When I caught up with Jacob Rajan, he was in the middle of rehearsing Balloon Dog at Merrigong Theatre Company. After sharing a laugh over whether it was “bumping in” or “packing in” (we never quite settled it!), our conversation quickly unfolded into something far richer.

As co-writer, actor and co-founder of Indian Ink Theatre Company, Rajan has spent more than three decades creating theatre that is playful, poignant and deeply human. Ahead of Balloon Dog‘s Wollongong season, we spoke about the freedom of masks, adapting Rabindranath Tagore for modern audiences, and why laughter might just be the best way to open hearts.

Without further ado, here’s Faith’s Top 5 with Jacob Rajan. Let’s get unmasking! 

Q1. You were the first Indian student to graduate from Toi Whakaari back in 1994. Looking at how cultural representation has shifted since then, how does it feel to bring a mainstage work like Balloon Dog, which deeply explores the modern migrant experience, to Australian audiences today?

I’ve never been political about what I’m doing. But when you’re the first Indian to graduate, it’s a political act. Anything you do subsequently is seen that way because you’re a new voice and people haven’t seen anybody who looks like you on stage in New Zealand. Suddenly you become this pioneer.

I was writing, as most pioneers do, to survive. When I was acting in film and TV, it became very apparent that the words coming out of my mouth were written by somebody not of my ethnicity. They were writing to a type. I consider myself an actor first and a writer second, but I had to write in order to play characters that I felt had some level of authenticity.

What is authentic? It’s my particular lens, my sense of humour and my cultural perspective. I was raised in New Zealand by Indian parents in the South Pacific. That’s the perspective I bring to the work I do. Representation hasn’t opened the floodgates since I graduated. The actors are still pretty thin on the ground in New Zealand, and when we cast our plays, we often have to cast in Australia and further afield.

Being an actor wasn’t really on the radar for most Indian families. That journey had to be justified in terms of success, and success wasn’t the arts. You were supposed to be a doctor, an engineer or an accountant.The biggest shift isn’t just what you see. It’s who’s doing the writing. That’s critical. There are more brown faces in the writers’ room now, and that leads to a better quality of representation.

Q2. Your work is globally renowned for its distinct use of masks, puppetry and multi-character storytelling. In Balloon Dog, what unique physical or emotional muscles did you have to flex to bring the characters to life using your signature style?

The mask was in the DNA of Indian Ink from the beginning. My director and co-founder, Justin Lewis, and I came together over a love of masks.I was a painfully shy kid. My drama tutor encouraged me to take a mask workshop with John Bolton, and it was a lightbulb moment. As soon as they put that mask on, the shy kid disappeared and this character was unleashed.

I felt like I was channelling something rather than acting. It gave me permission to be bigger in the world. I saw that transformation happen to anybody who put a mask on. I became convinced I was going to bring masks to the mainstage because, at the time, masks were relegated to street theatre or children’s theatre.

When I went to Toi Whakaari, they didn’t have a mask component. So when we had to create a twenty-minute self-devised piece, I used masks. It was so well received that my tutors encouraged me to turn it into a full-length play after I graduated. That became my first play, Krishnan’s Dairy. Justin and I expanded that twenty-minute piece into a full production, and that was the beginning of Indian Ink, thirty years ago.

Mask has shaped the style of everything we do. It’s slightly larger than life, a little amplified and much more imaginative. The audience doesn’t realise they’re working, but they are. They have to suspend their disbelief.In Balloon Dog we’ve reduced the mask down to its smallest form, a set of oversized teeth. They’re hyper-realistic but larger than life, almost clown-like. They let you do more absurd things and they amplify the actor’s voice.

Q3. Balloon Dog is a wonderfully playful title, yet the show bravely confronts some quite bleak realities faced by migrant workers. As a co-writer, how did you and Justin Lewis balance that tightrope walk between laugh-out-loud comedy and emotional truth?

It’s one of the central pillars of Indian Ink. All our shows are funny. They’re all comic in some way because we have this philosophy of the serious laugh, in which we open the audience through laughter in order to slip something serious in.Comedy on its own, nutritionally, is candy floss. You enjoy it for a moment, but then it disappears and does nothing for your body. If you slip a serious note in there, it becomes far more nutritious. You feel nourished when you’ve had a good night at the theatre, where you’ve been invited to think and invited to feel.

