The first real play I wrote was back in the early 80's. The Meeting, (One Act, 4m,4f) I had been on several committees, including the local Little Theatre group. It struck me that the frustration, time wasting and indecision that goes on would make a god theme for a play. I set the scene in the Chairman's house, his wife being the obsessional secretary. I based several of the characters on personal acquaintances and we put it on. Subsequently I submitted it to Playlab, a Queensland based programme supporting plays. They staged a rehearsed reading and it received good reviews.. There have been a few productions in Australia. and had has in general favourable reviews. Anyone who has ever been on any committee will empathize with this. This play has recently had performances.
Shortly after that, in 1987, the centenary of Sherlock Holmes's first appearance, the local university staged a competition, Hemlock Shomes, for a play on the Holmes theme. My submission The Body in the Restaurant (3m,3f,1 body) was the winner. The action was set at the University and featured a current cartoon character and one modelled on a current pop singer. The plot is over the top. The play is probably too specific to its setting. There have been other works such as Outside Dingley Cottage (2F) specifically written as a project for an historical heritage village project and several skits, parodies and revue items, and scripts for specific purposes over the years.
REVUES
There have been four of these. The first on "THE 200 CLUB" was co written with Peter GUNN in 1988. This was a large cast production with music and several themes.
We followed it up a couple of years later with "201 A SPACE ODDITY" which did have items dealing with space along with a lot of other themes.
A few years later I headed a team of contributors to present "GST REVUE"- the GST not being the goods and services tax, but the Good Ship Titanic. It concerned an alternative version of the final voyage. I co-directed this one. It has been rewritten The last one was more recent, in 2018. Again other people contributed scripts and we staged "BOGANVILIA" a revue about things Australian which I directed. This one was done at Yeppoon, the earlier ones in Rockhampton. Again there was a large cast with numerous costumes. Some of the items from these revues have found their way into other works. The scripts are still available. Revues are very time consuming with constant re-writing required. All of these are available, and a lot of the individual items can be done as stand-alone skits.
RECORDINGS
A few years back we ran a series of broadcasts of short plays. over 2 hundred in just over 2 years. A lot of mine were used and the recordings are available. The ones that came from or closely based on material from the reviews are: -
From 200 Club "Aeroplane" (3F) (also as a 10 minute play) has been recorded
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1iZdlsfa2vU5PocRyrgA9Vic8sFyVMU2i/view?usp=drive_link
Also recorded "Collision" (2M) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RJeDpjGWX4vExi2OifjiajY-bP_JJY4r/view?usp=drive_link
Cheeses (2E) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LuNj40SmbzHpRLeV6-PXtOaB2bI-KC36/view?usp=drive_link
Quotations(4E) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1j6lm4PSKsO7HrwqgP1294OMlRy_IZCEa/view?usp=drive_link
From 201 A Space Oddity "Russian Space Station"(!F,3M) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uqk2MzofeSsbruyLA8XEIEew1ylyZWib/view?usp=drive_link
"Hypocriticals" https://drive.google.com/file/d/1OA1NC1IZlBI-PY6w4o7-BiXRK8a6FSOi/view?usp=drive_link
From Boganvilia a variation of a song based on the poem "The Night Before Christmas" called "A Christmas Story" was recorded.(1M,1F,3 E & chorus) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1I3uJhBZCeizRVpk_TXsiYdkImXg3YeB8/view?usp=drive_link
These are available
From GST Revue An adapted excerpt called "Ship Ahoy" was broadcast https://drive.google.com/file/d/1s5ImWIzxEf_4Av895zhbvgIvYh2JPxJO/view?usp=drive_link
For ten years or more I have been an assessor for "Short and Sweet". We assess the plays that are submitted, and that submission is part of the process of selecting which ones will be performed. In the course of this I have read many 10 minute scripts, and some of these were used in the broadcasts. Some of them have given me ideas of what to do next.
OTHERS
There are a lot of ither script which are partly complete, and many will most likely remain so.
There are a few things in the pipeline. I'm still looking for assistance with the music for "King Prawn" and looking at some music for "Ivan The Terrible" but the main project is a murder mystery where audience members read some of the parts, The number of parts will depend on how many volunteers there are so the whole thing has to be very flexible yet coherent. A real challenge,