Silent Disco

by Lachlan Philpott

Tamara and Jasyn are in love. Tamara is fourteen. Jasyn lives with Aunty and his brother Dane is in prison for dealing. Jasyn wants to take Tamara to the formal, but he hasn’t got the cash.

In a world of absent mothers and missing fathers, Mrs Petchell battles to keep another year of students out of the ranks of the vanished. The Outsiders is on the syllabus again, but instead of Socs and Greasers, this is the world of Speds and Skanks – fuelled by Red Bull and powered by iPods. It can be hard to find your own rhythm when everyone is marching to the beat of a different drum.

Genres: Plays

Paperback

Published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Amelia Garvey]

Hard to read if you focus too hard on reading each sentence properly. However, probably realistic to how Australians talk especially in the 2000s. I like that Tamara really liked Squid even tho she cheated on him. I’m doing a monologue from Petchall’s character and I’m glad to have really enjoyed her character while reading this. She’s younger than I thought she was - from initially reading only the monologue.

[Cassie]

feel like it would translate a lot better on stage

[Luke Devenish]

There's a rich, unbroken tradition of bogan-highschool-as-vicious-battlefield dramas, starting with Blackboard Jungle and To Sir With Love, that Silent Disco slips right on into. They're always pretty bleak, maybe with just a soupcon of hope at the end if you're lucky. The hope is little more than a whimper here, but what stops this play from being just another link in the Bogan High chain is the extraordinary language used throughout and the car wreck of a love triangle in Act Two. Memorable.