Woman

Female | 30s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 1

EXTRACT: The Night the Bleeding Stopped by NAKKIAH LUI. "The day the world started ending I miscarried. We were told to not leave our houses. Right as my husband locked the doors, I sat on the floor of my shower, the gushing waters drenching me as I cried in pain and my tears and blood flooded my bathroom drain."

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | Unspecified
Starts on page 3

EXTRACT: On Xenia by ELENA CARAPETIS. "You know the Trojan War was started because of bad guest behaviour at a dinner party. True. Menelaus the King of Sparta was hosting his Trojan friend Paris for some mezethes and a lamb on the spit. Paris took a shine to Menelaus’ hot wife Helen and abducted her."

COVID

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | under 3 minutes
Starts on page 5

EXTRACT: Hello Australia by WILLOH S. WEILAND. "How’s everyone doing tonight? Hey, hey, hey. Want to know what you look like to a virus? Rows of scared little flesh puffs. Teeny weeny white marshmallow’s waiting to be melted. Yum. Silence. Tough crowd."

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | Unspecified
Starts on page 7

EXTRACT: Baby, I’m Home by ELLEN van NEERVAN. "Baby, don’t look at me, I’ve had a terrible day. I had to pull the plug on a chess prodigy. A preschool teacher. I don’t like my job. It’s a tough gig, I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Long hours, always on my feet. People die, every day. Where’s the bottle opener?"

QUEENIE WATSON-TOWNSHEND

Female | 40s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 8

EXTRACT: Ladies Against Lockdown by SAM NERIDA. Character age: 40s-60s. "Excuse me, everyone, thank you, yes, Marcia, good to see you pet, yes. Sharelle, how’s Keith? Lovely. Oh, look at you all. I haven’t seen so many determined faces since September, when we gathered to Fight for the Foetus and Stand For Life. It is so thrilling to feel this sense of purpose once again."

Woman

Female | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 10

EXTRACT: Slow Doom by MORGAN ROSE. "Hello! Sorry, I didn’t hear it ring-- my phone was on silent. It’s jazz. Jazz? Like music. From the apartment above me. Sorry. I’ve been really busy. I haven’t been busy. I miss you too."

MIMI

Female | 30s | Unspecified
Starts on page 13

EXTRACT: And My Body by CLAIRE CHRISTIAN. Character age: 20s-30s. "My body is your ‘After Quarantine’ meme. Hilarious. I know you think it’s hilarious. I’ve always known it…because of that thing my Uncle said about “big girls” at a BBQ when I was seven. Or because Sam Ingleton didn’t want to kiss me in a game of spin the bottle in grade six because I was the chubby one. I’m not making that up, that’s what he said, “I’m not kissing her. She’s the chubby one.”

MILES

Male | Teen | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 16

EXTRACT: Spirited Away by DAN GIOVANNONI. "Is that My Neighbour Tortoro? The private message pops up at the bottom of the screen. I turn around and look at my wall, the poster, above my bed. [He turns around and looks at the poster.] (whispers) Fuck. Fuck."

Unnamed

Non-binary | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 19

EXTRACT: Tap Tap Tap by BUMPY FAVELL. "hello bad boi with your wavy hair I like those waves you list your butch masc-ness, your tools, your knives you love femmes, love watching them get dressed I ask if you want to meet up not today babe, but send me pix"

Unnamed

Female | 60+ | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 23

EXTRACT: Virginia by DIANE STUBBINGS. "He died ten days after they wheeled him out. Virginia. Drowned. Lungs flooded. He’d always wanted to drown. Not like that. It’s the virus, they said. It’s taken him. Coincidence, I thought. A virus. Same way he killed me."

Unnamed

Male | 40s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 25

EXTRACT: Distance by MARK ROGERS. "I got your email late last night. Early this morning really. I haven’t been sleeping much, Ellie wakes us up before dawn anyway so I’m up at weird hours. Not doing anything. I just stay awake checking my phone. I spend all day in video conferences for work and then unwind by staring into another, slightly smaller screen. That’s relaxation for me at the moment."

Sione Kulikefu Taufa

Male | Teen | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 27

EXTRACT: Goodbye Papa by EMELE UGAVULE. "Malo e lelei, My name is Sione Kulikefu Taufa and I am recording this eulogy to pay respects to my late grandfather Epeli Kanitola Taufa. It is with deep sadness that my family and I can’t attend our Papa’s farewell due to Tonga closing its borders during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, we know he watches over us with love."

