Roger Bennett

Who was Roger Bennett?

Roger Bennett was an Arrernte man from Central Australia, an actor, and a playwright. His best known works are Up the Ladder and Funerals and Circuses.

His works dealt with his life experiences, particularly the travelling boxing tents, where his father, Elley Bennett was a boxing champion during the 1940s and '50s. Roger himself had also fought in the travelling tents.

Up the Ladder was first performed at the Adelaide Fringe Festival in 1990, in a production directed by Bob Maza. The play subsequently moved to Melbourne, 1995, for a long stint at the Melbourne Workers Theatre and came to Sydney in 1997 for the Festival of the Dreaming. According to the Sydney Morning Herald,

Up the Ladder takes the audience right inside the spangled, sweaty, tatty and deceptive world of the travelling sideshow carnival, from tawdry fake snake charmers to the sawdust of the boxing ring. [co-director] Enoch says the Aboriginal culture comes through in the play's physicality, mocking humour and the sparse nature of the dialogue. Critics have hailed it as a "feel-good show", "full of fun and good humour".

The fact that the play emphasizes positive aspects of the Aboriginal experience in travelling shows led at least one reviewer to criticize it as apolitical. Wesley Enoch "however argues that any play about Aboriginal people is political," stating that