Nick Enright's Blackrock: when the good do nothing
It's probably true that one's early endeavours are more fondly remembered . M emory smoothes the edges of rough biograph y. One of my very first major productions was the first production of Nick Enright's Blackrock . Nick and I were friends - both born in Maitland (along with John Bell and Ruth Cracknell , weirdly) - and we spent some time developing this play at Sydney Theatre Company . Cate Blanchett acted Rache l in the early workshops, and the first cast included a fresh Joel Edgerton, Angela Punch McGregor, Simon Lyndon, Kym Wilson, Rebecca Smart, Paul Bishop, Dan Wyllie, Teo Gebert, Kristina Bidenko, John Walton and Julie Godfrey. It's a piece of which we were all very proud. Yesterday, a new project was launched called Reading Australia , initiated by the Copyright Agency. It aims to promote and expand knowledge of essential pieces of Australian writing. In July, the Australian Society of Authors’ (ASA) Council selected an initial 200 Aus...