Big Toys
BIG TOYS (1977)
John Brack, Woman and Dummy (1954)
“You must realise, darling, that ‘Mag’ as a name is utterly chic.”
Plot: Big Toys is a brittle comedy of sexual politics which explores the domestic triangle of Queen’s Counsel Ritchie Bousanquet, his promiscuous wife Mag, and idealistic trade union leader Terry Legge. Terry is a witness for the prosecution on a case which Ritchie is defending, so the QC is using his wife in an attempt to seduce Terry, buy his testimony, and betray his class at the same time. However, while Ritchie’s plan is clear, the other players in the game are less sure. Is Terry really willing to take these gifts in exchange for his soul? And is Mag – who worked her way up from humble beginnings – willing to settle for the big toys that have placated her, the money and the honours and the men who desire her? One of them will make the choice to leave this behind; the other will accept. But can either ever be fully happy?
Editions: First published as a stand-alone play by Currency Press in 1978 (61pp), with an introduction by Katharine Brisbane. ($6.95 hardback, $3.95 paperback). Reviewed by Peter Corris, National Times, 10/2/1979 / Geoffrey Dutton, Australian, 10-11/2/1979, and H. Hewitt, Canberra Times, 5/5/1979.
Published in the USA by Limehouse Editions, June 1985. Republished by Currency Press in 1993 in association with Playbox Theatre. Collected in Collected Plays, Volume 2 (Currency Press, 1994, with an introduction by Pamela Payne).
History: By 1976, it had been 12 years since a Patrick White play had been staged in Australia. The last one – Night on Bald Mountain (1964) – had been a critical failure, and it seemed that he would never write another. By 1976, however, The Season at Sarsaparilla was revived, and PW was a Nobel laureate. To mark the occasion, PW began writing Big Toys in late 1976, inspired by what he saw as a degraded and corrupt culture. (PW wryly noted, on more than one occasion, that the very same rich people who had complained that the left-wing Whitlam government had left them bankrupt were still seen in their fancy cars buying fancy items throughout the dying days of his administration.)
PW had in mind Jim Sharman for the director and Kate Fitzpatrick for the lead role of Mag. The production opened in Sydney – the first and only time a PW play would open in his native city – and travelled to Melbourne and Canberra. By far his most naturalistic play, Big Toys received a polite response in Sydney but, as many critics have argued since, its take on corruption and politics was seen as naïve rather than shocking. The show sold well, but critics in Melbourne were much less kind than their Sydney counterparts.
The rejection of, and scathing approach to, Sydney society would see its ultimate form four years later in Flaws in the Glass. Terry Legge is based on union leader Jack Mundey, with whom PW had worked for years opposing development and corruption. (Not that Mundey was without flaws himself.)
Many critics noted the final moment of the original production, in which the backdrop of the Sydney skyline opens into a void with a hot wind blowing over the city, and Mag is forced to choose whether to continue with what May-Brit Akerholt calls “a life of compromise”.
A production was filmed for ABC TV in 1980. The play has not been staged professionally since the 1990s. Whereas PW’s early plays have become classics of the canon, his later plays have not yet achieved this goal.
Also premièred in 1977: Neil Simon, Chapter Two; David Williamson, The Club; Anthony Shaffer, Whodunnit?; Tennessee Williams, Vieux Carré; Bernard Pomerance, The Elephant Man.
Productions:
The Old Tote Theatre Company – Parade Theatre Sydney – 27 July – 13 September 1977
Dir: Jim Sharman, designer: Brian Thomson, assistant director: Mark Gould, costumes: Victoria Alexander
with Max Cullen (Terry), Arthur Dignam (Ritchie), and Kate Fitzpatrick (Mag),
Reviews:
Harry Kippax, SMH 30/7/1977
Frances Kelly, Weekend Australian 30-31 July 1977
Katharine Brisbane, National Times 1-6 Aug 1977: where some critics saw the form as being unexciting and not worthy of White, Brisbane saw the work as “couched seductively as a comedy of artifice” precisely to make the point of how easily power corrupts.
Brian Hoad, Bulletin 6/8/1977:
The cast “evoke to perfection the familiarly tortured world of White… White offers no hope. Big Toys, together with its predecessors, lacks a basic love of humanity… Perhaps that is what the author intended.”
David Malouf, Quadrant 21.9 (Sep 1977), with contributions by Axel Kruse and Judith Little
Dorothy Hewett, Theatre Australia, Sep-Oct 1977
Melbourne production – Comedy Theatre, Oct 1977
Above production on tour.
Reviews:
Sally White, The Age, 3/10/1977
John Larkin, Sunday Press, 16/10/1977
Madeleine Armstrong, Quadrant, 21.10 (1977)
Canberra production – Canberra Theatre, 9-12 November
Above production on tour.
Queensland Theatre Company, SGIO Theatre, Brisbane, 16 Aug-2 Sep 1978
Dir: William Redmond, design: Peter Cooke, with Douglas Hedge (Terry), John Krummel (Ritchie), Kate Sheil (Mag)
ABC TV recording
Dir: Chris Thomson, set design: Quentin Hole, with Diane Cilento (Mag), Max Cullen (Terry) and John Gaden (Ritchie)
Recorded as part of the Australian Theatre Festival, a series of six adaptations produced for the ABC. Wikipedia rather sadly says “The series was not a ratings success.”
Broadcast on ABC TV 24/8/1980 and reviewed by Dennis Prior, Age, 29/8/1990
Hole in the Wall Theatre Company, Perth – August 1984
???
Rawcus Productions – ANU Arts Centre, Canberra: 22 March 1993
The 2nd in a two-year project to stage readings of all of White’s plays. The project was conceived by Ralph Wilson, and this one-night only production directed by Eulea Kiraly.
Playbox Theatre Company, Malthouse Theatre, Melbourne 1-19 June 1993
Followed by tour of regional Victoria.
Director: Malcolm Roberston, design: Hugh Colman, with Carrillo Gantner (Ritchie), Julie Nihill (Mag), and Geoff Paine (Terry)
Reviews:
Fiona Scott-Norman, “Big Toys Won’t Fly”, Bulletin 29/6/1993
Helen Thomson, The Australian 4/6/1993
Leonard Radic, “White Drama is Trapped Between Eras”, The Age 4/6/1993
Marian Street Theatre, Sydney 11 Mar-17 April 1994
Directed by Adam Cook, design by Wendy Osmond,
with Danny Adcock, David Field, and Kris McQuade
This production is listed, but the beloved Marian Theatre apparently ceased trading on March 6 due to financial losses, meaning the play never saw an audience. The theatre was revived the following year, but closed permanently in 2013.
Previous play: Night on Bald Mountain
Next play: Signal Driver
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