The Peach Season

by Debra Oswald

  The Peach Season

  Debra Oswald

  Currency Press • Sydney

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Playwright’s Biography

  Demeter and Persephone - Debra Oswald

  Acknowledgements

  First Production

  Characters

  Act One

  Scene One

  Scene Two

  Scene Three

  Scene Four

  Scene Five

  Scene Six

  Scene Seven

  Scene Eight

  Scene Nine

  Scene One

  Act Two

  Scene Two

  Scene Three

  Scene Four

  Scene Five

  Scene Six

  Scene Seven

  Scene Eight

  www.currencypress.com.au

  CURRENCY PLAYS

  First published in 2007 by

  Currency Press Pty Ltd,

  PO Box 2287, Strawberry Hills

  NSW, 2012, Australia

  enquiries@currency.com.au

  www.currencypress.com.au

  Copyright © Debra Oswald, 2007.

  Copying for Educational Purposes

  First electronic edition published in 2012 by Currency Press Pty Ltd.

  The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or 10% of this book, whichever is the greater, to be reproduced and/or communicated by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that educational institution (or the body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) under the Act. For details of the CAL licence for educational institutions contact CAL, Level 15, 233 Castlereagh Street, Sydney NSW, 2000. Tel: (02) 9394 7600; email: info@copyright.com.au

  Copying for Other Purposes

  Except as permitted under the Act, for example a fair dealing for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review, all rights are reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.

  Performing Rights

  Any performance or public reading of The Peach Season is forbidden unless a licence has been received from the author or the author’s agent. The purchase of this book in no way gives the purchaser the right to perform the play in public, whether by means of a staged production or a reading. All applications for public performance should be addressed to the playwright, c/- RGM, PO Box 128, Surry Hills, NSW, 2010, Australia; email: info@rgm.com.au; ph: +612 9281 3911

  Printed book ISBN: 9780868198057

  ePub ISBN: 9781921429644

  Cover design by Kate Florance, Currency Press.

  Cover shows Maeve Dermody as Zoe and Scott Timmins as Keiran, from the 2006 Griffin Theatre Company premiere production. (Photo: Robert McFarlane)

  Playwright’s Biography

  DEBRA OSWALD is a writer for stage, film, television and children’s fiction. Her stage plays have been produced around Australia. Gary’s House, Sweet Road and The Peach Season were all shortlisted for the NSW Premier’s Award. Her play Dags has had many Australian productions and has been published and performed in Britain and the United States. Gary’s House has been on the senior high school syllabus, and has been performed in translation in both Denmark and Japan. The Peach Season won the 2005 Seaborn Playwright’s Prize. Mr Bailey’s Minder broke the Griffin Theatre’s box office record in 2004, toured nationally in 2006, and was produced in Philadelphia in 2008.

  Debra has written two plays for atyp (Australian Theatre for Young People). Skate was performed in Sydney, on a NSW country tour and at the Belfast Theatre Festival. Stories in the Dark premiered at Riverside Theatre Parramatta in 2007. House on Fire premiered at atyp in 2010. She is the author of three ‘Aussie Bite’ books for kids, including Nathan and the Ice Rockets, and five novels for teenage readers: Me and Barry Terrific, The Return of the Baked Bean, The Fifth Quest, The Redback Leftovers and Getting Air.

  Among Debra’s television credits are Bananas in Pyjamas, Sweet and Sour, Palace of Dreams, The Secret Life of Us and award-winning episodes of Police Rescue. She is the writer and creator of Offspring, and her script for the telemovie won the 2011 NSW Premier’s Award.

  Demeter and Persephone

  Debra Oswald

  The myth of Demeter and Persephone exists in many forms and with many variations, from pagan legend, Greek myth, Homer, Ovid, Tennyson, through to very recent reinterpretations of the story.

  Demeter was the goddess of the crops and the harvest, keeping the earth abundant with growing things and plenty to eat. She had one daughter, Persephone, known as the Maiden of Spring. Lovely Persephone made Demeter’s heart sing and the goddess liked to keep her daughter close. But as Persephone grew older, she grew curious about the world and eager to explore beyond her mother’s watchful gaze.

