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 Our
Country's Good
by Timberlake Wertenbaker
April 23 - May 15, 1993
Directed by Lyn Adams
Described as "highly theatrical, often funny and at times dark and disturbing, it sets an infant civilization on the stage with clarity, economy and insight [as] it relates the true story of the first theatrical performance in Australia.";
OUR COUNTRY'S GOOD is based on Thomas Keneally's novel THE PLAYMAKER.
 In June 1789 in the penal colony that was later to become the city of Sydney, a marine lieutenant decides to put on a play to celebrate the king's birthday.
He casts the play with the English convicts who populate this distant Australian prison camp. Few of them can read, let alone act, and the play is being produced against a background of food shortages and barbaric
punishments - brilliantly juxtaposed against the civilizing influence of theatrical endeavor.
The "hangman,"
himself a convict, has been recruited along with a woman, wrongfully accused of
stealing. Even as the play is being rehearsed, he measures her for a
noose.
Despite its grim subject
matter, OUR COUNTRY'S GOOD is often funny and joyful, imbued with a firm faith
in the power of the human spirit.
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