CONFESSIONS OF A BOBA LIBERALIST To Be Presented At Adelaide Fringe

Showing at the Courtyard of Curiosities at the State Library of South Australia - tickets to Confessions of a Boba Liberalist are on sale now at FringeTIX.

Returning to Adelaide Fringe in 2025, Confessions of a Boba Liberalist is an attempt to prove that Nita is in fact NOT Boba Liberal and an answer (or not) to the dreaded question “where are you from?”.

Come into her world as she recounts moments throughout her life that have been pivotal in her navigation of who she is in a predominantly white society. Is she Asian? Latina? Australian? All of the above? Who gets to decide?

There's bubble tea and snacks along the way, not just for Nita, she'll share her food with everyone! From the school yard, to working in hospitality, to becoming a working artist – join her on a journey searching for a sense of belonging and connection with the audience. Sometimes you just need to talk through things to remember what you forgot you already knew.

Performed and presented by Juanita Navas-Nguyen, directed by Kidaan Zelleke, and supported by Arts South Australia and ActNow Theatre.

Juanita Navas-Nguyen

Juanita is a passionate actor, theatre maker and creative based on Kaurna Country in Adelaide, South Australia. Since graduating with an Advanced Diploma of Acting from Adelaide College of the Arts in 2020, she has worked extensively in mainstage and independent theatre. Juanita has appeared in multiple works by State Theatre Company South Australia including Eureka Day (2021), Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (STCSA/Queensland Theatre, 2022), and stared as Zoe in Single Asian Female (2022).

Her first independently self-written and produced show Confessions of a Boba Liberalist debuted as part of the 2024 Adelaide Fringe season supported by ActNow Theatre. This is a deeply personal work that explores the notion of identity and feelings of belonging as a person of colour in a predominantly white society. Juanita's other independent theatre credits include New World Coming (CRAM Collective, 2021), and Theatre Republic's incubator project Future:Present 2.0 (2023) as well as touring nationally as part of Windmill Theatre Company's Grug (2024) and in Bluey's Big Play (HVK Productions/Windmill Theatre Co/BBC, 2021).

Juanita hopes to create art that represents the diverse reality that we live in and that she may contribute to the ongoing success of championing Australian voices and stories.

Kidaan Zelleke

Kidaan Zelleke is an actor, director and producer with an established presence in local independent theatre. As an actor, she featured in back-to-back RUMPUS seasons, in the ‘The Wolves' by Clare Barron (RUMPUS, 2019), then as Hamlet/Cassidy in ‘Hamlet in the Other Room' (RUMPUS, 2021) for which she also produced. In 2022, she played various roles in the award-winning Deus Ex Femina show, ‘All the Things I Couldn't Say' (Adelaide Fringe), followed by her mainstage debut in ‘Antigone' (State Theatre Company of South Australia, 2022). 

Her passion for new and diverse storytelling led her to three directorial roles in 2022; ‘Baby, What Blessings' presented by Deus Ex Femina (Adelaide Fringe, 2022), ‘Future: Present' (Theatre Republic, 2022), and finally finished the year as assistant director and understudy for ‘Kill Climate Deniers' (Kinetic Collective, 2022). 

To post a comment, you must register and login.