Signal Driver

SIGNAL DRIVER (1982)

Albert Tucker, Gift Bearers (1955)

“Sentimentality’s a dead loss.”

Signal Driver: A Morality Play for the Times

Plot: “We never succeeded in escaping,” Over three decades, a couple experience marriage with true connection always out of reach, yet never quite able to take the train to an escape. They are shaded by two spiritual avatars, a chorus of clowns reflecting on the times.

Editions: First published as a standalone play by Currency Press (1983, reprinted 1993, 50pp), with a  foreword by Neil Armfield including notes on music in the play. The script was reviewed by Barry Oakley, SMH, 16/6/1983, and in The Age , 1/10/1983. Published in the US by Applause Theatre Book Publishers, 1985.

Released as a cast recording, starring Kerry Walker and John Gaden, directed by Richard Buckham, on ABC Radio Drama in 1989.

Collected in Collected Plays, Volume 2 (Currency Press, 1994, with an introduction by Pamela Payne).

Dedication: to Neil Armfield.

History: Jim Sharman – who had by now directed three productions of PW’s plays as well as his film The Night the Prowler – became Artistic Director of the Adelaide Festival, and asked PW for a play to open the 1982 Festival. Although Big Toys had only been a modest critical success, it had done well with audiences due to PW’s increased profile, and he was happy to provide what the people were calling for. After the opening in Adelaide, where reviews were somewhat muted, the Sydney Theatre Company declined to program Signal Driver. It opened in Sydney three years later with Belvoir Theatre as part of the now-iconic company’s inaugural season.

PW wrote that “The play is about a couple who spend their lives just failing to signal the driver and escape from each other and their responsibilities. Their lives also reflect the decay of Australian society from 1920 to the present days.” The tram stop at which they gather reminded PW of one near his home, where he would sometimes go after a row with his partner.

As with PW’s other late plays, Signal Driver has not yet returned to critical prominence, and appears not to have had a professional production since 1985. (It has been staged by amateur companies at least intermittently, as the Gold Coast Little Theatre put on a production in early 2015.)

Productions:

Lighthouse Theatre, Adelaide Festival of the Arts, 5-20 March 1982

Dir: Neil Armfield, composer: Carl Vine, design: Stephen Curtis,

Cast: Peter Cummins (Being), Melissa Jaffer (Ivy), Kerry Walker (Being), John Wood (Theo)

Reviews:

  • Brian Kiernan, SMH Good Weekend, 6/3/1982
  • P. Ward, Australian, 8/3/1982
  • Colin Menzies, SMH, 7/3/1982:
    • “White never makes it easy for audiences… but the play gives an intellectual satisfaction few other playwrights achieve. On this level I enjoyed it.”
  • Harry Kippax, SMH, 8/3/1982:
    • “It is a curious, apparently slight play, building from a schematic laboured beginning to an unexpectedly poignant resolution”
  • A. Roberts, “A gentle play lacking fire”, The Advertiser, 8/3/1982
  • Ken Healey, Canberra Times 21/3/1982
  • Elizabeth Perkins, LiNQ 11.1 (1983)

Queensland Theatre Company in conjunction with Melbourne Theatre Company:

SGIO Theatre, Brisbane, 9-27 August 1983

The Athanaeum, Melbourne, 13 September – 15 October 1983

Dir: Armfield, design: Mike Bridges, composer: Carl Vine, with Elizabeth Alexander (Ivy), Errol O’Neill (Theo), George Spartels and Sheila Bradley. For this production, Vine also performed onstage as a musician.

Reviewed:

  • David Rowbotham, Courier-Mail, 11/8/1983
  • Leonard Radic, “White’s gentle look at partners in misfortune”, 15/9/1983
  • D. Cloonan, National Times, 30/9/1983

Hole in the Wall Theatre, Perth, 16 February – ?? 1985

Dir: Raymond Omodei, with Rosemary Barr, Rod Hall, Maggie King, Neville Teede

Review:

  • Mardy Amos, The Australian, 18/2/1985

Company B Belvoir, Sydney, 25 May 1985 – 23 June 1985

Dir: Neil Armfield, starring John Gaden and Kerry Walker

Reviews:

  • Harry Kippax, SMH 27/5/1985:
    • “I [come] down in favour of the play – but only just, because the commentary nagged less and less as the night wore on… The play is slight. Its better part could be done in little more than an hour without loss… The view is bleak. Yet the play has attractiveness – the elegiac warmth which Mr White distils from these obscure lives and their independence… the “beings”’ powers of foresight and insight excite a supercilious trait in the author and the result is a protracted gloat. Such a pity, for when he has got this sad stuff of his chest… the human potential in the play shows strongly.”
  • Andrew L. Urban, Australian 28/5/1985
  • Frank Gauntlett, Daily Mirror 29/5/1985

Rawcus Productions – ANU Arts Centre, Canberra: 15 March 1993

This was the première in a two-year project to stage readings of all 8 of White’s plays. The project was conceived by Ralph Wilson, who directed this one-night only production. 

Gold Coast Little Theatre – January – February 2015

This amateur company in Queensland produced the play, directed by Noella Johnson and using Vine’s original music, with a cast including Noel Thompson (Theo), Jackie Simmons (Ivy), Shayne Caddaye and Jann Alcorn.

Previous play: Big Toys

Next play: Netherwood

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