Naked Possum is a 1956 Australian play by Barbara Vernon. It was her first play performed in Sydney and is one of the few Australian plays to examine the Malayan Emergency.[1][2]
Reception
Leslie Rees described it as "something of a damp squib."[3]
The Sydney Morning Herald called it "ripe old melodrama" with "stale situations and limping cliches".[4]
However The Bulletin said "it has a remarkably attractive set.. and a most impressive performance by Owen Weingott, while the plot has sufficient intricacy and suspense to keep one guessing."[5]
Premise
During the Malayan Emergency, Australian troops looking for Communists arrive at a temple in the jungle. They meet the widow of a murdered planter who tries to seduce the soldiers.
Original cast
Sydney Morning Herald 13 Sept 1956
Margaret Roberts
Owen Weingott
Jerold Wells
Derek Stanley
References
^Jane Connors, 'Vernon, Barbara Mary (1916–1978)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/vernon-barbara-mary-11922/text21359, published first in hardcopy 2002, accessed online 29 July 2023.
^"Aust Play at the Independent". The Sydney Morning Herald. 14 September 1956. p. 7.
^"Women's Letters – Sydney", The Bulletin, John Ryan Comic Collection (Specific issues), 77 (3997), Sydney, N.S.W.: John Haynes and J.F. Archibald: 18, 19 September 1956, ISSN0007-4039, nla.obj-694447958, retrieved 30 July 2023 – via Trove
