Review: RBG, Of Many, One at the Dunstan Playhouse

“This is theatre that does not ask to be watched; it demands to be considered.”
“Mitchell doesn’t imitate Ruth Bader Ginsburg – she embodies her, with breathtaking precision.”

RBG: Of Many, One carries the weight of history while remaining firmly tethered to the urgency of the present. Anchored in the formidable legacy of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, it unfolds with a disquieting immediacy that feels both charged and essential.

First premiered in 2022, the work quickly established itself as more than a conventional biographical drama. In the years since, its relevance has only sharpened. What may have initially read as a portrait of a singular legal mind now lands as a broader meditation on power, progress, and the fragility of hard-won rights. In this current staging, a Sydney Theatre Company production, presented by State Theatre Company, that impact is unmistakable, this is a production that feels even more assured, refined, and vital in its moment.

Written by the extraordinary Suzie Miller and directed by Priscilla Jackman, the production resists straightforward biography, instead emerging as a theatrical act of resistance. It interrogates justice, gender, and the precariousness of progress, asking its audience not only to reflect, but to reckon with what dissent truly means, and what it demands in return.

At the centre of it all is the exquisite Heather Mitchell, delivering a performance of astonishing control and complexity. This is not imitation; it is embodiment. Mitchell charts Ginsburg’s life from age 13 through to 87, traversing decades of change with breathtaking precision. Her physical transformation is rendered through subtle, deliberate shifts in posture, gait, and presence, marking time’s passage without ever tipping into caricature. A youthful sharpness gradually yields to measured authority, and ultimately to the fragility of age, all underpinned by an unwavering inner resolve.

Her vocal work mirrors this evolution, moving seamlessly from the tentative brightness of adolescence to Ginsburg’s unmistakable, deliberate cadence in later life. Equally remarkable is her ability to inhabit every other role in the play, from her husband Martin D. Ginsburg to Donald Trump, each rendered with clarity, specificity, and flashes of sharp humour. These transformations are seamless and theatrically exhilarating, never gimmicky, always grounded in narrative truth. It is a masterclass in precision and restraint.

Miller’s writing avoids hagiography, instead embracing contradiction; the personal alongside the political, the icon alongside the woman. The text carries a legalistic sharpness that reflects Ginsburg’s own intellect, tempered by moments of warmth and wit that prevent it from ever becoming didactic. The result is a script that trusts its audience, and in doing so, elevates the entire experience.

Visually, the production is striking in its restraint yet rich in texture. David Fleischer’s design is anchored by a series of extraordinary wave flats, undulating forms that ripple across the stage, evoking both the grandeur of institutional architecture and the shifting terrain of law and politics. They suggest courtroom walls, pages of legislation, and something more abstract still; history itself, constantly in motion. The simplicity of the space allows for seamless transitions across time and place, while ensuring Mitchell remains the unwavering focal point.

Alexander Berlage’s lighting works in precise dialogue with this design, sculpting the wave flats into spaces of interrogation, memory, and reflection. Light slices, softens, and reshapes the stage with exacting control, while Paul Charlier’s score and sound design hum beneath the surface, never intrusive, but persistently present, underscoring tension and momentum with quiet insistence.

What lingers most is the production’s political resonance. In a world still grappling with the issues Ginsburg spent her life confronting, gender inequality, reproductive rights, and the politicisation of the judiciary, RBG: Of Many, One does not feel like a history lesson. It feels like a warning, and perhaps, a call to action.

This is theatre that does not simply ask to be watched; it demands to be considered. In the hands of this creative team, it becomes something more than a portrait. It becomes provocation.

5 Stars

Lia Loves.