Journey With Us in 2010...

I am delighted to welcome you to Deckchair’s Season 2010 – and invite you to come on a journey with us.

Great theatre is about transporting an audience on a journey in time and space to experience something a little outside the ordinary. Great theatre can lift you out of the everyday into a place of magic, a place of fantasy, a place of dreams, into forgotten histories or imagined futures.

Our season in 2010 is all about journeys: journeys back in time, journeys around the globe, and most importantly journeys around our beautiful home of Western Australia. We travel from Pinjarra to Kalbarri, and right up to the far northern tip of Western Australia in the Kimberley.

We invite you to kick off the year with a trip to the scenic beauty of the Kimberley, where GRACE our first production of the year is set. Adapted by Humphrey Bower from Robert Drewe’s celebrated novel, this on-stage road movie travels from Kings Cross in inner-city Sydney, across the wide expanse of the Great Sandy Desert, and beyond. We are thrilled to launch our year with this world-premiere commission, in collaboration with the Perth International Arts Festival.

Next up is a visit to Kalbarri, WA – back in time to 1942. Kate Mulvany’s magical and hugely funny THE DANGER AGE is a journey back to another world. In this hilarious and highly theatrical tale, the world of the very young John Curtin (not THE John Curtin mind you… but rather his 10 year old namesake) is turned upside down when he receives an unexpected birthday call from the President of the United States.

Lastly, we journey along with three extraordinary people who have dedicated their lives to putting themselves in harm’s way for the sake of others. In THE MODERN INTERNATIONAL DEAD, we travel to the heart of the world’s most dangerous hot spots, and find ourselves risking more than just life and limb. This is an adrenalin charged journey not to be missed.

Alongside these fantastic new Australian plays, our UMBRELLA season moves into its second year. Both of our 2010 umbrella companies take us back in time. With BINDJAREB PINJARRA, we wind back 175 years to 1834, to the small town of Pinjarra, the site of one of WA’s darkest and bloodiest massacres. We are very proud to welcome this hugely successful production to Fremantle for the first time.

Our final destination for the year is a more surreal location – the home of dreams and fantasies. With Matt Cameron’s absurdly fractured fairytale RUBY MOON, we are everywhere and nowhere when we visit the small suburban town of Flaming Tree Grove.

Deckchair Theatre, too, is on a journey in 2010. We welcome you back to our beautiful newly restored heritage home at Victoria Hall this year, and to a new and dynamic and highly dedicated team. Here at Deckchair we are all devoted to bringing our audiences the very best new plays from Western Australia and around the country. This means following infinitely rewarding creative journeys with brilliant playwrights and theatre-makers to continue developing new work for not just this year but for many years to come.

We look forward to travelling with you on these extraordinary journeys throughout 2010.

Chris Bendall
Artistic Director