The One Day of the Year

Abstract

'The One Day of the Year' is one of the most provocative plays ever staged in Australia, and was banned for fear of offending members of the Returned Services League. A panel of judges had chosen the play to be performed at the Adelaide Festival of Arts in 1960. But before rehearsals commenced the board of governors of the festival banned it, believing the content to be insensitive to returned servicemen. The decision to ban the play aroused considerable controversy and an amateur group defiantly staged it in a suburban hall in Adelaide several months after the festival, with some funding from the Australian Elizabethan Theatre Trust. It was a success and a Sydney production followed. The first professional production of 'The One Day of the Year' opened on 26 April 1961 at the Palace Theatre in Sydney after bomb threats kept the cast out of the theatre for 24 hours.