Lisa Milner

Kenny: the evolution of the battler figure in Howard's Australia

Abstract This article explores ways in which the low-budget mockumentary film Kenny (Clayton Jacobson, 2006) evolves the figure of the Australian battler, from its earlier incarnation in The Castle (Rob Sitch, 1997). A surprise hit on Australian screens, Kenny is the quietly humorous story of a portaloo worker, one of the ‘ordinary Australians’ that the Howard government claimed it spoke for. But whilst Kenny brought some old-fashioned toilet humour to the box office, he was overworked, underappreciated and apprehensive. The article maps the film from the perspective of its Australian audience, to suggest ways in which this comic but uneasy version of the working-class battler responded to socioeconomic change. It scrutinises the circumstances of the films Australian reception to examine the legacies of an era in which many people became disengaged from politics, the work/family balance seemed harder than ever, and fear was exploited for political advantage. Such an analysis of the representation of the battler figure suggests that both Kenny and The Castle present an idealisation of the battler figure, but they do so differently in response to their sociocultural milieu.

No Handmaidens Here: women, volunteering and gender dynamics in the Sydney New Theatre

ABSTRACT This paper considers the role of women in the Sydney branch of the New Theatre, from 1936 to 1969. In contrast to other gendered spaces found in the theatrical, industrial and political spheres, women held together the New Theatre. Not only did the theatre give opportunities to women as performers, but women embraced roles as directors, stage managers, writers, designers as well as holding elected offices. Drawing on oral histories and archival research, this study presents new scholarship on Australian women’s leadership in the theatre, arguing that their pattern of involvement was shaped by the voluntary nature of the work, the longevity of involvement, their political commitment and the theatre’s democratic structure. The blending of organisational and creative leadership created spaces for women’s voices in ways that were crucial to the long-term success of the Theatre, at a time when women were generally expected to focus on the domestic sphere.

‘The unbreakable solidarity of women throughout the world with heroic Vietnam’ : Freda Brown, women’s organisations and the anti-Vietnam War movement

Abstract One of the many Australians who campaigned against participation in the Vietnam War was Freda Brown (1919–2009). Among the anti-war groups she worked within, three employed a maternalist approach to many of their campaigns. Mobilising against the prevailing concept of a woman’s role to keep the home fires burning and support the troops, Brown travelled to North Vietnam at the height of the conflict. One remarkable outcome of her activism was the funding of the Hanoi Obstetrics and Gynaecology Hospital. This article explores Brown’s work in these organisations, and examines her work in transnational maternalism.

Staging international communism: British–Australian radical theatre connections

ABSTRACT Encouraged by Communist parties and left-wing trade unions, radical, or working-class, theatre groups of the twentieth century were crucial in the development of a long-lasting left-wing cultural activist impulse in a number of nations. The branches of the Unity Theatre in UK and the New Theatre in Australia had a highly conscious democratic and explicit working class orientation, and presented various combinations of mainstream and radical dramatic genres and plays. Drawing on oral histories and archival research, this chapter explores the politics of popular culture by focusing on the degrees of mobility of ideas, dramatic texts and people and politics between the two theatres. The emergent mobility patterns across these elements demonstrated the effect of ‘tyranny of distance’ to invoke Blainey’s phrase1 and the sociocultural mores of ‘Empire’ on those transnational flows. Whether it was the mobility of ideas, texts or people, a more complex picture emerged than simple exchange or reciprocal influence. Informing our discussion is the mobility studies literature, following the ‘mobility turn’ in the social sciences. A number of concepts within mobility studies provide a lens for analysing the movement of ideas, scripts and people between Unity and the New Theatre.

Political theatre and the state, Melbourne and Sydney, 1936-1953

For much of the twentieth century, branches of the New Theatre in Australia presented left-wing theatre within a culture that was resistant to their ideas. A novel mix of conventional theatre forms, experimental performative styles, agitational propaganda and Communist theories of ‘art as a weapon’ produced theatre that was responsive to international issues, infused with social comment, and oppositional in orientation. The larger Melbourne and Sydney branches of the New Theatre, on which this article focuses, attracted the attention of governments and security services anxious about the ‘insidious’ influence of left-wing workers’ theatre. The article explores the various attempts to monitor, censor and silence the Melbourne and Sydney branches of New Theatre from 1936 to 1953, and suggests that the state circumscribed but did not cripple the groups’ contribution to the development of a radical cultural activist tradition in Australia. This article has been peer reviewed.

From martyr to robo-nurse: the portrayal of Australian nurses on screen

Nurses have traditionally been seen as among the most trusted of workers, with cultural connections with caring and femininity long been associated with their profession. While the portrayal of nurses in overseas screenworks has had some attention, Australian productions have not. This study identifies four categories of screenworks: popular entertainment, training and recruitment films, wartime nursing, and nurses as workers and unionists. Although more recent mainstream media portrayals of nurses increasingly depict strong, assertive professionals, little research has been conducted into the fourth category, a significant number of which are made by nurses. When nurses take on the film-making task, different outcomes are produced. New types of film about nurses and by nurses offer an evolving representation of the profession and are helping to change the identity of nurses.

Moving forward with an action plan: political campaigning on the big screen

ABSTRACT For decades, the media has been increasingly central to the conduct of elections. Politicians have made their mark in highly produced advertisements to further their cause, educate voters, and, perhaps, contribute to informed decision making at the ballot box. Ian Ward notes that television ‘has literally transformed the very practice of politics’, but well before the advent of television, politicians were massaging the media. Since the days of silent film, election campaign advertisements have set the agenda for debate and have reflected carefully selected images of the voting nation to themselves. I recently undertook the first comprehensive analysis of existing pre-television campaigns produced for Australian cinema screens. This article examines selected Australian election advertisements from silent screens to the dawn of the television era to explore how choices of framing agents have affected screen representations of politicians and their parties. Issues explored include aesthetic and stylistic considerations, personality and policy, and the growing intersection of early Australian political and media industries. The article charts a series of ongoing aesthetics and influences connecting our earliest political media to contemporary campaigns on television and the Internet, which demonstrate how some emerging trends of contemporary small- screen campaigning are but revamped older public relations methods.