  One morning Persephone was collecting flowers in a meadow. The beautiful narcissus flower caught her eye and to get a closer look she wandered deeper into the forest. Suddenly the ground under her feet began to tremble and a huge chasm opened up. Out from the gaping hole in the ground came a chariot drawn by mighty black horses. Hades, the god of the Underworld, ruler of the Kingdom of the Dead, had been watching Persephone. He had fallen desperately in love with her. Hades pulled Persephone into his chariot and sped away into the shadows. Persephone cried out but quickly the earth closed over her, leaving no trace.

  When Demeter discovered her daughter was missing, she was overcome with grief, refusing to eat or bathe. She wandered the earth, searching for her daughter, but could find no sign of her. Finally, she was met by Hecate, the old woman goddess of the crossroads, known as the Queen of the Night, mysterious and wise. The crone Hecate told Demeter that she had heard Persephone’s cries as she disappeared into the Underworld. It broke Demeter’s heart to think of her precious daughter trapped in the shadowy Kingdom of the Dead.

  And so for many months, the angry goddess neglected the crops and refused to allow the earth to bloom. Every growing thing withered and died, the once green fields became barren and people were dying of starvation across the lands.

  The danger was that all humankind would be destroyed, so Zeus stepped in to solve the problem. Zeus tried to negotiate between his brother Hades and Demeter. Finally Hades agreed to allow Persephone to leave the Underworld. However Hades knew she would have to return to him because Persephone had eaten seven seeds from a pomegranate. Anyone who has eaten food while in the Underworld is doomed to return there.

  Eventually a compromise was reached: it was decided that Persephone would spend three months of the year in the Underworld, ruling alongside Hades, and then spend the other nine months living on the earth with her mother.

  When Persephone and Demeter were reunited, there were tears of joy. During her time in the Underworld, Persephone had learned the mysteries of death and darkness, emerging stronger and forever changed. She could no longer look at a beautiful flower in bloom without also imagining its withered decaying fate. There were no more carefree summer days full of laughter and innocence.

  Every year, during the months Persephone stays in the Underworld, the goddess Demeter mourns and makes the earth barren and cold, allowing little to grow. Then when Persephone returns to her mother each spring, the earth blooms again with fertility, warmth and abundance.

  Sydney

  April 2007

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

 
Debra Oswald would like to thank Christopher Hurrell, Michael Wynne, Richard Glover, Campion Decent, Kerry Laurence, Les Langlands, Dr Rodney Seaborn and the Seaborn Broughton Walford Foundation, Stephen Collins, Sydney Theatre Company, Griffin Theatre, David Berthold, the cast and creative team of the Griffin production.

  FIRST PRODUCTION

  The Peach Season was first produced by Griffin Theatre Company at the SBW Stables, Sydney, on 15 March 2006, with the following cast:

  CELIA Anne Looby

  DOROTHY Maggie Blinco

  ZOE Maeve Dermody

  JOE John Adam

  SHEENA Alice Parkinson

  KIERAN Scott Timmins

  Director, David Berthold

  Designer, Alice Babidge

  Lighting Designer, Stephen Hawker

  Sound Design, Jeremy Silver

  CHARACTERS

  CELIA

  DOROTHY

  ZOE

  JOE

  SHEENA

  KIERAN

  For Annabelle Sheehan

  ACT ONE

  SCENE ONE

  A stone-fruit farm. Summer.

  Trees heavy with fruit. Palettes of packing boxes in a yard which is flanked by a house and sheds.

  CELIA enters with her arms full of peaches. She is in her early forties, energetic, warm.

  CELIA: Have you seen these Red Havens?! Luscious. Dead-on ready to pick. A day over, if anything.

  She gently releases the armload of fruit into a box. We realise she is speaking to DOROTHY.

