Monash Memo - 18 July 2001

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Monash Graduate Players to tour the UK

The newly formed Monash Graduate Players will take their first production to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in the UK next month.

The group, which includes current students and graduates of performing arts at Monash, will perform Pandora's Box at the Clayton campus in July before taking it to Edinburgh and then on to the Monash Centre in London.

Written by Monash graduate Ms Sally Faraday, Pandora's Box looks at the licentious world of Restoration theatre in England through the eyes of writer Aphra Behn.

Aphra Behn was a playwright in seventeenth century England who began writing plays to avoid poverty. Her work, which includes dark, witty and courageous women, was popular with audiences of the era but was looked down upon by the male-dominated literary establishment.

Ms Faraday said she felt compelled to write about Aphra Behn because the writer's work has often gone unnoticed.

"She was writing plays to support herself at a time when it was thought obscene for any woman to be doing this. As a result, much of her work has been lost. With Pandora's Box, I was hoping to create a celebration of her life," she said.

The play will be performed at Monash on 25, 27 and 28 July at the Monash Drama Theatre in the Performing Arts Centre before going to the UK. For more information and for bookings contact Ms Faraday on 0417 519 869.