by Jack Davis
Look, before you get started, I want to apologise to you all … and to Peggy.
WILLIAM: No need, Mr Ranger. We know you got a job to do.
RANGER: No, it was more than that. I didn’t trust you to look after that Forestry cottage and I was really looking for an excuse to get you out. Now as far as I’m concerned you can stay there as long as you like.
MOTHER: That’s great!
WILLIAM: I gotta say I’m sorry too, Mr Ranger.
RANGER: What for?
WILLIAM: For cutting down those trees.
RANGER: What trees? Oh, those trees? Well, that was an emergency, wasn’t it? You had to make a bush stretcher for a man dying of snake-bite!
They all laugh.
WILLIAM: Well, I’m not cutting no more.
MOTHER: He got a job in town last week.
WILLIAM: Don’t need to make no more didgeridoos.
RANGER: Now look, if you ever do need timber, well, we’ve got a block out the back of our place. You just go there and cut all the wood you like. Any time.
TIM: Hey, we gonna do this dance or what?
WILLIAM: Sure, Cuz, just as soon as you and Peggy get ready.
TIM takes off his shirt. PEGGY takes off her dress revealing a leotard. When they are ready they perform a dance piece—a modern dance incorporating elements of classical and traditional Aboriginal dance with music from didgeridoo and clapsticks. The dance is a great sucess. When it is over, they congratulate each other. The RANGER claps.
RANGER: Terrific! You’ll get that scholarship for sure. Hey, you Honey Spot Dancers should do more shows. You could get an audience out here and sit them all round the clearing.
PEGGY: Yeah, kids from school would come.
TIM: And the oldies. We could have a real big mob.
WILLIAM: Just so long as they don’t damage any trees, eh?
PEGGY: Or get stung by the plura.
TIM: You watch out for snakes too, Mr Ranger.
Their chat continues as music plays. They pack up their things and PEGGY and the RANGER get ready to go one way and the Winallis go the other. They all wave to each other and leave.
THE END
Copyright Details
First published in 1987 by
Currency Press Pty Ltd
PO Box 2287, Strawberry Hills NSW 2012
[email protected]; www.currency.com.au
Revised edition published in 1993
Reprinted 1997, 2003 (twice), 2004, 2005, 2006, 2009, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 (twice), 2015
First digital edition published in 2014 by Currency Press.
Text copyright © Jack Davis, 1993.
Illustrations copyright © Ellen José.
Copying for Educational Purposes
The Australian Copyright Act 1968 allows a maximum of one chapter or 10% of this book, whichever is the greater, to be copied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or the body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) under the Act. For details of the CAL licence for educational institutions please contact CAL, Level 15, 233 Castlereagh Street, Sydney, NSW, 2000; tel: within Australia 1800 066 844 toll free; outside Australia +61 2 9394 7600; fax: +61 2 9394 7601; email: [email protected]
Copying for Other Purposes
Except as permitted under the Act, for example a fair dealing for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission. All inquiries should be made to the publisher at the above address.
Performance Rights
Any performance or public reading of Honey Spot is forbidden unless a licence has been received from the author’s predecessors Madolen Davis or Nicholas Davies. The purchase of this book in no way gives the purchaser the right to perform the play in public, whether by means of a staged production or a reading. All applications for public performance should be made to Curtis Brown (Aust.), PO Box 19, Paddington NSW 2021; tel: 61 2 9331 5301; email: [email protected].
Honey Spot was commissioned by the Australian Content Department of the Elizabethan Theatre Trust in 1984, and acknowledges the Arts Board of the Australia Council. The first production of Honey Spot for the Come-Out Festival in Adelaide in 1985 was made possible with the generous support of the Department of Aboriginal Affairs (through the Public Awareness Program).
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