Not a Cult* | Counterpilot

Images: Morgan Roberts

Was it a show? An immersive experience? A social experiment disguised as a bit of festival fun? Counterpilot's Not a Cult* sits somewhere between all three, and the fact that I’m not entirely sure which one(s) is probably the point.

Armed with headphones and dressed in patriotic robes, we were given instructions by an unseen voice and encouraged to join a growing public spectacle of wheelie bins, barbecue tongs and unrelenting Australian optimism. It's a wonderfully silly premise, directed by terrific voice work by Toby Martin, who co-wrote the script with Counterpilot Artistic Director Nathan Sibthorpe, all backed by a pumping electronic soundtrack. I was instantly draws into the world, with the authoritative, pseudo-inspirational voices in my ears making the increasingly ridiculous instructions feel oddly reasonable. I, like the rest of the punters, gleefully and enthusiastically followed along, every step of the way.

Not a Cult* leans into a certain Australian-ness. The cheerful insistence that she'll be right, the motivational slogans, the promise that if we all have a go we'll all get somewhere. Counterpilot takes these familiar cultural touchstones and turns them into something faintly sinister. Is our national identity just a collection of rituals we've agreed to repeat? When does community spirit become herd mentality?

There's a more interesting question lurking beneath all the patriotic robes and coordinated nonsense. How much of what we were doing is our own choice, and how much are we doing because someone told us to? At what point does participating become compliance? And how easy is it to get caught up in a group before stopping to ask what, exactly, you've signed up for?

Images: Morgan Roberts

I, for one, was all in and didn’t question the voice in my ear. I followed the instructions. I played along. I did what I was told. And yet, when someone else was selected to be the chosen one, I found myself feeling genuinely jealous. Why them? What had they done that I hadn't? I'd bought into the whole thing enough to want the reward, despite knowing perfectly well that this was the very behaviour the show was asking us to examine. It's a wonderfully uncomfortable little realisation: even when I knew I was being manipulated, I still desperately wanted to be the one who gets picked.

Not a Cult* is at its best when it lets us enjoy the absurdity before quietly asking us to think about why we're enjoying it. I'd have liked it to push that tension further, challenging us with increasingly questionable requests to see if / when the audience decides to stop following along and opt out. But there's something satisfying about leaving a show wondering whether you were simply having fun or had been gently manipulated into it.

And of course there’s a particular pleasure in being given permission to be silly in public. The voice in our ear actively encouraged to let go of the social norms and all of us gave in willingly. I experienced the show during the day, with a relatively small group of participants. There was something intimate and slightly awkward about that, watching a handful of us dutifully follow instructions in public. But I couldn't help thinking how different it would feel at night, with a much larger crowd all dressed up, following the same commands and committing to the same bizarre rituals. I'd have loved to experience that version, seen the impact of masses in yellow robes spreading the Straylia through the masses. There's a tipping point where a few people doing something ridiculous looks, well, ridiculous, but thirty of us doing it together would have felt like a movement. Or a cult. Or perhaps just a particularly enthusiastic Bunnings sausage sizzle.

Not a Cult* has stayed with me in the days since participating with my fellow yellow-robed devotees. I keep returning to how I’d spent my time enthusiastically following instructions from a disembodied voice while dressed like an Australia Day fever dream, only to be left jealous of the person who got singled out for special attention. Perhaps the question isn't whether I was in a cult. Perhaps it's how readily I said yes — and why I wanted so badly to be chosen.

Not a Cult* plays 10-18 September 2026 at the Southbank Forecourt as part of the 2026 Brisbane Festival