The Wire

Nearly a thousand Australian women went to Vietnam during the war as entertainers, typists, consular staff & army nurses. Siobhan McHugh wrote a book called “Minefields and Miniskirts” in 1993, after interviewing many women about their experiences in the war. Terence O’Connell has just adapted this award-winning book into a play, which tells the women’s stories in a documentary style, propelled by songs of the era by artists like Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez and Carole King. The main characters in the play are a volunteer, a journalist, a nurse, the wife of a Vietnam veteran, and an entertainer, all of whom happen to cross paths at an Anzac Day march during the 1980’s. As a helicopter flies over them, the now middle-aged women are transported back to Vietnam in the 60’s and early 70’s where rice paddies, paper lanterns and ancient temples contrasted starkly with G.I.s, orphaned children and constant attacks. Cinnamon Nippard spoke to Director, Terence O’Connell.