The laughter opens you up. A belly full of laughter is not a bad thing, but if you can slip something more fibrous in there to think about, that’s even better. If you can take people from laughter to tears, you’ve moved them, and that’s a good night at the theatre for me.Laughter is the Trojan horse that gets through the gates of a cynical world.

Q4. The play is a brilliant modern adaptation of Kabuliwala by India’s beloved Nobel laureate, Rabindranath Tagore. Why did it feel vital to transport a story from 1890s Calcutta into 21st-century Auckland?

It’s doing double service for me because the story was written by Rabindranath Tagore, who is a cherished Indian writer. He was the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize for Literature, so he’s a pretty big deal.

Within the Indian community, Kabuliwala is a much-loved story. It’s only about six pages long, but it’s studied in schools, films have been made from it, and it’s beautifully written. When I first read it, those six pages had me in tears.The storytelling is so compelling. The characters are so rich, and the dramatic spine is so well constructed. To make a reader feel an entire world and go on an emotional journey in such a short space of time is an extraordinary piece of writing.

When I presented it to Justin as a possible play, he immediately saw that what Tagore was writing about in the 1890s was still relevant today. Sadly, things really haven’t changed. The othering of people, seeing the stranger as threatening, those ideas are still in our headlines and our politics. A contemporary adaptation felt completely ripe.

We’ve taken those central elements and created a multi-generational family. I play the grandfather. My daughter is a solo mum with a five-year-old, and this migrant worker forms a friendship with the little girl. Naturally, it throws the mother into conniptions, while the grandfather has his own views about this stranger entering their lives.

Everything that happens in the short story is still there, but we’ve expanded it into a family drama. Having Tagore’s ending already there was a gift because it’s so gut-wrenching and powerful. We knew where we were heading from the very beginning.

Members of the Indian community often come to the show with a little trepidation because the original story is so beloved. But when they leave, they understand why it’s speaking to us now. More than a hundred years later, it’s still telling us that we need to truly see people rather than simply label them as strangers. Ultimately, people are so much more similar than they are different.

Q5. The ultimate heartbeat of the show leaves the audience with a massive, soul-searching question: “Would you open your door to a stranger?” What core conversation do you hope people take home?

There will naturally be a lot of focus on the migrant issue, and of course the play raises those questions. But I feel an in-depth look at the policies that drive those issues is better served by journalism or documentary. This is ultimately a play, and plays work best through human relationships.

Theatre, for me, is an engine for empathy. If audiences leave feeling empathy for this migrant worker and what he’s going through, that’s wonderful.The play is also about the bond between parent and child. If you ring your mum after the show, that would also be a good thing.

Ultimately, we come to see the migrant as a parent as well. The bond between parent and child, how swiftly our children grow up, and how we want to cling to them as five-year-olds… there’s a planned obsolescence to parenthood where you’re simply not needed anymore. That’s the human tragedy within the show as well.

Once I’ve written it, it no longer belongs to me. Your interpretation is your own. Hopefully the play is fluid enough that wherever you’re at in your own life, you’ll find some reflection of it within the story.

The themes aren’t Indian. They’re universal. They’re about our shared humanity. Tagore always did that brilliantly, and we hope we’ve served him well with our interpretation of his work.

Bonus Question: What question were you secretly hoping I’d ask and what’s your answer ?

* What do you think audiences will enjoy most about the Balloon Dog experience?

I know people can be reluctant to see theatre they think is going to be depressing or heavy. Although Balloon Dog is hard-hitting, there’s so much joy, humour, charm and theatricality within it that I would definitely say: if you’re worried you’re going to be bummed out at the end of the show, don’t be.

It’s an utterly joyous ensemble. I’m joined by two gorgeous young actors and me – held together by tape. (laughs) We dance together, we have great comic shtick together, and we employ all the tricks of theatre to give you a great night. The play is about something important, but it’s told with a lightness of touch.

Balloon Dog runs at Merrigong Theatre Company from 1 to 5 July at the Bruce Gordon Theatre, IPAC (32 Burelli Street, Wollongong).
Details/tickets : https://merrigong.com.au/shows/balloon-dog/
Please note: Performance warnings apply.

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