  DOROTHY is in her seventies, with a Hungarian accent. She wears an assortment of vibrantly patterned clothes and a mass of long grey hair. She can wander between scenes—sometimes in the scene herself, sometimes addressing the audience.

  DOROTHY: [to the audience] Before we begin this story, let me say: you can’t put the blame to anyone for what happened. Good people. Trying to avoid the necessary losses.

  CELIA: Zoe fell asleep after lunch.

  DOROTHY: Ah.

  CELIA: I won’t wake her up now. She might as well sleep while I work out what to do. [She grabs a peach from the box and inhales its scent. She laughs.] Can you believe this? Best season for five years and the bloody fruit’s going to rot on the trees.

  CELIA throws herself into work, hauling stuff around.

  Sixteen-year-old ZOE appears, unseen by CELIA, and watches from a hiding spot.

  DOROTHY: [to the audience] Sometimes all you can do is sit back and watch people make mistakes. The instant a person loves a person or a thing, they face the risk of losing that person or thing.

  JOE enters, taking off his suit coat and rolling up his shirt sleeves. He’s about forty.

  CELIA: Joe! Hi. Want a cold drink on this stinking day?

  JOE: Nah, I’m fine, thanks.

  DOROTHY: He’s driven in his airconditioned car from his airconditioned office.

  JOE: How are you, Mum?

  JOE gives DOROTHY a kiss on both cheeks.

  DOROTHY: Why do you come out here to check on me? I’m okay.

  JOE: I’m here to maybe do Celia a favour. Are you still needing pickers?

  CELIA: Desperately. Roy’s whole mob of pickers have buggered off nobody knows where.

  JOE signals to someone offstage. KIERAN and SHEENA enter.

  JOE: I might’ve found you a couple of people.

  CELIA watches them approach. KIERAN is eighteen, ebullient, hyper, gauche, but winning. SHEENA, in her mid-twenties, has a tough, sharp-tongued manner, awkward and wary.

  CELIA: You know them?

  JOE: No. They were at the garage in town. Car broken down.

  CELIA: [smiling heartily] G’day. I’m Celia.

  SHEENA: Oh, uh, Sheena and this is—

  KIERAN: Kieran. Celia? Celia? Hi. This place is so mad. The trees right down to the road—You grew all those?

  CELIA: Yeah.

  KIERAN: Mad. All this excellent fruit.

  KIERAN grins at CELIA who can’t help smiling back.

  CELIA: Oh, this is Joe’s mum, Dorothy.

  SHEENA nods hello.

  Dorothy handles the fruit grading and packing for us at this time of year.

  DOROTHY: [dancing her hands in the air] The sharpest eyes and softest hands available in the fruit bowl of south-western New South Wales.

  KIERAN laughs, appreciating DOROTHY. While SHEENA and CELIA talk, KIERAN bounces around looking at the peaches with delighted curiosity.

  SHEENA: Heard you might have some work going.

  CELIA: Yeah.

  SHEENA: Well, we need to earn some money as quickly as we can so—umm—

  CELIA: Any experience picking stone fruit?

  SHEENA shakes her head.

  Any kind of fruit?

  SHEENA: None.

  CELIA: Okay. That’s teachable. That’s doable. When your car’s fixed, you’ll have transport out here from town every day?

  SHEENA: Uh, no, we don’t get the car back ’til we earn the money to pay for the parts.

  CELIA: Right… It’s just we’re not set up to have pickers stay on the place.

  JOE draws CELIA aside for a whispered conference.

  JOE: They’re pretty desperate, I reckon. Any chance they could camp on the property?

  CELIA: I don’t like the idea of people—strangers—staying out here. I decided years ago not to go that way.

  JOE: Yep, fair enough. If you don’t feel comfortable about it, I’ll find them somewhere else to—

  SHEENA: Look, um, if it’s all a big hassle, y’know, don’t worry. We’ll piss off and—

  CELIA: No. Don’t piss off. I’ve got twenty thousand peaches that have to be picked before they rot. I need hard workers in a hurry.

  SHEENA: I need two thousand bucks in a hurry.

