Millennium Bridge A contemporary Australian history Hilary Beaton A stage play and exegesis submitted for the requirements of the Masters of Arts (Research). Faculty of Creative Industries Queensland University of Technology 2006 Keywords Mid career, playwright profile, playwrighting, early career, commissioning process, theatre reviews, theatre industry, creative industries, government funding, audience development, consumers and distributors, Asian-Australian relations, globalisation, human rights abuse, bridge-building. ii Abstract The script, Millennium Bridge, is an investigation into the passions and fears that are shaping contemporary Australia today. Charting the political climate of the past decade, at the play’s centre a man is building a bridge from Australia to Asia. The central dramatic question being asked is “In an environment where the emphasis on economic prosperity overrides that of human rights and freedom of speech—what will be the consequences for the Australian people?” The accompanying analysis of the ten-year period it took to write Millennium Bridge illuminates the significance of institutional issues on a play and playwright’s development. Written from the perspective of a mid- career playwright, the paper argues that the professional and personal circumstances within which a work of art is created (and their effect on the playwright’s confidence and financial capacities) are a significant determinant of the productivity of playwrights. iii Table of Contents Keywords ii Abstract iii Statement of Original Authorship v Acknowledgements vi Play: Millennium Bridge 7-95 Exegesis: Context is everything: the perspective of a mid-career writer 96-134 Bibliography 135 Appendix A: Table 1 Professional Relationships 140 Appendix B: Table 2 Time Commitments 141 Appendix C: Table 3 Financial Limitations 142 Appendix D: List of theatre credits 143 iv Statement of Original Authorship The work contained in this thesis has not been previously submitted for a degree or diploma at any other higher education institution. To the best of my knowledge and belief, the thesis contains no material previously published or written by another person except where due reference is made. Signature:________________________________ Date:____________________________________ v Acknowledgements Thanks are due to the academic and general staff of the Creative Industries Faculty at the Queensland University of Technology and to all those who have contributed to the process and completion of this Master of Research. Without the opportunity to work within the structure of the MA (Research) I doubt this project would have seen fruition. In addition, I would like to thank John Baylis from the Theatre Board of the Australia Council whose timely feedback and sourcing of essential research material provided the context for my personal reflection and transformed it into academic investigation. I also wish to thank those who read Millennium Bride at various stages of the script’s development, and who provided constructive comment: Jan McKemmish, Christopher Smith, Tom Gutteridge, Jenny Palmer, Sue Gough, Sue Benner and Saffron Benner. Finally, I wish to thank my supervisor Stuart Glover for his ongoing guidance, feedback and friendship. At all stages he was the editor every writer wants—a reader who understood what I wanted to say often before I did, and then helped me achieve it. Without him this MA would not have been completed. vi Exegesis Context is everything: the perspective of a mid-career playwright. 96 1. Introduction This exegesis examines the writing of my script Millennium Bridge from the perspective of a “mid-career” playwright, particularly, the role of institutional and contextual issues in its long delayed genesis. The case study offers an insight into the broader conditions that shape individual playwrights’ careers, the processes of script development (in particular, those conditions operating in the Queensland theatre industry at the time), and the effects of those conditions on playwright development, productivity and sustainability. While most exegeses provide clues about how and why the author wrote what he/she did, my interest lies in the context in which the play was written and the conditions which led to its delayed development and eventual abandonment. The exegesis posits that it is almost impossible to discuss or understand Millennium Bridge, or indeed any play, independent of contextual influences because they shape and can even direct the writing process. Loosely, I argue that the protracted genesis of Millennium Bridge (it took nearly ten years to write) and the hesitations of local theatre to take on the challenge of producing the script are due in a large way to the cultural and industrial milieu in which the play was written more than any inability on my part to write such a demanding play to a producible standard. No writer sets out to write a bad play nor does any theatre company set out to fail the writer. The aim of both parties from the outset is for the best outcome. But as often happens in our industry, sector, art form (whatever we wish to call it), the relationship between playwright and theatre company (or script organisation or dramaturgical process) does not always result in producible work. And when such endeavours fail, the writing process and particularly the playwright comes under scrutiny, especially, when the common denominator is the playwright. My intention here however, 97 is not to highlight the shortcomings of institutions or individuals involved in the process but to investigate these relationships via another perspective—one that rests outside the script development process—that is, the institutional context (political, economic and artistic) within which artists live and work. Again, it is not my intention to expose “failure” on the part of institutions or individuals involved at any stage in the development of Millennium Bridge. However, I do want to draw attention to the inherent conditions both past and present within which the writing took place to expose the particulars of that “environment” which in turn failed the writer. (It is understood, it would then fail the theatre company and subsequently the audience.) Had any party, including myself, foreseen the derailing of our mutual objective (of seeing Millennium Bridge completed and produced) by the prevailing conditions and influences, we may have been able to provide an alternative pathway or route out of the dilemma. However, this would have required recognition of those conditions and influences within which we were operating by those involved in the process. For the mid-career playwright operating in millennial Brisbane these conditions are of a particular kind.1 In the case of Millennium Bridge, it was the combination of institutional factors (mainly the limited resources to support playwrights) and contextual issues that failed to generate the essential prerequisites for a major work of art to be produced. For Peter Hall, author of Cities in Civilisation, a crucial prerequisite in the 1 After the change of government in 1989 Queensland was a much changed environment in which to produce art work. A decade of policy-making and strategic planning spearheaded by the new Labor Government’s 1991 review, Queensland: A State for Arts led to the introduction of funding to individual artists (including writers) for the first time. As a consequence, “professional arts practice flourished as never before in the state and the success of writers, generally, was seen as one of the significant signposts of the state’s developing intellectual and cultural life” (Beaton 2). This seems to indicate that Queensland had become a fertile environment in which to write a play. This paper will, I hope, underline that the change was relative. Industry growth and improvement does not mean industry sustainability or sustainable careers for the artists in it. 98 process of creating a work of art is an environment where the artist is esteemed or even over-esteemed. He insists it is a sense of self-worth that allows the artist to feel at their best or most inspired and therefore, one can conclude, most able to create works of art. But he warns the act of creation is almost totally and exclusively explained in terms of individual personality.2 He goes on to say that in academic studies there “are only a few examples that mention the social context” (Hall 10). His book, which examines the possibility “of grafting a concept of the culturally determined milieu” (279), rejects the idea that creativity is dependent on individuals but suggests it requires the recognition that “creative behaviour is a direct result of the interaction of individual personalities with their social and cultural environment.” (279) Despite claims (including my own in other settings) that during the period of writing “professional arts practice flourished as never before in Queensland” (Beaton “The Creative Flame” 2), this lack of esteem, which partly takes the form of a lack of resources played a significant role in the length of time it took to write an—as yet—unproduced play. 2.Background The whole notion of the mid-career playwright is a hazy one. While much has been written on playwrighting and the practice of script development for the stage in Australia and overseas, little addresses the mid-career (or even uses the term specifically) or has much to say on the question of the playwright’s conditions of production more broadly. 2 Hall goes on to say “The same goes for the extension of this approach into management studies, where it has been as the basis for studies of company innovation.” (Hall,10) That is to say, the search is for an individual management style rather than the creation of a particular environment. 99 Perhaps most germane is the literature that is determinedly industrial in nature, such as published interviews in industry newsletters with established playwrights, theatre directors and dramaturges or these newsletters (such as The Australian National Playwrights Centre’s Dialogue or the Queensland Theatre Arts Network’s journal Ignite!) which often feature profiles of theatre organisations or script agencies that are committed to the production of new work.