Gilgamesh (Carriageworks) ★★★½

Composed by Jack Symonds. Libretto by Louis Garrick. World Premiere. Carriageworks. 26 Sep – 5 Oct, 2024.

Composer Jack Symonds’ new work Gilgamesh has premiered at Carriageworks under the stewardship of longtime collaborator, and outgoing Sydney Theatre Company Artistic Director, Kip Williams. It’s big, bold and complicated. And my reaction to it was similarly big… and complicated.

Part of the joy of opera is the scale and spectacle, and Gilgamesh dishes both up with finesse. The cavernous space of Carriageworks’ Bay 17 has been opened up, giving us a wide canvas on which to play. And the white floor is especially canvas-like, as Elizabeth Gadsby’s set sprawls horizontally over the expanse. 

We open on the vista of a felled tree, sectioned into pieces but lying in place. Greeting audiences as they enter, is a blood-soaked Gilgamesh (Jeremy Kleeman) sitting on the stump nursing his chainsaw, wearing little more than his coronet. As far as opening images go it’s instantly arresting and fascinating. It sets the stage for an evening of glitter and gore; blood, metal and bone. 

In the midst of this, David Fleischer’s costumes strike a pose. Ishtar (Jane Sheldon) is a vision in blue. The evolution of Shamhat (Jessica O’Donoghue) from dark coat and collar to shimmering ruby one-piece cements the aesthetic. When Gilgamesh returns in full regalia, he travels in a shower of metallic confetti, fanned into the air by his courtiers. In comparison, Enkidu (Mitchell Riley) is a creature of clay and dust. Combined with Amelia Lever-Davidson’s dramatic, rock-stadium lighting, and sound design by Bob Scott and Benjamin Carey, this is a sumptuous experience from beginning to end. 

Kip Williams creates an array of vivid images that have stuck with me long after the opera ended. The endlessly evolving spiral of Uta-Napishti’s dessert home, the violence of the dismembered tree, the sight of Humbaba’s (Daniel Szeisong Todd) bedazzled wrestler appearance, the cowboy/scorpions, and Gilgamesh & Enkidu bathing themselves in their slain foe’s blood. Gilgamesh is suitably epic.

Where I struggled was the center-piece score and libretto. As an interested but emerging lover of opera, this was challenging. For me Jack Symond’s dissonant compositions elevated the supernatural and violent scenes, but the sharp modernist tone cut against the softer moments. The storytelling felt as if it were rearing up to confront the audience, rather than invite us in. But as I said, I’m no aficionado of opera. Those with more grounding in the art may (and seem to) find much more to adore.

Kleeman’s Gilgamesh is a refreshingly non-binary presence, fully embodying their own persona. Passionately loving the undefeated Enkidu, as much as loving the rage & violence of victory. Their spiritual awakening is slow and esoteric but powerfully realised. Riley’s Enkidu is guttural and animalistic, a fantastic physical performance than is as much dance as it is movement.

Gilgamesh is a feast of visual imagination, utterly stunning to behold. As a piece of art and performance it is undoubtedly challenging but viscerally impactful.