Lorae Parry
{{Short description|New Zealand playwright and actor}}
{{Infobox artist
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| name = Lorae Parry
| honorific_suffix = {{post-nominals|country=NZL|MNZM|size=100%}}
| image = Lorae Parry The Witch Project (cropped).jpg
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| birth_date = 1955
| birth_place = Sydney, Australia
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| education = Diploma in Acting, Toi Whakaari, New Zealand Drama School, MA in Scriptwriting, Victoria University of Wellington
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| known_for = playwriting, performance
| notable_works = Eugenia, 1996
| style = Parry's plays often explore sexuality, gender, and class systems.
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{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2020}}
{{Use New Zealand English|date= February 2020}}
Lorae Ann Parry {{post-nominals|country=NZL|MNZM}} is a New Zealand playwright and actor.{{cite book|last1=Forster|first1=Michelanne|last2=Plumb|first2=Vivienne|title=Twenty New Zealand Playwrights|date=2013|publisher=Playmarket|location=Wellington|isbn=9780908607471}}
Biography and education
She was born in 1955 in Sydney, Australia and in 1970 moved to New Zealand. Parry has two qualifications, a Diploma in Acting from Toi Whakaari, the national New Zealand Drama School in 1976,{{Cite web|title=Graduate|url=https://www.toiwhakaari.ac.nz/graduate|access-date=2021-08-09|website=www.toiwhakaari.ac.nz}} and a Master in Scriptwriting from Victoria University of Wellington.
Career
A noted feminist playwright, Parry's plays often explore sexuality, gender, and class systems.{{cite web|title=Lorae, Parry|url=http://www.bookcouncil.org.nz/writers/parry.html|website=New Zealand Book Council|access-date=8 August 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150923195323/http://www.bookcouncil.org.nz/writers/parry.html|archive-date=23 September 2015|url-status=dead}} Her first plays, Strip, and Frontwomen, used a combination of realism and humor to promote empowerment of women and more acceptance of lesbianism.{{Citation|last=Carnegie|first=David|title=Parry, Lorae|date=2005-01-01|url=https://archive.org/details/oxfordencycloped0002unse_e9d3|encyclopedia=The Oxford Encyclopedia of Theatre and Performance|publisher=Oxford University Press|language=en|doi=10.1093/acref/9780198601746.001.0001|isbn=9780198601746|access-date=2019-10-08|url-access=registration}} The play Frontwomen was a breakthrough in history when it was the first lesbian play performed in New Zealand.{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/routledgeinterna0000unse|title=Routledge international encyclopedia of queer culture|date=2006|publisher=Routledge|others=Gerstner, David A., 1963-|isbn=9780415306515|location=London|oclc=62475216|url-access=registration}} However, her most influential play, Eugenia, was published in 1996 and explored the nature of sexuality and gender, as well as challenging social traditions around females. Eugenia is noted for its mixing of the magical and supernatural with the true historical figure Eugene Falleni, an Italian-Australian transgender man convicted of the 1917 murder of his first wife.{{Cite journal|last=Edmond|first=Murray|date=2004|title=How gothic is s/he? Three New Zealand dramas|id={{ProQuest|763426985}}|journal=Australasian Drama Studies|volume=44|pages=113–129, 149}} Parry constantly focuses on empowering women through theatre and through her plays, she focuses on the importance of women's lives.{{Cite web|date=January 2017|title=Parry, Lorae|url=https://www.read-nz.org/writer/parry-lorae/|access-date=2019-10-08|work=Read NZ}} She continues to be active in women's issues through play publishing and theatre.
Parry is a performer including being part of the Crows Feet Dance Collective, a dance company for women with a lowest age limit of 40 years.{{Cite web|last=|title=Crows Feets Dance - C is for Climate Change|url=https://danz.org.nz/c%20is%20for%20climate%20change%20review|access-date=2021-09-10|website=DANZ|language=en-NZ}}{{Cite web|date=2019-02-25|title=The Witch Project|url=https://www.thebigidea.nz/events/222329-the-witch-project|access-date=2021-09-10|website=The Big Idea|language=en}} She is known for her stage impersonation of former New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark.{{Cite web|title=WRITING WELLINGTON: TWENTY YEARS OF VICTORIA UNIVERSITY WRITING FELLOWS|url=http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-RobWrit-_N74542.html|access-date=2021-09-10|website=NZETC}}
Plays
- (1986) Strip File:Scarlet and Gold Circa Theatre 2016.jpg in 2016]]
- (1992) Digger & Nudger Try Harder, co-written by Carmel McGlone
- (1993) Frontwomen{{cite book|last1=Parry|first1=Lorae|title=Frontwomen|date=1993|publisher=Women's Play Press|location=Wellington, N.Z.|isbn=0473021714|pages=71}}
- (1994) Cracks{{cite book|last1=Parry|first1=Lorae|title=Cracks|date=1994|publisher=Women's Play Press|location=Wellington, N.Z.|isbn=0473021714|pages=76|url=http://natlib.govt.nz/records/21083182?search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=cracks+lorae+parry}}
- (1996) Eugenia{{cite book|last1=parry|first1=Lorae|title=Eugenia|date=1996|publisher=Victoria University Press|location=Wellington, [N.Z.]|isbn=0864733046|pages=86|url=http://natlib.govt.nz/records/22047591?search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=eugenia+lorae+parry}}
- (2002) Vagabonds{{cite book|last1=Parry|first1=Lorae|title=Vagabonds|date=2002|publisher=Victoria University Press in association with Women's Play Press|location=Wellington [N.Z.]|isbn=0864734352|pages=92|url=http://natlib.govt.nz/records/21031867?search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=vagabond+lorae+parry}}
- (2003) The Truth About Loven, co-written by Pinky Agnew
- (2006) The Candidates, co-written Pinky Agnew
- (2008) Kate & Mrs Jones
- (2010) Bloomsbury Women & The Wild Colonial Girl{{cite book|last1=Parry|first1=Lorae|title=Bloomsbury women & the wild colonial girl|date=2010|publisher=Women's Play Press|location=Wellington, N.Z.|isbn=9780958231015|pages=43|url=http://natlib.govt.nz/records/21758579?search%5Bpath%5D=items&search%5Btext%5D=bloomsbury+lorae+parry}}
- (2010) Sex Drive, co-written by Pinky Agnew
- (2014) Destination Beehive, co-written by Pinky Agnew
- (2016) Scarlet & Gold
Film
- (1988) Send a Gorilla as Sender of revenge gram
Honours and awards
- 1994 – Awarded Stout Fellowship, Victoria University of Wellington
- 1995 – The Reader's Digest PEN Stout Research Centre Fellowship
- 1998 – Writer in Residence, Victoria University of Wellington.{{cite book|last1=Birch|first1=Dinah|last2=Drable|first2=Margaret|title=The Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature|date=2009|publisher=Oxford University|location=New York|isbn=9780192806871}} Parry was the first female playwright to achieve this award.
- 2004 – Appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to the performing arts, in the 2004 New Year Honours{{cite web |url=https://dpmc.govt.nz/publications/new-year-honours-list-2004 |title=New Year honours list 2004 |date=31 December 2003 |publisher=Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet |access-date=15 February 2020}}
References
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Category:20th-century New Zealand dramatists and playwrights
Category:New Zealand women dramatists and playwrights
Category:Victoria University of Wellington alumni
Category:Members of the New Zealand Order of Merit
Category:21st-century New Zealand dramatists and playwrights
Category:20th-century New Zealand women writers