Readings of excerpts of works-in-development from three playwrights.
The Great Emu War by Declan Furber Gillick
You get… empty. In your body, your eyes. After a while no-one sees you or hears you. Still walkin’ round, but. Like ghost, unna
1932. Australian WW1 vets and their families battle the elements in a remote wheat-farming district. Things look dire when they start losing ground to native fauna. Over the fence, two young Emus approach initiation. An Emu Elder insists that a strange fleshy creature is one of the mob. It’s a war on all fronts. Who’ll stand up and be counted?
Based on the true story of The Australian Military’s campaign against a mob of emus, this dreamtime resistance allegory fires a bullet into the heart of this country’s culture wars. And blood ain’t black and white.
Happy Ending by Kylie Trounson
A young man is murdered outside a Melbourne brothel. Clues point to a love story gone wrong. Four women – a cop, a mother, a sex worker and a barrister – are suddenly working in concert for justice. Together they must negotiate the forces of power, privilege, race and gender that bind and divide them, in pursuit of a truth that is more confronting than they ever imagined.
Inspired by a true Melbourne crime, Happy Ending is a heartfelt, provocative, genre-busting detective story.
K by Katy Warner
‘I consider myself a postfeminist.’ – Kellyanne Conway
There has been a break-in at one of Kay’s childcare centres. Someone has smashed the windows, defaced and desecrated it.
But Kay is loved. Once crowned Miss Canola, Kay is single-mother who has pulled herself up by her bootstraps. She has smashed the glass ceiling, is a success, is adored. Sitting amongst the glass and graffiti, Kay has no idea where it all started to go wrong.
Credits
