BY JAN NARY
A stage show in production has stumbled into a happy serendipity, where unexpected pieces click together. Raymond Noonan, who is directing Ray Lawler’s Australian theatre classic Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, had asked a museum volunteer about photocopying a script and they got to chatting. On hearing the name of the production the volunteer, Judith Ryan, disclosed that she was familiar with the play.
Her late grandmother, actor Eve Wynne, was managing Magnolia Court, a Melbourne boarding house popular with visiting actors. Lawler, who was an emerging playwright and in the process of writing Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, was a regular visitor. He decided to enter the play in a competition and Eve, a mother hen for many of her residents, offered to type up the reams of handwritten script for him. The play was entered, shared first prize and immediately went into production and touring, becoming an iconic contribution to Australian theatre.
Eve and Ray followed their individual careers but Ray, remembering Eve’s organisational skills, hired her as a household manager when he was based in Copenhagen. He presented her with a first publication copy of the play with the inscription, “Dear Eve, without whose encouragement I feel there wouldn’t have been any summer, or seventeenth doll either. Love and thanks, Ray.”
Eve’s career continued in Australia in TV series and commercials. Judith remembers the celebrity status that her grandmother retained.
“She was a beautiful woman, always immaculately dressed. We weren’t allowed to sit on her lap for fear we’d leave finger marks on her beautiful clothes.”
Judith will give a floor talk about her grandmother at the two matinee performances of Summer of the Seventeenth Doll at Redlands Coast Museum in June. For more information go to https://www.redlandmuseum.org.au/whats-on/events/ or call 3286 3494.
