In an Australian first, Special Education from the inside – a transgressive work in progress, based on true stories. A Special play on RESISTANCE against The Norms and The Normals.
Simon and Cheryl were once at Special School together. And through a quirk of fate, they soon will be again.
When the pair travel back in time to their days as students, they are once more fighting the forces that showed them the real costs of being Special. As they encounter the evil headmistress, the scary nurse and the compromised teachers and parents, they turn to each other. These are the struggles that Deaf, Disabled and Neurodiverse children faced in the 1960’s and are still facing now.
Specials! draws from writer Kath Duncan’s real life Special Education experiences in Australia in the 1960s. It’s a comedic and confronting depiction of the different routes Special Ed takes kids on, a world largely hidden from sight. This untamed disability-led pride and power tale features disabled performers and an explosive climax. Showings of Kath Duncan’s unashamedly Feral Crip Clap Back play Specials! take place as the Australian Special Education system comes into question nationally, with a deadline for its existence.
For the last two months Kath and her collaborators have been in residence at Arts House developing Specials!
In these unique work in progress showings as part of Alter State, the unconventional and campy Specials! characters will bring you into our Special classroom – raw, radical and twisted scenes based on real student experiences.
Specials! is a rally cry and rebellion; an act of centring voices that have been systemically marginalised for far too long. Specials! is fact, it’s fiction, it’s furious and funny.
