Norm and Ahmed

These plays portray a society at the cusp of reform. The writing reflects a deep sense of the need for change, and awareness of the ground beginning to give way beneath the feet. The plays are: Alan Hopgood's Private Yuk Objects, a rich portrait of Australia in the mid-60s centred around Australia's participation in the Vietnam war; and This Old Man Comes Rolling Home, Dorothy Hewett's celebration of working-class life and politics in an inner-suburban Sydney during the cold war. The Lucky Streak by James Searle, a comedy about two young men who share a room in a boarding house, the play is an exploration of the rhythms of the inarticulate and the aggression, rooted in frustration, present in the simplest of domestic conversations; and Norm and Ahmed, Alex Buzo's classic examination of racism and alienation, and the subject of a controversial censorship debate.