A Second Moses

In a letter to playwright George Landen Dann responding to a draft of his play A Second Moses (later renamed Caroline Chisholm), Barbara Sisley wrote: “I love the play! It is vitally interesting and the characters, especially the central one, are, to my mind, very well drawn. You have struck out on a fresh path, and shown what a woman has done for colonisation. Congratulations on a very fine piece of work”.(i)

Produced in 1939 under Sisley’s direction, it was greeted in The Telegraph as “by far the best play Mr. Dann has yet written”. Praise was heaped on Sisley for her excellent direction – “a triumph” and “one of her finest achievements” especially considering the “grave difficulties” of a large cast of 28 actors, period costumes and many scene changes. Daphne Roemermann – an "ideal Caroline” – was praised for the acting strength she brought to this leading role. [ii] Professor Stable wrote in his 1939 Annual Report that the production of Dann’s A Second Moses “provided easily the most outstanding event of the theatrical year in Brisbane”.[iii]