The Red Cross Letters

Verity: I’ll be opening a new show on Wednesday 3^rd August at The Space in the Adelaide Festival Centre. Well, it’s a new-old show, called The Red Cross Letters. It’s the most verbatim piece I’ve ever been associated with, with every word spoken by the actors taken from a selection from 8,000 packets of letters held by the State Library of SouthAustralia. The correspondence is between the (mostly South) Australian Red Cross Information Bureau, and the bereaved relatives of soldiers lost, killed or wounded during World War 1. It’s one of the most comprehensive collections of such letters in the world. A treasure.

The current, fully-staged show (presented by the State Theatre Company of SA and directed by Andy Packer, from the Slingsby Company) has developed from an initial reading, held in 2013. This new version is supplemented by more information about the lives of particular soldiers than was available in 2013; and – this being Adelaide – no sooner had initial publicity started for the show than yet more new information appeared.

One of ‘my’ soldiers was a young man, the longed-for son, born after four daughters to a family in country Mintaro, who, the day after his 20^th birthday in October 1917 died as a machine gunner amongst the carnage of Passchendaele on the Western Front. There’s a particularly affecting letter from his distraught, if ever-so-slightly histrionic mother, Julia, where, needing comfort in her loss, she enquires - with heart-breaking innocence – about what his last words might have been and where he might be buried. The boy was, of course, blasted to smithereens along with his co-gunner and their gun.

I’d imagined Julia (‘Mrs J E Williams’ as she signed herself every time except the once when she must have forgotten her formal manners), and I’d imagined her lost Edgar. We do have photographs, mostly from death notices in The Chronicle, Adelaide’s then-newspaper, of some of the young men whose stories we tell, but not many. And we don’t have any photographs of the family members who with such naive dignity sought news of their sons, brothers, brothers-in-law, husbands and fiancés. But in Adelaide there are only, say, two degrees of separation in any social connection and thus – by a series of serendipitous connections – we have now connected with the descendants of two of Edgar’s older sisters, both of whom are demon researchers and…we have some additional images. Below is a picture of Philip ‘Edgar’ Williams, and also a picture of his parents about ten years after his death. Julia must have been a very young mother because, with that dark hair, she couldn’t be much more than in her early fifties. Edgar is still just ‘young’, his face in that slouch hat is still soft and unformed, with its blush of red added to the lips of a sepia photograph, and you have no real idea of the man he might have become; but I have to say, Julia looks exactly how I imagined she would.

I’ve found the show immensely rewarding to work on. The material is so simple, but so sad. The sub-text speaks to the simplicity and modesty of the lives of Australians back then, and the curious innocence of all not directly concerned with the massive slaughter. There is an added piquancy for a South Australian audience in hearing the place names with which they are so familiar in such a different context.

And here are my newly discovered people.

Critically endangered theatre companies and arts organisations

Still reeling from the news that 62 companies and arts organisations have lost their Australia Council funding, 7-ON looked back over our collective history to see how many plays, performance texts (and other writing-related employment) we had between us that had been commissioned, developed and/or produced by those companies once funded by the OzCo, now critically endangered and teetering on the brink of extinction.

Vanessa

Checklist for an Armed Robber was first produced by Vitalstatistix in 2005. The play was nominated for a Victorian Premiers Award and won an AWGIE. It went on to be published by Currency Press and produced by theatre@risk, Belvoir B-Sharp, Deckchair Theatre, Stooged Theatre, ABC Radio Airplay and has had countless schools productions.

Verity

Long Tan, Brink Productions. Long Tan received the largest grant possible from the SA Ministry for the Arts. It also received a large grant via Catalyst funding. But the company itself has been de-funded via the Australia Council. Go figure.

Carrying Light, co-production between Vitalstatistix and the State Theatre Company of SA. The chopping of Brink and Vitals could mean—though of course everyone hopes that other funding may be found—that potentially the ONLY professional theatre company producing work for adults in the entire state of South Australia—which includes Adelaide, a city of one million people!—would be the State Theatre Company of SA. Another go figure. How many theatre companies, opera companies, orchestras and so on in a German city of 1 million people? Hmmm.

The Red Cross Letters. I’m working with Andy Packer of Slingsby on another show scheduled for production this year, The Red Cross Letters. This is in fact an add-on to the program of the STCSA, but Andy’s directing the new version. Slingsby survives on 1.4 people, makes new work, has an ongoing international touring circuit of several repertoire plays, launched the career of Finnegan Kruckemayer, I could go on. What more does a small company have to do to get a nod, we wonder?

Noëlle

Madagascar Lily was commissioned and first produced by PACT. It was also produced by St Martins Youth Theatre, and I adapted it for ABC Radio National’s Summer Drama program. The radio adaptation was nominated for a 2008 AWGIE Award, and the stage play is published in a US anthology of plays for young people. Madagascar Lily has also had in-school productions.

Jennifer in Security was commissioned, workshopped and produced by Vitalstatistix.

Hilary

The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Ruysch was commissioned, workshopped and produced by Vitalstatistix, winning the AWGIE for Music Theatre, published by the Australian Script Centre and produced in the USA.

Memmie Le Blanc was co-produced by Vitalstatistix and Deckchair (defunded out of existence a couple of years ago), giving it a life in both WA and SA. It won the Inscription Award and was also produced in Melbourne.

Take Up Thy Bed And Walk, a work I devised with Gaelle Mellis and the performers, was supported and produced by Vitalstatistix.

Cutaway—A Ceremony, a theatrical event on which I worked, was created and produced by Vitalstatistix.

The Bloody Bride was commissioned, workshopped and produced by NORPA.

Milk Crate Theatre Company employed me as a dramaturg on Fearless.

Donna

Quest. I lament the loss of operational funding to PACT Centre for Emerging Artists where, as a young playwright, I held a funded year long residency, wrote three shows, and had my first hit, Quest, which brought the likes of Baz Luhrmann and David Williamson to the transformed warehouse in Erskineville, and led to commissions with ATYP and Jigsaw Theatre Company.

I also am really saddened that Milk Crate is in the same boat. As an artistic associate with Milk Crate I have recently worked with refugees and people recovering from mental illness, as well as Milk Crate’s dedicated ensemble, to create space for their stories. It has been a pleasure to accompany Milk Crate as they evolve their inclusive theatre methodology, and it is a social sin that a company this unique and affective, and their vulnerable constituents, have been passed over.