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Playwright

Occupation - Playwright
Afford, Malcolm (Max)
Batey, Peter
Brand, Mona
Buzo, Alex
Cooper, Walter
Cusack, Dymphna
Enright, Nicholas (Nick)
Flower, Pat
Free, Colin
Gray, Oriel
Harding, Alex
Henry, Juliette
Hewett, Dorothy
Howarde, Kate
Hutchinson, George
Keneally, Tom
Kenna, Peter
Lawler, Ray
Livermore, Reg
Locke, Helena Sumner
Maza, Bob
Meredith, Gwen
1932 - 1976
Merritt, Robert
O'Sullivan, Edward William
Radic, Therese
Roland, Betty
Somers, Thomas
Stone, Louis
Tomholt, Sydney John
Upton, Andrew
Valentine, Alana
Williamson, David
Witcombe, Eleanor
Position - Playwright of New Theatre
Brand, Mona
1953 - 1976
Gray, Oriel
1937 - 1949
Witcombe, Eleanor
Position - Playwright of Rusty Bugles
Elliott, Sumner Locke
1948
Position - Playwright of Storm
Elliott, Sumner Locke
1933

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Playwright

Afford, Malcolm (Max)

The foremost writer of commercial radio serials and stage plays in the 1940s.

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Batey, Peter

Playwright, director and producer who has had a major influence on comedy and satire in Australia for over 50 years.

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Brand, Mona

Playwright, poet and freelance writer who wrote over 24 plays and, whilst living, was better known in Europe than in Australia. Her topics were often new to Australian playwriting.

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Buzo, Alex

A principal Sydney playwright of the late 1960s and 1970s. He was one of the first contemporary Australian playwrights recognised overseas and authored 88 works.

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Cooper, Walter

First Australian writer to craft sensation melodrama with comic characters speaking rich slang. Three of his plays were produced in the United States of America which made Cooper the first Australian dramatist performed abroad.

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Cusack, Dymphna

Writer and activist whose work focused on social issues.

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Enright, Nicholas (Nick)

In a widely varied career, he was best known as a playwright. His better known works were the plays Blackrock, Daylight Savings and Mongrels.

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Flower, Pat

Crime novelist and television playwright.

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Free, Colin

Theatre playwright.

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Gray, Oriel

A socialist writer brought up during the Great depression who sought to extend the imagination and raise social issues through theatre.

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Harding, Alex

Writer, composer and actor who migrated to Sydney from England and became a prominent writer in the gay theatre scene.

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Henry, Juliette

French woman who joined her partner, doctor Paul Rastoul, in New Caledonia in 1873 after he was exiled from France after the defeat of the Commune in Paris in 1871. She arrived in Sydney with her two children in 1874 after being deported for assisting in the attempted escape of a French communard. Paul Rastoul drowned trying to escape the following year. In Sydney she worked as a French teacher and in 1880 she married French artist Lucien Henry, another former Communard. After his departure for Paris in 1891 she began divorce proceedings. As well as taking part in Sydney's intellectual and social life, she established Cercle Litteraire Française, French literary circles in Hobart and Sydney. A monument to her was erected in Waverley Cemetery in November 1898.

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Hewett, Dorothy

Feminist poet, novelist and playwright.

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Howarde, Kate

Actor, playwright, cinema pioneer and very successful theatrical entrepreneur who founded her own theatre company and toured extensively. She was best known for her play 'Possum Paddock' in 1919 and she was the first Australian woman to direct a feature film.

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Hutchinson, George

Playwright.

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Keneally, Tom

Author, essayist and playwright. 

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Kenna, Peter

Playwright, radio actor and screenwriter.

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Lawler, Ray

Playwright whose most famous work is The Doll Trilogy of plays, written between 1955 and 1976.

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Livermore, Reg

Singer, actor and playwright who has entertained Australian audiences for over five decades.

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Locke, Helena Sumner

Author and playwright who died in 1917 of eclampsia after giving birth to her son Sumner Locke Elliott.

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Maza, Bob

Actor who became politically active as a member of the Aborigines Advancement League and the Aboriginal Tent Embassy.

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Meredith, Gwen

Beginning as a playwright in the 1930s several of her plays were produced by the Independent Theatre. By the mid 1940s she was writer of popular ABC radio serials, such as The Lawsons and Blue Hills.

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Merritt, Robert

Aboriginal playwright whose work 'The Cake Man' was the first production of the National Black Theatre in 1975.

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O'Sullivan, Edward William

Printer and journalist whose work as a labour leader lead to a career in politics. As Secretary of Public Works he was responsible for the new Central railway station at Devonshire Street.

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Radic, Therese

Biographer and musicologist.

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Roland, Betty

Writer of plays, screenplays, novels, children's books and comics.

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Somers, Thomas

Playwright.

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Stone, Louis

Novelist and playwright.

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Tomholt, Sydney John

Playwright whose 11 short plays include the most substantial introduction to symbolist and expressionist drama in Australia before the 1960s.

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Upton, Andrew

Playwright, director and screenwriter.

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Valentine, Alana

Playwright whose plays, often reflecting social issues of the times, have been produced in Australia and overseas.

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Williamson, David

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Playwright whose work includes Emerald City, about Sydney, and many other works focusing on the social morality of the day.

Witcombe, Eleanor

A pioneer of theatre for young people, she went on to write mostly for screen and radio.

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New Theatre

Independent theatre company first established in Newtown which is now the oldest theatre company in continuous production in New South Wales. It is also Australia's oldest radical theatre movement and over its lifetime, it has staged plays of contemporary international and Australian writing. It has been at its current premises on King Street in Newtown since 1973.

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Rusty Bugles

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Play written by Sumner Locke Elliott about life in the Australian army in the Northern Territory during World War II. Attempts to censor the natural language in the play eventually forced a revision of Australian censorship laws.

Elliott, Sumner Locke

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Novelist, playwright and actor who won the Miles Franklin Literary Award in 1963 and the Patrick White Literary Award in 1977.

Storm

Play written by Sumner Locke Elliott as a teenager in 1933. The play won the Nellie Stewart Annual Prize for the best play by an Australian author in the Junior Theatre League drama competition.

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