"Home is...

Making snow angels in the grass.

Grabbing a fistful of lawn and hearing the brittle roots

Pop, pop, pop, pop out of the soil."

 

No booze for sale after 10pm. No pass outs after 1:30am. Last drinks at 3. Is this the beginning of the ‘nanny state’ for a violence-ridden City of Sydney? Just before these new and contentious laws come into effect, we zero in on Tiffany and Donna, two Asian Australian women who have reached a critical moment in their unconventional friendship.

 

Tiffany has finally mastered the highest setting on her vaginal dilator and is ready for her big, messy foray into Sydney’s nightlife. As she’s about to step out, she receives a visit from Donna, an old friend from a tumultuous past. We see their relationship begin to fracture as their feelings about culture, family, womanhood, and autonomy are brought to the fore and to the boil.

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Lockout is a journey to the roots of Tiffany’s psychosomatic pain. Memories of home, trauma, and moments of hostility swim in an ocean of medical, psychological and political talk only to be stuck in rips of confusion and uncertainty. It is a tender and searching piece about intimacy, our bodies and our urges to protect and keep safe that which we hold most dear.

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Lockout was initially incubated at The North Wall Arts Centre as part of TheatreCraft 2016 under the mentorship of John Hoggarth, Ellen McDougall, Bea Roberts, Chris O'Connell and Barney Norris, dir. Robert Awosusi. It has also been developed by Playwriting Australia at the National Script Workshop 2016, dir. Iain Sinclair, dramaturg: Erin Taylor. It has since been presented as a work-in-development at Old 5050's Rapid Reads 2018, and Legit Theatre Co's KXTeethCutting in a co-presentation with Montague Basement (2020).

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Characters from Lockout also feature in short play, Look, See, which was performed by Vera Chok and Chloe Ewart at Gerry's Studio at Theatre Royal Stratford East as part of Stepping Through The Door in March 2017 and Step Up Festival at Kings Cross Theatre, 2019.

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