In defence of the humanities and 'humans doing' — Kate Mulvany's commencement classic
On Fathers' Day 2017, actor Kate Mulvany delivered one of the great commencements to humanities students at Curtin University.
I remember when Kate Mulvany came on the fifth episode of the Speakola podcast, in July 2020. It felt like such a coup. She’s one of Australian great stage and film actors, her performance in MTCs Bernhardt/Hamlet this year was immense, and this has been one of my favourite commencement speeches since the first day I heard it. Kate’s having some huge career wins at the moment, including starring opposite Al Pacino in The Hunters (Amazon Prime).
There’s a post show bit in this podcast episode (beginning 1.14.14) where Kate talks about a death bed speech she gave to her own father that’s a a post show tearjerker for Father’s Day here in Australia.
Every artist, and person who who works in creative fields, should listen to the Curtin University speech.
Here’s a taste of it:
I was taught from a very early age the importance of imagination. My country town of Geraldton was a glorious community of cultures. Noongar, Greek, Vietnamese, African, Indian all made up my English-Irish dad's original Sicilian soccer team. The stories, accents, and ideas that would fly around that team and their families were hilarious and heartbreaking. They challenged the way I saw my small town community and my place within it, and therefore my place within the world.
Later, as you've heard, I spent a large portion of my childhood battling cancer inherited from my dad's exposure to Agent Orange in the Vietnam War. In a stark Perth hospital ward in the early 1980s, there were no video games or Netflix, no Channel 7 Telethon hosted by Basil Zempilas to tell the outside world that we were there, no Make-A-Wish Foundations to whisk us away to Disneyland. All we had in that ward were each other, families surviving together.
Thanks to all of you who are paid subscribers on here and Patreon. Thanks to Kirsty Trott, Gerard Powell and Laura O’Shea who have jumped on board.
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