Doll Seventeen
For sixteen years Roo and Barney have come off the cane fields in the 'layoff' to live it up in Melbourne with their girlfriends. It's now the seventeenth year and everything has changed. Director Jacqui Carroll has distilled the essence of this prize winning play from three acts to one, and added rich layers of emotion and multiform performance.
Doll Seventeen is Frank Theatre's interpretation of the seminal 1950s Australian play, Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, by Ray Lawler. Director Jacqui Carroll and her creative team have used theatrical fantasy to effectively interpret this play so that it still resonates strongly with both Australian and Queensland contempory life.
Frank Theatre, training as they do in the Suzuki Actor Training Method (SATM), is renowned for innovative and high quality productions. They also provide training throughout Australia and internationally. Frank's east-west fusion philosophy of theatre practice gives a unique perspective to their work and ensures a fascinating blend of theatre, text and dance.
The original work, Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, was an Australian classic that gained widespread national and international acclaim. We feel sure that Frank Theatre's interpretation will continue this critical success.
DIRECTOR'S NOTE
It is my intention not to present the play, Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, but a designed impression: a fantasy of the play driven by the language of the senses. I offer here an intuitive impression, rich in movement and music.
Olive, Roo, Barney, Pearl and the Kewpie Doll all drift through, enmeshed in their dreams and nightmares. Surrounded by the vocal and musical chorus of the three probing realists, the main players continually search for equilibrium in a tilting world. Popular songs, movie themes, tangos, mambos, blues, etc. intersect throughout with the principal protagonists' world, allowing them time for reflection on their interior life.
Jacqui Carroll - Director
Frank Theatre www.ozfrank.com