Gary

Male | 40s | Unspecified
Starts on page 32

EXTRACT: Family Man by ROSS MUELLER: "Sun is low. Winter closing in. Love the beach this time of the year. Wind and the rain. Seaweed and foam, a few crazy dogs. Fishermen. Be mad to be go down there in this weather. But we do. Don’t we, Dad? (We can hear some waves in the distance) So he got that dog. Got his own dog now. And we. (Pause) Okay. Let me start again."

Unnamed

Male | 20s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 36

EXTRACT: Shine Armour Scratch Repair by ERIC GARDINER. Character age: 20s-30s. "This thing cuts your circuits Fills up the wires So you’re not thinking Wrapped up in the car And when you go to park You grind a pylon down the side The paint descales The side caves in"

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 38

EXTRACT: This Stretching Cloth of Silence by FINEGAN KRUCKEMEYER. "Dear Australia, When we closed our ports, we had our friends. When we closed our doors, we had our kin. When we closed our eyes, we had our thoughts. When we closed our thoughts… we had nothing. But this is not a tragedy. It is, if anything, maybe a need. This silence is a broad cloth, which stretches beneath the sky, and through the days."

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | Unspecified
Starts on page 40

EXTRACT: Our Lot 44 by ANCHULI FELICIA KING. *NOTE*: monologue must be performed by an actor who identifies as Asian-Australian. (delivered at an auctioneer’s pace with a beaming smile) "We move on now to our Lot 44. Lot Number 44. Showing here behind us. Thank you very much indeed. Our Lot 44, catalog resume number four-four-four-four, dash-four-four. If you care to direct your attention to the work behind me. And before we start, please: enjoy."

MATEO

Male | 30s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 42

EXTRACT: The Fly and the Wasp by BJORN STEWART. Character age: 20s-30s. "You ever seen a wasp, fuck up a fly? Nah I’m not fucking around. Cold-blooded gangsta fuck up a fly? Oi cunt, don’t be a dumb cunt. I’m serious. It was fucked. I’m outside and I see this wasp, shiny thing too, look like a speck of gold, catch a fly, mid-air, spear tackles it Boom. Drop the cunt. Right in front of me."

Aurora; a planet

Female | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 44

EXTRACT: Threshold by MARY ANNE BUTLER. "Feel it creep in from the edges. Brutal. Ooze forward. Malevolent. Bubble upwards. Determined. Unstoppable. Across deep time, these moments come. And you know, when it’s time. To cleanse. To purge. Begin again."

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 48

EXTRACT: If you could take a step in my shoes by GLENN SHEA. "I feel a breeze … soft … cold. The season is changing. The patterns have shifted. We are no longer connected to the outside world. A new invasion of a foreign species has come to our shores to live amongst us. The docks are now empty after the gates have been open. Shall we just follow the yellow brick road?"

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 49

EXTRACT: Little Sister by JADA ALBERTS. / indicates line break. "Down a long line of cracks, your case worker calls/ She’s talking again at the notes on her desk/ So many names, so many families/ I think it’s you she’s referring to"

Pat

Female | 60+ | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 51

EXTRACT: Limbo by STEPHEN CARLETON. "Well, yes, with hindsight I think you’d probably say it wasn’t the ideal time to take the cruise. But the discounting was ridiculous. And you can’t predict the future, can you? It’s not the route we’d ideally have taken. But the views of the various ports and harbours has been stunning."

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 53

EXTRACT: home is where the heart is by CHRIS BECKEY. [a camera begins to record they move away and into frame a room in a house. a private space, where one would not be seen nor heard.] "Can you see me? So I’m here surrounded the walls of my room the walls of this house Sheltered from this in the safe arms of family waiting for this to pass Stay safe Stay home"

Houda

Female | Teen | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 56

EXTRACT: Home Schooling by AANISA VYLET. "Like, like, Miss - I get it, I get it! But…what else did you want me to say? I was confused. I’m confused! It was the truth - I wasn’t trying to be a smart-arse Miss, it’s just I’m confused! Look, Miss – I tried. I tried to talk to you - one on one - in lockdown – remember? I asked why there was no zoom classes in iso?"

Ling

Female | 30s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 58

EXTRACT: SKIN by MERLYNN TONG. Character age: 30s-40s. Gender: Female or Non-Binary. "Are you eating? You look skinny. Your bones jut out of my screen. Drink the ginseng I bought you. Brighten your skin until it gleams in the sun. But, no. Do not go outside. Our skins are yellow glutinous traps. Those people hurl insults, vitriol and hate at us. And they stick. They seep into my bones. Stay inside Mei. Send Simon to the shops."

