NAN DEAR: Not related to any Fishers, even?
ERROL: No, ma’am.
It dawns on DOLLY and NAN simultaneously.
DOLLY: That means…
NAN DEAR: Dear God. Thank goodness.
NAN reaches over and gives him a smacking kiss on the cheek.
DOLLY stands there, agape. GLADYS rushes up with the glass of lemonade—she hasn’t seen the kiss.
GLADYS: Here’s your lemonade, Mum.
NAN DEAR: You know I never touch that stuff. Bad for my sugars. Give it to Dolly.
GLADYS is completely exasperated. She has not yet noticed DOLLY’s expression.
WOMAN ON MICROPHONE: [voice-over] We can’t wait much longer for your father.
GLADYS: He’ll be here.
WOMAN ON MICROPHONE: [voice-over] Right you are…
DOLLY’s baby cries and GLADYS turns her attention to the pram. She’s speaking to DOLLY, not even noticing the DOLLY and NAN’s sudden mood change. ERROL is just bewildered.
GLADYS: Papa Dear will be here soon. I hope that you, Regina, will be as lucky as I am. Papa Dear… he’s the best father a girl could ever have.
DOLLY: [to GLADYS] Mum, I’ve got something to tell you. Papa Dear’s not—
The squeal of a microphone.
GLADYS: Not what? Not coming? ’Course he is!
DOLLY hesitates.
WOMAN ON MICROPHONE: [voice-over] Ah… we’ve just had word. Papa Dear’s been caught up at a funeral. If Uncle Wally is here, can he present the petition? Where are you, Uncle?
GLADYS stares in the direction of the voice, then something snaps.
GLADYS: Petition. Uncle Wally… What’s he got to do with this?
She marches up to the podium.
I will present the petition. [Tremulous] After all, me and my father Papa Dear, we came up with this here petition together… Gawd, I’m nervous— [To an audience member] Oh, hi there, Aunty…
She closes her eyes and without looking at the paper she begins.
As you know, William Cooper tried to present a petition to King George a few years back, but it was refused. Maybe our current monarch will listen to what we have to say.
Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth the Second, Queen of England and her territories. We humbly present this petition to you… [To herself] Why humbly? We’ve been humble too long. Anyway… [She continues confidently.] We request… [To herself] No, we don’t, sorry Papa. [Continuing] We demand to be heard.
CROWD: [offstage] Hear, hear.
GLADYS: Your Majesty, Queen Elizabeth the Second. We demand suitable housing for the Aboriginal people. [To herself] Yes, we got Rumbalara. And I’ll be the first to admit, the idea sounded good. But—have you seen it? Concrete. No doors inside—so, we don’t need privacy, not like regular folk, is that it? We want decent houses. Mrs Windsor, would you live at Rumbalara? Then why is it good enough for us? Why do we have to prove we can live like whitefellas, before we get the same opportunities? And, to boot, we’re watched over like a bunch of cheeky kids… We’re secondclass citizens in our own country. No, we’re not even citizens. Heavens, and this is the fifties!
We demand the right to control our own destiny. Now how exactly did Papa Dear word it…?
She looks at the paper. She’s lost her train of thought. She begins to panic. She’s up in public, reading. She looks at the piece of paper wildly.
VOICE: [offstage] Do you need your glasses?
GLADYS: No.
There is a sustained moment of tension, then she hesitatingly reads one word, then another, then another.
‘We demand the right to make our own decisions, and not be at the whim of government, at the mercy of Protection Boards, at the vagary of landlords and property owners.’
‘We demand proper schooling.’ [To herself] And not just for us. [Continuing] ‘The white people too—they need to be educated about us, and our ways.’
She is reading more fluently now.
‘Opportunities. We want jobs in town for our sons and daughters. We want them to go to universities.’ [To herself] Yes! Not just high schools but universities! And why not? They say we can’t learn, but we can. We can do anything once we set our minds to it, eh?
‘We, the undersigned, demand to be the equal of anyone. And we will fight for that right. And keep fighting. Until we are treated right. By our neighbours and employers. By the Shire, by the Crown, by Mr Menzies.’ [To herself] And if it’s not him, then the next Prime Minister. Or the one after that.
