About

Griffin Theatre Company’s first production for 2006 is a big, juicy, ambitious play from the author of the 2004 hit Mr Bailey’s Minder. Evoking the heat, scent and hard slog of an orchard at harvest time, The Peach Season by Debra Oswald is about intoxicating first love and the burning love of a mother for a child.

Celia fled Sydney with baby Zoe in her arms after her husband was killed, an innocent bystander of a bungled arm robbery. Sixteen years later, their isolated peach farm is a safe haven keeping Zoe safe from the dangers of the world. But the restless teenager is chaffing against her mother’s over-protectiveness, yearning to bite into all life has to offer.

When secretive siblings Kieran and Sheena turn up at the farm desperate for picking work, they trigger strong feelings, bad decisions and danger. Set for her first bumper crop, and with only elderly neighbour Dorothy to help, Celia is left with no choice but to hire the itinerant workers.

Dorothy’s son Joe is the town solicitor, a good-hearted man trapped in a loveless marriage and locked in a strange dance of mutual worry with his mother. As budding romances grow amongst the ripening fruit, Celia is plagued by fear and makes a move that could have devastating consequences for all. Will their relationships flourish or rot under the pressure of reality and past mistakes?

Winner of the 2005 Rodney Seaborn Playwright’s Award, this moving and suspenseful story is about our overwhelming desire to protect the ones we love and the painful necessity to let them go out into the world.

Cast & Creatives

Director David Berthold
Design Alice Babidge
Lighting Design Stephen Hawker
Sound Design Jeremy Silver
With John Adam, Maggie Blinco, Maeve Dermody, Anne Looby, Alice Parkinson and Scott Timmins

Performance Times

Previews 10 – 14 March
Season 16 March – 22 April