Summer of the Seventeenth Doll

We regret to inform you that due to the current situation with COVID-19 the Summer of the Seventeenth Doll have made the decision to cancel their coming show, scheduled for Saturday 6 June.  Tickets holders will be contacted.

 

 

BY RAY LAWLER

Presented by Ipswich Civic Centre and Hit Productions

For sixteen years two Queensland cane cutters have worked the punishing routine up north in the sugar cane fields for seven months of the year and travel back to Melbourne to meet up for five months of partying and romance with their barmaid girlfriends.

This seventeenth summer everything is different.

One of the barmaids has ‘settled down’ and married a city bloke so a replacement date has had to be found.

This ‘off-season’ proves challenging for them all.

 

 

“The Doll is a wonderful piece of theatre, that isn’t really about a moment in our past, but about the search for love and the disappointments, denial and heartbreak that can come to those who refuse to see the realities of the world around them”. Australian Stage

“A story of love, heartache, hope and loss, Ray Lawler’s Summer of the Seventeenth Doll remains one of the theatrical canon’s most moving explorations of the fading of youth and dreams”. Arts Review

“Summer of the Seventeenth Doll” provides a rare and theatrically realistic glimpse into an Australian working-class psyche that is not simply from the past but is still ever-present.” City News

“More than sixty years after its debut Lawler’s play still holds a mirror that reflects Australian society”. Out In Perth

“Hope, love, mortality, delusion, class identity and gender equity are all explored within the single setting of a 1950s inner city Melbourne lounge room; the familiar setting ensuring the conflict resonates with audiences even nearly 70 years down the track”. Arts Hub

Top Row L to R – Ruth Caro, Neil Pigot, Rebecca Howell, Arthur Angel.

Bottom Row L to R – Laura Gabriel, Bree-Anna Cummins, Adam Hetherington.