Wollongong-based playwright Dhananjaya Karunarathne spent the last six years perfecting the script for A Sri Lankan Tamil Asylum Seeker’s Story as Performed by Australian Actors Under the Guidance of a Sinhalese Director.

The work has hit a few snags since its inception including constant change to government policy forcing rewrite after rewrite. While there was a public boycott by a local Sri Lankan community when it was presented in a studio session with the Merrigong Theatre Company last year.

The thought provoking “black comedy” explores who has the right to tell asylum seekers’ stories, and is flagged as being a confronting and searing study in political correctness.

The play follows two young white performers as they grapple with the story of a Tamil refugee, his journey to Australia in a boat, and his final meeting in Villawood Detention Centre with a young refugee studies student called Garth.

“The civil war in Sri Lanka is something I grew up with, and my perspective was shaped by constant exposure to the Tamil-Sinhalese conflict,” said Mr Karunarathne.

While Mr Karunarathne originally moved to our shores 2003 to study at University of Wollongong he said he had met many refugees over the years, their stories adding another dimension to his view of the situation.

Co-director and Dramaturg David Williams became involved in the project in November 2014, and admitted the script surprised him with its “wit, insight and fearlessness”.

“The public dialogue around asylum seekers in Australia is very polarised. So there are either people who are activists or advocates, and there are people whose political careers are built on demonizing [asylum seekers],” said Mr Williams. “This play dances a delicate line between the two perspectives.”