David Williamson AO b.1942

His plays include: Jugglers Three (1972), What If You Died Tomorrow? (1973),
The Department (1975), A Handful of Friends (1976), The Club (1977), After the Ball (1977), Travelling North (1979), Celluloid Heroes (1980), The Perfectionist (1982), Sons of Cain (1985), Emerald City (1987), Top Silk (1989), Siren (1990), Money  and Friends (1991), Brilliant Lies (1993), Sanctuary (1994), Dead White Males (1995), Heretic (1996), Third World Blues (1997 – an adaptation of Jugglers Three), After the Ball (1997), Corporate Vibes (1999), Face to Face (2000), The Great Man (2000), Up for Grabs (2001), A Conversation (2001), Charitable Intent (2001), Soulmates (2002), Amigos (2004), and Influence (2005). While most of Williamson’s plays have been premiered by the Sydney and Melbourne theatre companies, some were deliberately written with smaller venues – such as Sydney’s Ensemble Theatre – in mind.

Williamson’s plays have been translated into many languages and there have been major productions in London, Los Angeles, Washington and New York – where The New Yorker hailed him as ‘Ibsen in the Antipodes’.

Several of Williamson’s plays have been televised and produced as films, most notably The Coming of Stork (filmed as Stork), Don’s Party, The Club, Travelling North, The Removalists, Emerald City, Sanctuary and Brilliant Lies. He has also written original screenplays for Libido, Petersen, Eliza Fraser, Duet for Four, Gallipoli, Phar Lap and The Year of Living Dangerously. His television scripts include The Perfectionist, the miniseries The Last Bastion, A Dangerous Life and The Four-Minute Mile, and the series Dog’s Head Bay, which he wrote with his wife. He wrote the telemovie adaptation of Neville Shute’s On the Beach, which was nominated for a Golden Globe Award and won the AFI Best Miniseries Award. His directing credits include Arthur Miller’s All My Sons and John Power’s The Last of the Knucklemen for the State Theatre of South Australia and his own Sons of Cain for the Melbourne Theatre Company, which toured nationally.

In 2005 Williamson announced his retirement from main stage productions. He ‘retired’ to Noosa, Queensland where, in 1991, he and his wife, writer Kristin Williamson, were instrumental in founding the annual Noosa Longweekend cultural festival. He and Kristin were in the cast of his play Charitable Intent, which had its premiere in the 2002 festival. Flatfoot premiered there in 2003, Birthrights in 2004, Operator in 2005, and Strings Under My Fingers in 2006. 

Williamson’s stepson Felix Williamson and his son Rory Williamson are both Australian actors. Rory starred in the 2001 revival of The Coming of Stork at the Stables Theatre in Sydney, produced by Felix’s Bare Naked Theatre Company.

David Williamson has won four AFI awards and 11 Awgies. He has received honorary doctorates of Literature from the University of Sydney (1988), Monash University and Swinburne University of Technology (1996). His work has been recognised with the Australian Film Institute’s Award for Best Screenplay (four times) and, in 1966, the United Nations Association of Australia Media Peace Award. In 2005 he received the Richard Lane Award for Services to the Australian Writers’ Guild. He has been named one of Australia’s Living National Treasures. He was made an Officer of the Order of Australia in 1983.

David Williamson’s remarkable contribution to excellence in Australian performing arts was recognised in 2005 when Live Performance Australia presented him with its James Cassius Williamson Award.

Frank Van Straten, 2007