Wretched

Erin Pearson
“PRISON is like hell”, according to play-write Angus Cerini.
Six years after working in a juvenile justice facility “boy’s prison”, Cerini has brought his experiences to life in a new play to feature in Geelong this weekend.
His Patrick White Playwrights’ Award winner, Wretch, tells the story of a mother visiting her son serving time for a crime of violence while exploring their “often tubulous” relationship.
Cerini said his time working in the justice facility was “pretty striking”.
“You go into a prison and it’s a very confronting sort of place but very quickly I realised these young blokes were much like the boys I went to school with in the outer suburbs of Melbourne.
“A lot had just stuffed up. Many were destined for jail but for most of them things had gone wrong and they never thought that would happen to them.”
Cerini said most of the young males he met in the detention centre suffered a “lack of male leadership”.
“It always seemed to be a father figure lacking in these boys’ lives,” he said.
“On the other side were the mums and it was so simple to see how they stuck beside their kids and forgave them no matter what.
“These guys in jail hate themselves but it’s the mums who love them and forgive.
“That’s what struck me the most and that’s really where this play came from.”
Cerini hoped the play would prompt regional audiences, particularly youngmen, to question their understanding of social justice and the influence of family and peers.
“Without these sorts of things being examined I don’t think we have any chance of dealing with them, least of all within ourselves,” he said.
“The experience I had in there was astonishing. It gave me a window into the lives of people that I had only ever seen reported in the newspapers.”
Cerini takes on the character of the son alongside Melbourne theatre stalwart Susie Dee as the mother.
Wretch will feature at Geelong Performing Arts Centre this Friday and Saturday as part of the centre’s 2010 Shaken & Stirred season.