NOTE TA TE RINGATOHU KUPU

Melanie Tait's play is a joy to experience. Based on her fundraising experience for the potato race in Robertson, New South Wales, she shows us a town that is incredibly relatable. The town is inhabited by hardworking women who deeply care about their community; however they don't always see eye-to-eye on what's best for it.

Penny is an optimist, but she’s also an unwitting troublemaker. She wants the world to be fair, but by fundraising to equalise the prize money for the women's and men's potato race, she unearths disharmony and division. This play takes a small-town conflict over a local event and uses it to reveal bigger ideas about how and why people believe the things they do, particularly when it comes to gender and race, culture and history. Penny has the best of intentions, but she also fails to consult before trying to implement change, and this is one of the key questions in the play: How do you create positive change, and in a timely manner, while bringing the community along with that change?

I’m so impressed with Melanie’s compassion when depicting the people of Appleton. The opposite of cynical or basic, each one of these women is complex and devoted to their town. This heartfelt writing is a great comfort in an ideological era that can so often feel needlessly polarised.

Creating this production has been such a delight. It’s always wonderful to come back to my hometown and back to The Court. But unlike Penny, I’ve found a merry band of enthusiastic souls keen for a new adventure, and for that, I’m very grateful.

Anthea Williams Director / Ringatohu