I can only say "I told you so" about Queanbeyan's Tom Murphy. Young Shakespearean of 1997, in many eyes a potential actor, Murphy showed me his script, then called The House on the Hill. Interviewing him for The Canberra Times in May 1998 I concluded: "Murphy is, to my mind, at core a writer. He is excited by writing. He is worried about the writing."
Now called Troy's House, Murphy's play has been picked up by the new Artistic Director of Australian Theatre for Young People, David Berthold, and was presented at A.T.Y.P Studio 1 at The Wharf in Sydney for a 5-night season October 12 - 16.
Murphy rewrote and directed Troy's House for a Sydney University Dramatic Society (SUDS) season in September this year "greeted with full houses and rave reviews". David Berthold, currently directing Spurboard, a new play by Nick Enright (author of Blackrock), for a November season at The Wharf for Sydney Theatre Company, said "I saw [Troy's House] at the Cellar Theatre at Sydney Uni and there spent one of the most thoroughly entertaining, funny and heart warming nights I've had in theatre. I had to enable this wonderful production to extend its life. It's exactly the kind of production you long for: warm, witty, intelligent and generous."
SUDS has been producing theatre continuously since 1889, and lays claim to Neil Armfield, John Bell, Clive James, Germaine Greer and Gough Whitlam. Now known as Tommy, Murphy is among illustrious company. We shall watch his career with interest.
©Frank McKone, Canberra
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