Dance Nation is an eye-opening whizz of a night, full of brio and chutzpah. It was written by the Yale educated American Clare Barron and first produced Off-Broadway in 2018. In 2019 it was a finalist in the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Barron has said of her plays that “they are full of blood and guts but also a lot of small very quiet scenes.” And this is exactly what you get.

Dance Nation revolves around a bunch of teenage girls (and one boy) in love with dancing and desperate to succeed in their profession. Obstacles in their way stem, as one would imagine, from a demanding routine, a dictatorial teacher and more successful competitors.

What sets this apart from other familiar plays with this theme however, is that Barron uses it as a vehicle to uncover in a brutally honest fashion the biggest obstacles for these teenagers – that of the fears, uncertainty and angst at the onset of puberty. And we are not spared some very intimate details (once totally taboo to even mention.)

The quiet scenes which Barron inserts into this drama take the form of sometimes funny and endearing beautifully rendered personal monologues in which we become privy to the individual fears, desires and dreams or the dancers, played by 3rd and 2nd year acting students: Andrea Fernandez, Holly Samaneigo, Monika Singh, Rali Maynard, Sarah Hindle, Sofia Watts, Natalia Myslinska, and Daniel Hsu, all brilliantly directed by Alexandria Steffensen. You wouldn’t want to miss the accomplished acting of these WAAPA probable future stars.

Ruby Trevor-Mills’ set design is perfectly apt for the smallish stage and features a rehearsal room laden on one wall with medals and trophies, pictures of successful dance troupes and large Red Stars on which is written Liverpool Dance Works. Into this room are wheeled in and out huge rectangular mirrors and dancers’ barres, make-up cases and a free-standing toilet bowl.

Kate Dugdale’s lighting design with its mirror dance ball helps change the space into various venues such as the Performance stage where the girls compete, or the greenroom where they spill their hearts out. There is also an inspired bathroom scene with a toilet – the likes of which many a girl has sat on and cried. Flashes of light threaten at times to outdo Piccadilly Circus. They accompany Even Hazell’s loud tension raising sound design which erupts into various girl songs with lyrics that say “If you want to be my lover you gotta gotta….I want to heal the world through dance….and the final song (spoiler alert) My Pussy’s Perfect, which brings the house down.

Alice Sillapaduriyank’s costume designs centre on the ubiquitous leotard and the boots and t-shirts that cover them in repose, until their performance outfits of yellow chiffon transforms them all. She also shocks the audience with a menstrual malfunction outfit that you find it hard to tear your eyes from.

Christabel Joy Ellis’s choreography blends everything together cleverly connecting the two themes of ambition and personal dilemma into a coherent whole.

The play opens with the dancers performing a short skit in sailors outfits and later finds the students on their knees quivering under the verbal onslaught of their dance teacher Pat (Nicholas Rose) with a mid-western American accent to die for. Rose is hilarious and superb as a narcissistic bully sounding more like a Liverpool Soccer coach at times than an empathetic leader. He’s hoping his Ghandi-focused routine will win the desired trophy to add to Liverpool’s collection and whips the dancers into ferocious competition for the starring role.

Fernandez and Samaneigo are sublime as star pupils Zuzu and Amina, caught up in the dichotomy of being best friends and rivals at the same time. Amina has the edge which sours their friendship and reflects the isolation success can bring, echoing our Tall-Poppy syndrome.

The performers are admirably courageous in some very demanding scenes. All credit to director Steffensen for coaxing this attitude and inspiring each performer to make this production funny, and emotionally touching as they negotiate the quagmire of ambition and female puberty. Its not a play for the faint-hearted but admirably reflects the difficulties of pursuing your dreams which can launch you into stardom or destroy your determination before you’ve even worked yourself out.

As Steffensen has said Barron focuses on “ambition, burgeoning sexual power, the deep roots of female friendship and what it means to be at the precipice of having the world at your feet.” As director of this WAAPA production she has very much succeeded with her cast and crew in eliciting this at a time when nearly every teenager needs to feel that confidence – but then, at this stage of our world under unleashed patriarchal control – who doesn’t.

Dance Nation runs between 27 – 31 March 2026 at Subiaco Arts Centre

Written by Clare Barron
Directed by Alexandria Steffensen

Performed by WAAPA 3^rd Acting Students