Heavenly Creatures on stage in Daughters of Heaven

Peter Jackson’s award winning movie Heavenly Creatures launched Kate Winslet’s career. The same sensational and true story is the focus of Michelanne Forster’s play Daughters of Heaven (written before Heavenly Creatures), directed by Pam Sexton, which opens at Gold Coast Little Theatre, Southport (Qld) on Saturday 14 April.

In 1954 two well-educated teenagers, Pauline Parker & Juliet Hulme, commit a savage murder in Christchurch, New Zealand. Their trial divides a strait-laced community and shocks a nation, raising fascinating questions about the girls’ relationship, sanity and motives.  

The play is based on extensive interviews with witnesses and on actual trial transcripts. You will hear the evidence, learn about the girls’ fantasy life and get the inside story from a witness to many of the events.

Director Pam Sexton says, “Questions were invariably raised: What motivates two intelligent, well educated young girls to kill so violently?

“Were they insane?

“What was the nature of their relationship? Were they romantically involved? Or just obsessed with one another?”

Sexton has circulated Peter Graham’s “fascinating and insightful” book So Brilliantly Clever (2011) amongst the cast and crew to give valuable insight and subtext in order to understand and flesh out the characters. “It uncovers some crucial facts about the families and the girls’ somewhat dysfunctional lives. Independently, the girls were subject to chronic childhood illnesses and left alone, or with strangers, in various medical facilities for long periods of time, free to indulge in their fantasies without too much interaction from anyone. They were both avid story and journal writers, a habit that would eventually convict them.

“It is no surprise the girls found great affinity and escape in one another.  They were devoted and aloof from the world, creating their own stories, religion and dieties – depicted in the play’s Fourth World. 

“Their togetherness became threatened when Juliet’s family planned to leave NZ.  Pauline’s mother refused to let her daughter go with the Hulmes…. The girls decided something had to be done.”

Sexton says the play “does not judge or give us all the facts but rather explores. It plays with the chronological order of events. We are given a sense and a taste of the players and their place in the story.”

Cast

Juliet Hulme  -   Courtney Bell

Pauline Parker   -   Alexandra Nel

Bridget O'Malley   -   Pam Barber

Hilda Hulme   -   Deborah Coulls

Henry Hulme   -   Paul Walters

Walter Perry   -   Doug Harvey

Honora Rieper   -   Janet Thwaites

Herbert Rieper   -   Joe Feeney

Alan Brown   -   John Rees-Osborne

Terrence Gresson   -   Noel Thompson

Daughters of Heaven runs at the Gold Coast Little Theatre, Southport from 14 April to 5 May 2012.  It plays 8.00 pm Thursday to Saturday with Sunday matinees at 2.00 pm on 22 and 29 April. Bookings: 5532 2096 or online at www.gclt.com.au

The Gold Coast Little Theatre is sponsored by WHK Group Ltd.