SUMMER OF THE SEVENTEENTH DOLL

About the show

1953. For sixteen summers, Roo and Barney have returned to Carlton to share a life of laughter, love and independence with Olive and Nancy. But this seventeenth summer feels different. Nancy is gone, Roo is weary, Barney restless, and Olive is determined to live on her own terms. Emma, now sharp-eyed and unsentimental, sees how choices echo across generations. Bubba longs for her turn in the spotlight, while Pearl - brought in by Olive in an attempt to replace Nancy - becomes an unwitting catalyst for reckoning. Lauded as a “watershed moment” for Australian theatre, The Doll shattered tradition by telling an Australian story in an Australian voice. Heartbreaking and iconic, it lays bare the fragility of dreams alongside the courage it takes to imagine life differently.