Steve is a support worker, making a living caring for people with disabilities. Through this line of work he became friends with Mirielle. They met at Cerebral Palsy Alliance nine years ago, where Steve ran group programs and Mirielle participated. They made short films together, remaking trailers from Priscilla: Queen of the Desert and Fast and the Furious. When the program was defunded and shut down, they kept in touch but never made another movie.

Until now.

Named after the sign-off Mirielle regularly gives Steve on the phone, Keep Your Head Up is a deep-dive into the care industry, the politics of incarceration and art-making as escape. The project draws on the social model of disability and lived experiences of the care industry to stage the escape of a friend Steve made whilst working at Cerebral Palsy Alliance: Mirielle Gabriel.

Mirielle will join Steve onstage from the confines of her bedroom via a video chat to discuss their new idea for a gaolbreak movie and, as the two old friends reconnect and share stories from both sides of the NDIS, they create a prison escape movie live on stage in a bid to breaking Mirielle free from the home to which society has confined her.

24 & 25 AUG 2024 - FESTIVAL OF DANGEROUS IDEAS, CARRIAGEWORKS

Image credit: Lucy Parakhina