
BOY OUT OF THE COUNTRY played as part of the inaugural Pioneer Play Festival. The play is a favourite with schools but this was the Sydney premiere. An interesting script which explores the conflicts around loss of rural lifestyle, it is written with an idiomatic style that sees naturalistic and non-naturalistic scenes beside each other and mood and emotion heightened by language.
Hunter and Gordon have come to blows. Hunter has returned to his rural hometown after seven years away to find progress in an unstoppable march. His boyhood home is next to be sold and developed, his mother Margaret, has been relocated and his elder brother has dollars in his eyes. There’s a squabble inevitable as Hunter refuses to let go of the past. Local police officer Walker will handle the physical dustup but Gordon’s wife, Rachel, will be left to moderate between the two. There are big stakes for both men and intractability is their male heritage. Continue reading BOY OUT OF THE COUNTRY. IS THE LOSS OF RURAL LIFESTYLE INEVITABLE?