David Milroy – September 24 2017

David was born in Perth, Western Australia in 1957. His family links are with the Injibarndi and Palku people of the Pilbara. Formerly Artistic Director of Yirra Yaakin Noongar Theatre, David has been involved in theatre in Western Australia for a number of years as a musician, director and writer. His writing/directing credits include: King Hit, Runumuk, One Day in ’67 and No Shame. He provided musical direction for Sistergirl and Dead Heart (Black Swan Theatre Company) and the Perth Theatre Company’s production of Wild Cat Falling. He co-wrote and directed Sally Morgan’s hit play Cruel Wild Woman and Barking Gecko’s production of Own Worst Enemy for the Festival of Perth.

Windmill Baby (published in Contemporary Indigenous Plays)
Currency Press, 2007; ISBN 9780868197951
Full length play; 1 female 0 male
Set on an abandoned cattle station in the Kimberley landscape, this one-woman play combines the poetry of a campfire story with the comedy of a great yarn. Maymay has come back to the pastoral station she worked on as a domestic half a century ago. As she beavers away around the old washing line, she recalls the season of love and revenge which swept through and turned this dusty collection of bungalows into the scene of an achingly beautiful tragedy. The story of Black Australians in the service of White Australia, it is also an ancient tale of unexpected love and sudden ruination. It finds meaning in a useless act of violence, and carries the meaning on in spite of the blunting powers of time and the wilful failures of the national memory.

Waltzing the Wilarra
Australian Script Centre; ISBN 9780868199092
Full length play; 4 female, 5 male
Playwright & Composer: David Milroy
Charlie, Elsa and Fay take you on a musical journey back to 1940s post-war Perth. Against a backdrop of curfews, and the fear of arrest for consorting, White and Black manage to form their own club. For a night they can forget their worries and experience rare happy times singing, dancing, listening to music, and with a little luck … romance. Forty years on, as the club faces demolition, they meet once again to stage a musical reunion and protest in an attempt to save their old stomping ground. As the trio reflects upon loves lost and found, old arguments and alliances re-surface. Dark secrets and ghosts that have lingered for more than half a century are revealed, and we discover that reconciliation is more than saying sorry.