Adam Cass - La Mama

This is number one hundred and seventy-four
in the second numbered series of
the Miegunyah Volumes
made possible by the
Miegunyah Fund
established by bequests
under the wills of
Sir Russell and Lady Grimwade.

Miegunyah was the home
of Mab and Russell Grimwade
from 1911 to 1955.

THE MIEGUNYAH PRESS

An imprint of Melbourne University

Publishing Limited

Level 1, 715 Swanston Street,

Carlton, Victoria 3053, Australia

mup-info@unimelb.edu.au

www.mup.com.au

First published 2017

Text Adam Cass 2017

Design and typography Melbourne

University Publishing Ltd 2017

This book is copyright. Apart from any use permitted under the Copyright Act 1968 and subsequent amendments, no part may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means or process whatsoever without the prior written permission of the publishers.

Every attempt has been made to locate the copyright holders for material quoted in this book. Any person or organisation that may have been overlooked or misattributed may contact the publisher.

Edited by Sarina Rowell Designed by Pfisterer + Freeman Printed in China by 1010 Printing

National Library of Australia Cataloguing -in-Publication entry

Cass, Adam J.A., author. La Mama/Adam J.A. Cass 9780522871562 (paperback) 9780522871579 (ebook) Includes index.

La Mama TheatreHistory.

TheatreVictoriaMelbourneHistory.

Performing artsVictoriaMelbourne.

Note: Play titles and the names of playwrights listed at the start of each playwrights listed at the start of each part are transcribed from La Mamas annual reports.

contents

Liz Jones

Adam Cass

Liz Jones

Malcolm Robertson, with Liz Jones and Roisin Lynagh

Bill Beard

Meg Clancy

Bill Garner

Alison Richards

MaryAnne Caleo

Liz Jones

Maureen Hartley

Judith Buckrich (Judy Raphael)

Richard Murphet

Nedd Jones

Carmelina Di Guglielmo

Mary Duckworth

Tes Lyssiotis

Stella Pulo

Tom Gutteridge

Merrilee Moss

Catherine Hill

Caroline Lee and Laurence Strangio

Bagryana Popov

Susan Bamford Caleo

Stephen House

Fiona Wiseman

James Clayden, Patricia Cornelius, Susie Dee, Barry Dickins, Jill OCallaghan (Buckler) and Daniel Schlusser, with Lloyd Jones, Fiona Wiseman, Caitlin Dullard and Mathilde Broudic

Jean Taylor

Bronwyn Pringle and Richard Vabre

Jane Woollard

Mary Helen Sassman, Emma Valente and Kate Davis

Mammad Aidani

Abe Pogos

Noel Tovey

Peta Hanrahan

Gayelene Carbis

Mic Smith

Sandra Long

Scott Welsh

Annabel Warmington (with a cameo by Penny Baron)

Tim Stitz

Kit Lazaroo

Cynthia Troup

James Hazelden

Robert Reid

Amber Hart, Elena Larkin, Stefania Di Gennaro and Zachary Kazepis

Darren Vizer with Caitlin Dullard

Monica McDonald

Cera Maree Brown

Sofia Chapman

Don Mackay

Sandra Chui

Lloyd Jones

Elnaz Sheshgelani

Malcolm Robertson and Liz Jones

Caitlin Dullard

Thank you to all of the interviewees, storytellers and other contributors.

Thank you to all the photographers, especially Sarah Walker, Darren Gill and Lloyd Carrick, whose image archives have been invaluable.

Thank you, Barry Dickins, for your beautiful pencil drawings and your enormous contribution to La Mama over many decades.

Thank you to Fiona Wiseman for all your assistance with the archives, the chronology, for your ideas and various other contributions.

Thank you to Nedd Jones for curating the visual presentation.

An enormous thank you to Mathilde Broudic and Darren Vizer for your enormous assistance in sourcing the visual material.

Thank you to Sam Lipski and the Pratt Foundation, Carillo Gantner and the Myer Foundation, and the Max Chapman Bequest, for providing much-needed funds towards the creation of this book, and for the many other contributions that you have made to La Mama.

Thank you to all of the funding bodies that keep La Mama alivethe Australia Council for the Arts, Creative Victoria, City of Melbourne, and all of our private donors and supporters.

Apologies to all the thousands of La Mama artists whose individual stories have not been told in this book. Please keep coming back to La Mama to share your stories in the flesh.

Thank you, Roisin Lynagh, for your ideas and intelligence, and offers at the beginning stages of research; your contribution was invaluable in framing my approach to the book, and my interview questions.

Thank you, Cathryn Lea Smith, and all at Melbourne University Publishing. Thanks also to Pfisterer + Freeman for the wonderful book design and page layout.

Thank you to Dianne Stubbings, who volunteered her time to work on the chronological lists.

Thank you to the University of Melbourne Archives for giving a home to all our treasured artefacts and helping us access them.

Thank you to our audiences, without whom there would be no La Mama, and no book.

Most of all, thank you to Liz Jones and Caitlin Dullard for believing in me enough to let me be the one to tell La Mamas story.

Betty Burstall and Liz Jones, 1988

Pencil drawings by Barry Dickins, 2016

La Mama interior, circa 197677

Pauline Whyman, Jack Charles and Glenn Shea in
Coranderrk: We Will Show The Country, 2016

La Mama, circa 197677

Winter Launch, 2016

A healthy artistic climate does not depend solely on the work of a handful of supremely gifted individuals. It demands the cultivation of talent and ability at all levels. It demands that everyday work, run-of-the-mill work, esoteric and unpopular work should he given a chance; not so much in the hope that one day genius may spring from it, but because, for those who make the arts their life and work, even modest accomplishment is an end in itself and a value worth encouraging. The pursuit of excellence is a proper goal, but it is not the race itself