Table Of ContentNick Enright
Nick Enright
An Actor’s Playwright
Edited by
Anne Pender
and
Susan Lever
Volume 12 in the series
AUSTRALIAN PLAYWRIGHTS
Series Editor: Peta Tait
Amsterdam - New York, NY 2008
Cover Photograph: Deidre Rubenstein, Nick Enright and Andrew Ross in
Songs of Love and Desperation, The Tilbury Hotel, 1986.
Photographer: Stuart Campbell.
Cover design: Pier Post
The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of “ISO
9706:1994, Information and documentation - Paper for documents -
Requirements for permanence”.
ISBN: 978-90-420-2460-1
©Editions Rodopi B.V., Amsterdam - New York, NY 2008
Printed in the Netherlands
Contents
List of Figures 7
Series Editor’s Preface 8
Editors’ Preface 9
Contributors’ Biographies 11
Acknowledgment 13
Part One: The Productions
1: Nick Enright: A Life in Theatre 17
Anne Pender
2: Life or a Cabaret?: Nick Enright and The Boy from Oz 27
Peter Fitzpatrick
3: Masculinity, Guilt and the Moral Failures of the Body: Nick
Enright’s Screenplays 47
Susan Lever
4: The Collaboration Process: Nick Enright and Justin Monjo’s
Adaptation of Cloudstreet 61
Jack Teiwes
5: Youthful Presence: Nick Enright as Teacher and A Property
of the Clan 79
Mary Ann Hunter
6: Enright’s Mongrels as Intervention in the Canon of
Contemporary Australian Drama 95
Veronica Kelly
7: Enright on the Record: Evidence from the Television Archives
of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation 115
Adrian Kiernander
8: Mongrels and Young Curs: The Hounding of the Feminine in
St James Infirmary, Good Works, Blackrock and Spurboard 127
Jane O’Sullivan
9: Anxiety and a Fragmented Australia in Nick Enright’s A Man
With Five Children 143
Felicity Plunkett
10: “Loved Every Minute of It”: Nimrod, Enright’s The Venetian
Twins and the Invention of Popular Theatre 157
Julian Meyrick
11: Summer Rain: Sweet Nostalgia 173
Susan Lever and Anne Pender
Part Two: The Collaborator
12: Nick Enright: A Man With Many Children 187
George Ogilvie
13: Nick Enright: Friend 195
Sandy Gore
14: Nick Enright: An Acting Teacher Recollected 203
Karen Vickery
15: Prima Le Parole E Poi La Musica 213
Terence Clarke
Appendix: Works by Nick Enright 221
List of Figures
Cover Photograph: Deidre Rubenstein, Nick Enright and Andrew
Ross in Songs of Love and Desperation, The Tilbury Hotel, 1986.
Photographer: Stuart Campbell.
Figure 1: A gentle caricature of Nick Enright as scribe/researcher by
collaborator, designer John Senczuk.
Figure 2: Geraldine Turner, Billie Brown, Elise Grieg and Anthony
Weigh in the Queensland Theatre Company 1997 production of
Summer Rain. Photographer: Rob Maccoll.
Figure 3: The company for the 1998 production of Cloudstreet,
Company B Belvoir and Black Swan Theatre. Photographer: Heidrun
Lohr.
Figure 4: Matt Costelli, Jackson Castiglione and Mathew Ralph in the
1996 Black Swan Theatre Company production of Blackrock.
Photographer: William Crabb.
Figure 5: Tony Sheldon and John Howard in the Sydney Theatre
Company 1997 production of Mongrels. Photographer: Tracey
Schramm.
Figure 6: Jon Ewing, Tara Morice, John Simpson, Jonathan Biggins,
Drew Forsythe, Bernadette Robinson, Terry Bader, Genevieve Lemon
and Arky Michael in the Queensland State Theatre Company 1990
production of The Venetian Twins. Photographer: Rob Maccoll.
Series Editor’s Preface
I welcomed the opportunity to include this volume in the Rodopi
series on Australian playwrights as it addresses a glaring gap in the
current scholarship. Volume 12 is the first detailed analysis about the
legacy of Nick Enright and I am extremely pleased that Anne Pender
and Susan Lever were able to bring together both theatre scholars and
practitioners to provide insights on aspects of his life and career. Most
importantly, Enright was a dynamic, influential figure whose work
made a significant contribution to Australian theatre and appropriate
recognition is overdue. This volume considers Nick’s prominent
works and captures impressions of Nick at work. It focuses attention
on the broad scope of his scripts and musicals, highlights productions
that have been seen by diverse audiences, and describes his significant
working processes and collaborations. Nick Enright was a major force
in Australian theatre, and is sadly missed.
Peta Tait
La Trobe University
Editors’ Preface
In this volume of essays and recollections, scholars, actors, directors,
and acting teachers explore Nick Enright’s contribution to theatre. The
book is designed to explain, illuminate and debate Enright’s plays,
television and film scripts, his directing style and his approach to
acting. Enright’s drama is frequently studied by students at high
school and at university. The essays and recollections included in this
book will inspire and inform students, teachers, scholars and theatre
enthusiasts.
Part One opens with an overview of Enright’s career in theatre
followed by an essay by Peter Fitzpatrick about one of Enright’s most
well-known works, The Boy from Oz, in order to give readers,
including those based overseas, an immediate sense of the important
achievements of Enright’s career which include musicals, film and
theatre. The ensuing chapters are arranged to convey the full extent of
his remarkable oeuvre, followed by chapters with detailed textual
analysis of Enright’s plays.
Part Two consists of moving tributes from artistic collabo-
rators. These recollections serve to document Enright’s approaches to
writing and teaching acting, and his attitudes to theatre, as well as
celebrating the warmth and love that this man extended to those with
whom he worked.
Anne Pender and Susan Lever
Description:Nick Enright (1950-2003) was one of Australia's most significant and successful playwrights. As a writer, director, actor and teacher he influenced theatre in Australia for thirty years. Enright wrote more than fifty plays for the stage, film, television and radio, translated and adapted more, and t