  CELIA looks at SHEENA, sizing her up.

  CELIA: See that shack? It’s primitive. And filthy. Hasn’t been used for fifteen years.

  SHEENA: Primitive is okay.

  CELIA: We can clean it out, I’m sure.

  JOE: Anything I can do to help?

  CELIA: We just need to scrounge up some stuff to make the place decent.

  [To DOROTHY] Can you start explaining to Kieran how we pick?

  SHEENA: Kieran. Remember. Don’t be a dickhead.

  KIERAN nods resolutely. CELIA, SHEENA and JOE exit together.

  KIERAN: Is it hard? Picking peaches?

  DOROTHY: Hard work. If you want to earn decent money. Oh, yes.

  KIERAN: I mean, hard like difficult.

  DOROTHY grabs KIERAN’s hands and inspects them.

  DOROTHY: You’ll be okay.

  KIERAN: You can tell from my hands?

  DOROTHY: This contraption is a picking bag.

  KIERAN: Cool.

  DOROTHY: How tall are you?

  She measures his upper body with her hands.

  I must adjust the strap before we start.

  She fiddles with the strap.

  KIERAN: So do you live here, Dorothy?

  DOROTHY: No. I live in the yellow house down there at the crossroad.

  On my own since Sandor died.

  KIERAN: Your husband?

  DOROTHY: He died since eight years.

  KIERAN: Oh, I’m sorry. Hey—what country are you from originally?

  DOROTHY: Hungary.

  KIERAN: Yeah? Far out. Did you come out here—?

  DOROTHY: Many years ago.

  DOROTHY makes a dismissive gesture—she doesn’t want to talk about it.

  KIERAN: This is an awesome place. So beautiful. And bulk peaches on tap! Oh—guess you get sick of eating peaches.

  DOROTHY: Not so much. Because the season ends and then by the time it comes around again you think—oh, peaches would be nice.

  KIERAN: Right. I get you.

  DOROTHY: Try one of the Red Havens.

  KIERAN: Oh—we allowed to eat them?

  DOROTHY: This one’s got a split. So you might as well.

  KIERAN bites into the peach and gasps, getting
a rush.

  KIERAN: Oh, this is—far out, this is—How come I never tasted anything like this in my life before?

  DOROTHY: Because you only ever ate those green bullety excuses for peaches they sell in supermarkets in the city. You never had a Red Haven fresh from the tree.

  KIERAN eats the peach with noisy, messy gusto, juice all over his face and hands. Without taking her eyes off the picking bag she’s adjusting, DOROTHY calls out.

  [Calling] Are you going to hide over there and spy on us all afternoon?

  KIERAN: Sorry?

  KIERAN spins around with mock paranoia.

  Are you, like, a mental old lady? Or is there really someone spying on us?

  DOROTHY: Zoe.

  ZOE comes out from her hiding place.

  ZOE: How come you always know where I am?

  DOROTHY: From the corner in my eye, I see you moving a little. Restless, ants on your pants, watching everything that goes on.

  ZOE: [affectionately] The same as you, Mrs Stickybeak.

  DOROTHY laughs and grabs ZOE’s face, proprietorial.

  DOROTHY: This is Zoe.

  KIERAN: Oh. Right. Hi. Hi. Kieran. I’m Kieran.

  KIERAN leaps forward and offers his hand to shake. ZOE, startled, shakes his hand and discovers it’s sticky.

  ZOE: Oh.

  KIERAN: Ah! Sorry. Peach juice.

  KIERAN laughs and licks the peach juice off his hand.

  SHEENA, carrying cleaning gear, emerges from the house to find KIERAN licking his hand like a hyperactive dog.

  SHEENA: Kieran. Are you acting like a head case and driving this lady crazy?

  KIERAN: No. Oh well, maybe—Am I?

  DOROTHY: He’s okay.

  KIERAN: Oh. Oh. Sheena, this is Zoe.

  SHEENA: Hello.

  KIERAN: Zoe might think I’m a head case. Do you, Zoe?