Sandra Shotlander – March 28 2021

The last of the native St Kildans, Rachel Johnson, died in April 2016

Sandra is a playwright, performer, founder/director of several theatre companies, and teacher of writing. Her short stories have been published in anthologies and magazines and her plays have been performed and published in Australia and the USA. Sandra’s other plays include Framework, Blind Salomé, Angels of Power and Is that you, Nancy? as well as two full length plays commissioned for secondary schools, Chronicles and The Crimson Firefly Circus. Sandra was also commissioned by ABC Radio to write the radio play Just One More Thing. She has been playwright in residence at James Cook University and has toured the USA giving writing workshops, talks and readings. St Kilda Story is Sandra’s sixth commissioned work for Penleigh and Essendon Grammar, and in March 1999 it was sponsored by the Department of Human Resources for a one-off performance during senior citizens week as a tribute to UN International Year of Older Persons at Chapel Off Chapel, Prahan, Melbourne.

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St Kilda Story
Australian Script Centre, 1999
75 minutes; 14 female, 10 male (variable cast size 18-24)
Cast age: 12 to 16; Audience age: children – adult
This ensemble piece links the history of the remote St Kilda islands beyond the Outer Hebrides with contemporary St Kilda in Melbourne. In 1930 the last 36 inhabitants were evacuated from St Kilda, Scotland, ending 4000 years of settlement. Gerry, a schoolboy in contemporary St Kilda, Melbourne, is led on a trail of discovery by Winnie, a resident of a nursing home in which Gerry’s mother Anna is a nursing sister. As the Scottish St Kilda’s extraordinary stories are revealed through narrative and song, Gerry sees links with events happening around him. History has spoken.

Chronicles of the French Revolution
Australian Script Centre, 1995
90 minutes; 15 female, 15 male (cast number is 30-130)
Cast age: 12 to 16, 16 to 18, 18+; Audience age: children – adult
In this Brechtian style, fast-paced sweep through French history, a young woman looks back on her struggle to survive during the French Revolution. From events leading to the fall of the Bastille, to the Terror in 1794, this play takes the audience into the sparsely armed crowds storming the Bastille, with the 6000 women who marched to Versaille. It follows the path of ill-fated Marie Antoinette and the exploits of Theroign de Mericourt. In the final scene it is clear women played a much greater part in the Revolution than knitting while heads rolled. Ideal for secondary school production. Can be done lavishly with elaborate sets and period costumes, or stripped back to basics for a small space and a tight budget.