This essay provides a brief account of selected performances of Australian refugee policy in the domains of politics and theatre. In the domain of politics, it considers rhetorical performances by government ministers and military personnel in relation to the so-called 'children overboard' scandal of 2001, and the scandal's parliamentary investigation of 2002, the Senate Select Committee on A Certain Maritime Incident. In particular, I examine the rhetoric of 'professionalism' in the testimony of Rear Admiral Smith to the Committee. The essay then moves to a discussion of the re-presentation of these policy performances in the domain of theatre, examining Sydney-based performance group version 1.0's 2004 production, CMI (A Certain Maritime Incident), a performance that took as its primary source material transcripts of the Senate Select Committee.