Melbourne’s Pentridge Prison still holds powerful memories for many thousands of people.

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The prison’s towering bluestone walls were an imposing presence in Coburg, and almost all Melburnians have a story to tell about this notorious place.

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My own connection to Pentridge dates from 1982, when I was 18 years old. At that time the prisoners in A Division had a theatre group called the Mess Hall Players. That year, they were putting on One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, an extremely powerful play set in a 1960s psychiatric institution in the US. There were several female roles in the play, and I was one of three young women who joined the theatre group to act alongside the prisoners.

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We went into A Division every day for four months to rehearse and then perform the play. Over that time, we got to know the prisoners well and learned a lot about their lives and conditions inside. We saw them first and foremost as our fellow actors and almost forgot where we were until it came time to leave each evening, the heavy metal gates of A Division clanged shut behind us.

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The play ran for five weeks, with audiences of about 200 people each night. It was a very professional production and got fantastic reactions from the public.

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The most memorable performance for me was opening night, always a nerve-wracking time for the cast and crew. As per tradition, the audience that evening were the other A Division prisoners.  We’d never met them as they were already locked in when we arrived for rehearsals each afternoon. But the guys in the theatre group had obviously been telling them about us, and they were very excited about finally seeing us.

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The lights came up for the opening scene and my fellow actress and I walked out onto the stage, completely unprepared for the reaction our entrance would provoke. The guys in the audience went wild – clapping, whistling, yelling and stomping their feet. The whole stage was shaking and we couldn’t hear a word of the lines we were saying. We forged ahead, but it was a pretty dramatic first few minutes.

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In the final scene, the main character, McMurphy – a loud, confident and rebellious inmate – has been brought back to his room after being lobotomised. His friend, Chief Bromden, knowing McMurphy would rather die than be reduced to this state, decides to smother him with a pillow.

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During this scene, every single man in the audience was absolutely silent. There was not a single sound in the entire theatre. And although the noise at the start of the play had been pretty impressive, that silence at the end was truly overwhelming. All these years later, the memory still gives me goosebumps.

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While the Mess Hall Players, A Division and Pentridge are now history (Pentridge closed in 1997), plays are still being performed in prisons. I recently saw a performance of The Sky Chose Me at the Dame Phyllis Frost Centre in Melbourne. Somebody’s Daughter Theatre worked with the women to create and perform this moving, funny, thought-provoking play and the art exhibition that accompanied it.

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Somebody’s Daughter Theatre has worked with women in Victorian Prisons and post-release to create theatre, visual art, music and film since 1980. The work they create together is stunning, and the impact they have had on these women’s lives over the past 40 years is immeasurable.

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In Pentridge and at Dame Phyllis Frost, I’ve seen what a powerful impact the written and spoken word can have in prison, for those who perform and those who witness the performances. Here’s hoping that there will be many more opportunities like these in the future.