Child

Gender Unspecified | Child | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 59

EXTRACT: Spiderweb by BRENDAN HOGAN. "The playground’s closed. The council put a sign up saying no one’s allowed to play. But it’s the only one, so I still go. What are they gunna do, fine a ten year-old?"

Unnamed

Male | 20s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 62

EXTRACT: Delivery by TASNIM HOSSAIN. "Because it means I can keep paying my quarter of the rent on our two-bedroom flat. There’s four of us there. Pervez and Jehangir are Uber drivers, but nobody is going anywhere anymore. And Soheil washes dishes in a restaurant that never worked out how to get online. Used to wash dishes. And he has a wife and son back home. Whatever home is now."

Woman

Female | 30s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 65

EXTRACT: Woman at the Bottle-o by CATHERINE McKINNON. "I’m in the bottle-o, standing in line, on the little yellow circle thingy that has been painted on the floor for social distancing. I have a six-pack of beer for Ben, a bottle of whisky for me, and a bottle of wine for both of us. We need it, after the day we’ve just had. The SECURITY GUY comes over and he says, New law for COVID-19. You can have up to two boxes of beer and one box of wine, or two boxes of beer and two bottles of spirits, but not all three, and he points to a sign by the cash register."

Magnus

Male | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 67

EXTRACT: The Server by JAMES TAYLOR. "Provider of service, was little old me. In a pop-up bar, setting up in the street. Now the streets are deathly silent cause the virus made them still. No more little piggies travelling around at will… I tell you what, my bloody dog’s happy! She gets me all to herself… With a dog you always know where you stand. Do something wrong, get bit. Nice and simple... I like things nice and simple."

Wayne

Male | 40s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 69

EXTRACT: Oakwood by KATHYRYN MARQUET. "Yeah, squeeze in. Frank, you done the count? We got the three-50 in here? Right, I’ve called the family together because — no, Debbie, I don’t need a bloody mask. I need to be frigging heard — Toby Jones from Boning had an incident yesterday, and, while he was waiting to get his fingers glued back on, he got tested for this bastard corona thing, and it’s come back positive."

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 71

EXTRACT: The Flock by JAMES ELAZZI. "Farmer Tony rounds us up, whilst that damn farm dog keeps barking at us. Little bastard, always frightening us into submission. Don’t know why; that dog is half our size and yet we still allow him to so easily control us. ‘That’s it boy, keep em in line Rusky!’ the farmer yells. Sweet disposition some might say."

Unnamed

Male | 20s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 73

EXTRACT: The Long-Gone Distant Future by KATHRYN ASH. "Like I said. Everybody there was up for it, true story. Yeah-nah fair play, there was a fuck-tonne a bog roll involved but it was all over the road, boxes of it, whole neighbourhood descended on it like carrion. We was gonna redistribute it. Yes. To old people’s homes and that. Give them the basics, mate. You recording this?"

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 76

EXTRACT: For Once by RACHAEL CHISHOLM. "For once please, listen to me, to us. I’m scared for my people. When I heard that the government had been sending body bags into the communities my heart stopped. Rumour says that they ordered two thousand body bags. Two thousand. Not for the country. For the Territory."

Father Chanel

Male | 50s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 78

EXTRACT: An Empty Church | JULIANNE O’BRIEN. Character age: middle aged. "I was thinking of retiring any way….. (pause) It’s been 6 weeks like this. Empty. I secretly prefer it. The truth is, if I’m honest, I don’t really like people. I think that’s true. But yesterday I did a small funeral - with the requisite 5 people - and I felt….something….new."

Michael

Male | 40s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 82

EXTRACT: Barry by PETER COOK. "I’m not doing it. I can’t. I know we’re meant to be back today and obviously I started to get ready, but I’ve stopped. To be honest I don’t know how anyone can go back. (He starts to get out of his suit and tie etc. and change into a tracksuit, or something he might wear to a park, it should be mismatching or done in a way that we as an audience become aware that how he looks or is seen is the furthest thing from his mind. He can stop and be still to talk, as long he is completely changed by the end.) The first four weeks I did anything to avoid being alone with my thoughts, filling myself up with food, alcohol, drugs. Binging TV. Zooming. Learning to make bread from scratch."

Unnamed

Male | 60+ | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 84

EXTRACT: Polished Pebbles by SUSAN ROGERS. "Five minutes from home and here is this playing field. I like the tall dark trees, bluish shadows, a brush turkey dance hall. Old people arm in arm, the fit and sweaty, dog walkers, the council man in a sharp green vest. And me ten times round the oval. Talking to myself observing greens. Hookers green, May, olive, lime. In this new morning all the greens smell fresh."

