Alana Valentine’s new play Nucleus is all about the nuclear energy debate, which is quite timely considering what is going on in the country at the moment. But when she began working on it six years ago, she had no idea the debate would resurface.

“I was working on this for about six years,” says Valentine. “In fact, I had a public reading at the Shoalhaven Art Centre in 2022 which some of your readers might've come to. It wasn't the same play but it was based on some of that research I'd done.

“I put all that in an archive box and wrote a different play which became Nucleus but in truth I've been working on it for years and I didn't know that they were going to revive the nuclear power debate, but in the end I like that theatre can have its finger on the zeitgeist.”

Nucleus follows the lives of a man and a woman on opposite sides of the nuclear debate, exploring their lives over nearly 30 years. The play is inspired by the real-life story of the proposed nuclear power plant in Jervis Bay.

“I have a deep passion for Australian history,” says Valentine. “I really believe that if we understand our past, we can better shape our future. I’m a resident of Jervis Bay, so I’ve swum at Murray’s Beach many times. I knew that the car park there had been the site of a failed attempt to build a nuclear power station on the headland in 1969.

“I started talking to activists who had been involved during that time - not just with the Jervis Bay project. I met some amazing people in the Shoalhaven area who made the kind of life that we live now possible.”

Nucleus Promotional Poster. Source: Griffin Theatre Company.

Valentine has been a playwright for many years, often focusing on verbatim theatre, where scripts are based on real people's words. Her most famous works include Paramatta Girls, which explores the experiences of three Indigenous women in a Parramatta Girls Home, and Run Rabbit Run, which focuses on the South Sydney Rabbitohs.

However, Nucleus is fictional - though rooted in extensive research and interviews about nuclear energy activists on both sides - because Valentine wanted the creative freedom to tell a richer story.

“When I work with real people and their lives, I want to portray them with integrity, making sure they feel they’ve been represented properly,” she says. “Similarly, I wanted to depict both sides of the nuclear energy debate with integrity. But Nucleus is also a deeply personal story. 

“The nuclear debate serves as a metaphor, pushing these two characters to confront the legacy of their relationship. The play unfolds in a series of reveals, and fiction allowed me to give more depth to the characters and make the story more engaging, as it’s just the two of them talking.”

While Valentine aims to fairly represent both sides of the debate, she makes it clear that the play isn’t going to make your mind up for you.

“My whole life has been based on the idea that people have their own opinions and that they have their own brains and what the theatre should do is complicate the issue and present the human face of this story,” says Valentine.

The play is structured to draw you into the debate through the relationship between the two characters. As their lives become increasingly intertwined, the debate falls away and you’re left with a complex, but human, relationship between two people.

It is refreshing to see at a time when heated debates online often obscure the human side of things, Nucleus reminds us that it’s possible to disagree respectfully, without compromising your beliefs.

“You can disagree with someone and still be civil. It doesn’t mean abandoning your opinions; it just means listening and explaining why you believe what you do,” Valentine says.

Nucleus opens at the Griffin Theatre Company in Darlinghurst on 14 February and runs until 15 March and you can buy tickets here: https://welcome.griffintheatre.com.au/overview/4505.