Lastly, and this isn’t in the petition, but maybe it should be, I don’t want my mother to be served last in the butcher’s. And I want townsfolk to say, ‘Hello, lovely day’. Not cross the road to avoid us like we’re lepers. [To her audience] We can get along with each other, can’t we?
ERROL and DOLLY look at each other, longingly. NAN, as always, notices this and smiles. GLADYS has revved the CROWD into a frenzy, but as she looks at them, she stops abruptly, her natural modesty reasserting itself.
Goodness, I think I’ve said more than enough. But please, sign our petition. Come up to me afterwards. If you want me to read any part to you… I can. Thank you.
GLADYS ends her speech to tumultuous applause. DOLLY and ERROL again look at each other, very emotionally, clapping hard.
VOICE: [offstage, yelling] That’s the spirit. She’s Papa Dear’s daughter all right!
GLADYS joins her family, excitedly. They hug her.
NAN DEAR: You done us all proud, Gladys. Your dad’d be…
A knowing look passes between NAN and DOLLY.
… real proud of ya.
The baby makes a sound, as if she wants some of this attention. ERROL and DOLLY both automatically turn to the pram.
The last verse of ‘Que Sera, Sera’ begins:
‘Now I have children of my own…’
The lights change for NAN’s dream sequence.
Wedding bells and confetti as DOLLY and ERROL—pram in the middle—get hitched.
The lights snap back to reality:
‘They asked their mother, what will I be…’
NAN DEAR: Oh, for heaven’s sake! Dolly, marry this boy, before someone else does—I saw your cousin Pauline eyeing him off.
DOLLY: What? Are you sure?
GLADYS: Mum, are you sure?
ERROL: Are you really sure?
NAN DEAR: Yes! Yes! Of course I am. I can recognise a good man when I see one.
‘Will I be handsome, will I be rich…?’
GLADYS rolls her eyes, incredulous. DOLLY and ERROL hold each other’s hands and look at each other adoringly.
ERROL: Thank you, Mrs Dear, for your blessing, Mrs Dear.
NAN DEAR: It’s ‘Nan Dear’ to you… son.
‘I tell them tenderly…’
ERROL: Yes, Nan Dear.
DOLLY: And, Mum…?
GLADYS: Yes, Dolly?
DOLLY: It’ll be all right.
GLADYS: You always say that.
A commotion is heard in the background.
DOLLY: It’s Papa Dear! He’s here! He’s here!
The lights fade out on the ‘Que Sera, Sera’ chorus.
Que sera, sera,
Whatever will be, will be,
The future’s not ours to see,
Que sera, sera,
What will be, will be,
Que sera, sera…
THE END
GLOSSARY
bodgies
boys who adopted certain fashions and behaviours during the 1950s
buka bung stew
stew made from nettles
goomees
drinkers
gubba
whitefella
humpy
a rough dwelling; a bush hut made from found materials
mamel
carpet snake
moom
bottom
widgies
female equivalent of the bodgies (see above)
Copyright Page
CURRENCY PLAYS
F
irst published in 2007 by
Currency Press Pty Ltd
PO Box 2287
Strawberry Hills NSW 2012
www.currency.com.au
[email protected]
Copyright © Jane Harrison, 2007
First published in 2007 by Currency Press Pty Ltd; in Contemporary Indigenous Plays, by Vivienne Cleven et al.
First electronic edition published in 2013 by Currency Press Pty Ltd.
Copying for Educational Purposes
The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or 10% of this book, whichever is the greater, to be reproduced and/or communicated by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that 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 contact CAL, Level 15, 233 Castlereagh Street, Sydney NSW, 2000. Tel: (02) 9394 7600; 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, all rights are reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.
Performance Rights
Any performance or public reading of Rainbow's End is forbidden unless a licence has been received from the author or the author’s agent. 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 directed to the author, c/- Currency Press Pty Ltd.
ePub ISBN: 9781925004243
mobi ISBN: 9781925004250
Rainbow's End Page 8