Unnamed

Female | 20s | Unspecified
Starts on page 86

EXTRACT: The Passenger’s Lament by H LAWRENCE SUMNER. "With reticent mind I return to the world and hold my soul aloft. Is it still the world I knew? I take in the first cool breeze of Autumn And fight against an imaginary lack of breath. I conjure the worst fears in this new world. The touch of a hand, or an embrace. Lips that meet, only to pass on a scourge. Never to transfer love."

Young Mum

Female | 20s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 89

EXTRACT: HAWK by DONNA ABELA. (soothing bedtime story voice) "look … lots of chicks … or one chick with lots of heads … sleepy heavy heads … all tucked up … twitch flap flop … yawn - wow, birds yawn … or maybe that one’s hungry … slip of a thing … wind wants to carry them off … good thing she’s sitting on them … beaks up her bottom … twitchy feathers and fluff … can’t get comfortable mum"

Meena

Female | 60+ | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 92

EXTRACT: Burning by BARBARA HOSTALEK. "(Calling out) I’m in the kitchen Junie - You’re right on time for a cuppa! (Normal voice) You see Lizzy riding her bike out front? You won’t believe it. I burnt the damper yesterday. True I’ve been cooking damper since I was Lizzy’s age. Shops still out of flour!"

Angela

Female | 20s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 94

EXTRACT: Allan by GRETEL VELLA. Character age: 20s-30s. "I’ve met someone. His name is Allan and he’s a Gemini. I know that because on May 24 he had a giant novelty donut bouquet delivered to his door with ‘Happy Birthday Allan’ written on the front. I’m an Aries you see, so that already tells me we’re compatible on an astronomical level. Allan is very sweet. I can tell. Whenever I’m off on a trip to the supermarket, he’ll always throw me a smile. And this one time when I went to get the mail and he said ‘how are you?’ and I said ‘Angela’ he pretended it didn’t even happen."

Unnamed

Female | 40s | under 3 minutes
Starts on page 95

EXTRACT: A Single Kiwi Fruit by LIV SATCHELL. Character age: 40 or above. "I’d just finished, and I was doing my usual routine at the front gate – you know, five minutes for the sweat to start drying. So I set off, down Missenden like I always do, but I couldn’t have gone more than a block or so, I hadn’t even made it to King Street yet, when I saw this woman coming towards me and she was so – "

Unnamed

Female | 30s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 97

EXTRACT: Flesh by LUCY COMBE. "It’s been eight weeks, five days and three hours since I last touched another person, or another person touched me. I wouldn’t have made the calculation, but someone posted a meme, next to a shot of their ‘iso’ family, Michelangelo’s David - “to touch is to give life.” And I found myself thinking about a ‘60 minutes’ I once saw. About babies in understaffed Romanian orphanages who stopped growing, functioning. Couldn’t seem to achieve the milestones they were (beat) meant to."

Unnamed

Male | 60+ | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 99

EXTRACT: Gone is gone by JANIS BALODIS. "Somebody come last night steal the dog. Bloody bastards just take. Dolly was on chain like every night. We watch TV like always. Can’t go nowhere. I clip hers on chain same like every night. Dolly is old, got the heartworm. She stay home, chain, no chain, no difference. Long chain, six metre. Alvina buy special so dog can go whole patio end from end. I hear from bedroom when chain is drag on tiles rattle-rattle. I hear how he goes from chair down to mat, chase toads from dog-biscuits. Last night, nothing. No rattle-rattle, no bark."

Jess

Female | 40s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 100

EXTRACT: The Fall by SUZIE MILLER. "At first it was quite brilliant, a sort of secret six months off; Autumn. The Fall. I could catch up a bit/ Be a great mum, cook more, love harder, paint more, less chat, less social stress, more boxes sorted, establish a routine of walking the dog, eating, working. More fucking, more everything."

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | Unspecified
Starts on page 106

EXTRACT: 2020:232 Years by KYLIE COOLWELL. "No, I am not feeling it… I don’t feel your talking to me when you say that we are… All in this together… I’m not one of those lucky Australians so when I hear ad nauseam… That, we are all in this together… I want to throw a brick at my TV… Except I usually don’t have a brick beside me and I paid a grand for my TV and I can’t afford another one so instead I seethe… But that’s not the worst one. What really gets me mad is the… We are going through unprecedented times… Ha? Are you for real? Unprecedented?"

