Pop, rock and opera collide in The Convict’s Opera, where a crew of motley convicts aboard a Second Fleet ship put together their own opera – with truly captivating results. Adam Bub speaks with performer Juan Jackson.

The Convict’s Opera is not your average night at the opera. Blurring the lines between so-called ‘high’ and ‘low’ culture, this multi-layered production features modern pop and rock surprises amidst a traditional operatic score, and an opera-within-an-opera plot about a group of convicts sailing to Australia staging their own version of the seminal musical theatre masterpiece, John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera (written in 1728). It’s an ambitious co-production between Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton’s Sydney Theatre Company and the UK’s Out of Joint Theatre Company, but the half-Australian and half-English cast, including moustached crooner Barry Crocker and musical theatre stalwart Peter Cousens, are certainly up to the challenge.

Florida-born opera singer and actor Juan Jackson, most recently seen in Cameron Mackintosh’s Miss Saigon in 2007, will play the dual roles of Virginian ex-slave Henry McMorton, and his character in the convicts’ play, romantic highwayman MacHeath. However, as Jackson tells AXN, it’s a boundary-pushing exercise in many other ways.

“The cast go from playing instruments to singing to running fantastic scenes; it’s something to be really proud of,” he says.

“Every person in this cast is multifaceted; they bring their bags of goodies and apply them to this show. But then we’re all asked to do something that comes out of our area of comfort, so we all explore and grow through the rehearsal process.”

Jackson’s CV reads like a musical theatre-lover’s dream, with credits such as Porgy and Bess (the Houston Grand Opera) and Cats (the Really Useful Company), working in both the US and Australia. “I don’t want to put down the Americans at all,” he says.

“But if you’re good enough to get a job in Australia, I reckon you’re good enough to work anywhere.”

Jackson, who has lived and worked in Australia for 11 years, notes that The Beggars Opera lends itself to both musical and thematic reinterpretation. “The original only had vocal lines written,” he explains.

“You can apply layers to it that are more or less contemporary, you can choose to be historically based in your musical application for the instrumental sections, or you can choose to substitute songs into it.”

Jackson has personally connected with the play’s theme of finding happiness even in the direst of situations, after visiting a disabled children’s orphanage in Vietnam.

“When they would play with each other, they were doing it completely to try and make each other laugh,” he reflects in awe.

Appropriately, The Convict’s Opera treads the fine line between comedy and pathos. “The Beggar’s Opera was one of the biggest comedic successes of its time. Our director [Max Stafford-Clark] has given us the ability to tell a story that is going to be a comedy, but also be rooted in historical seriousness,” he reveals.

To tap into the historical undercurrents of the times, each cast member had to deliver a 20-minute talk to the cast about life in the 1700s. “Those things might show up in the smallest physical movements or smallest wink of an eye, but it makes the character whole,” he muses.

Next up, the show will hit the UK, but Jackson has already set his sights on “the biggest whopping holiday you’ve ever seen!” A holiday well earned. AXN

The Convict’s Opera is on at the Sydney Theatre (Hickson Road, Walsh Bay), from October 4 – October 25. For tickets call the box office on (02) 9250 1777 or online at sydneytheatre.com.au