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 107

EXTRACT: The Bravest Thing I Ever Did by NATHAN MAYNARD. "Lads, come and sit down over there for a minute. I have a quick yarn for ya’s. It won’t take long, I promise. 1937 and I was the talk of the town. I had just thrown a dozen eggs at Mr Hardy’s car. Hardy was a wife beater. Everyone knew he bashed Mrs Hardy but nobody did anything about it. Because he was a big mean bastard. Nobody wanted to pick that fight. But Mrs Hardy, was always very kind to me, so I defended her honour in my own special way."

Unnamed

Female | 20s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 109

EXTRACT: Unconditional Love by MATT HAWKINS. "My father. I was going to call him. He’s out there. Ten thousand miles away. In New York. He was happy. He was healthy. He worked at the New Rasta café. West 141st Street. That’s what my dad did. He worked at a café, ten thousand miles away. He still loves me. And I love him. Unconditional love. That’s what he gives me. Flesh and blood. From ten thousand miles away."

Unnamed

Male | Teen | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 111

EXTRACT: Second Coming by TARIRO MAVONDO. "It was my fault. I created the virus. I know people say it started somewhere in China — but that’s not true. I kinda feel crap that people think that, when I know that I created it. Mum, please don’t be mad at me. Shit. I only created the virus so it could kill only black people! Fuck! I thought killing everyone that reminded me of him...well then maybe the pain would stop."

Unnamed

Female | 40s | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 113

EXTRACT: The time before the time to come by KAMARRA BELL-WYKES. "You never know when this time, could be the last time, in this time, before the time to come. So if you’re going to do it, you better do it right, you better make it a good one. In the now time, in the here place, where happens aren’t yet happenc’d and experiences not yet signified, where artefacts wait to be actualised, we can never really grasp the passing of time, not until its done. A distant view only visible through hindsight’s 2020 lens, when the present becomes the past but before you know the future’s begun."

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 116

EXTRACT: The Epidemy of our Time by FUTURE D. FIDEL. "Good morning my darling! I hear her sweet voice crackling through the frames of her sliding door. Her precisely measured footsteps get louder as they touch down the pavement of the hallway. She approaches and stretches her hands, hanging under her night gown. Rise n’ Shine my darling! I’ll rise, but I definitely won’t shine, my shire runs closer to the edge. She folds her hands and closes her eyes to recite her prayer like a gale."

Unnamed

Gender Unspecified | Unspecified | 3 to 5 minutes
Starts on page 118

EXTRACT: There is the Light by RICHARD FRANKLAND. / indicates line break. "There is the light/ Far off/ But closer than it was/ We have stood together/ We have lost and won together/ We have risen together/ Against the impossible/ Rise up/ The fight is not yet over."

ARTSHUB INTERVIEW

ARTSHUB, RICHARD WATTS, 24 JUNE 2020

"‘I hope it will be a really potent record of the time; a snapshot that will give us a glimpse of all these voices around Australia and what they’re observing and what they’re thinking – not only about the present moment, but about the future,’ said David Berthold, interim Executive Chair of Playwriting Australia." - ArtsHub

THE GUARDIAN ARTICLE

THE GUARDIAN, STEPHANIE CONVERY, 22 JUNE 2020

"100 playwrights and actors join forces in new theatre project challenging Australian identity" - The Guardian

LIMELIGHT ARTICLE

LIMELIGHT, JUSTINE NGUYEN, 23 JUNE 2020

"50 new short works by Australia’s leading playwrights will be simultaneously livestreamed by over 30 performing arts organisations across the country." - Limelight

CITYMAG ARTICLE

CITY MAG, SUZIE KEEN, 30 JUNE 2020

"South Australian writers and actors have lent their talents to a national project that will see the simultaneous livestreaming this week of 50 ‘fearless and inspiring’ short works capturing the COVID zeitgeist." - CityMag

THE GUARDIAN REVIEW - PART 3

THE GUARDIAN, CASSIE TONGUE, 5 JULY 2020

"These postcards are honest ones; no starry-eyed tourists here. Australia has a habit of throwing a wrench into communities, especially non-white, non-normative, non-wealthy ones." - The Guardian

THE GUARDIAN REVIEW - PART 2

THE GUARDIAN, CARISSA LEE, 3 JULY 2020

"Productions like this show that art can inform, and maybe it can also help us be better humans too." - The Guardian

THE AGE REVIEW

THE AGE, CAMERON WOODHEAD, JULY 6 2020

"All theatregoers should see these “postcards to the nation”. Not every offering is a standalone success, but cumulatively they bridge almost every kind of social division — across age, class, race, gender, vocation, politics, you name it — to weave a tapestry of Australian life in a rapidly changing environment." - Cameron Woodhead, The Age