Cultural depictions of Tom Wills

Cricketer and Australian rules football pioneer Tom Wills is the subject of a growing body of works in art and popular culture.

Visual arts

Painted by William Handcock in 1870, a full-length portrait of Wills in his cricket flannels is held at the National Sports Museum. Another painting of Wills wearing a football guernsey is in possession of the Geelong Football Club and held at Kardinia Park.

A monument to Wills was erected at Moyston in 1998. In 1988, the Melbourne Cricket Club erected bronze doors, designed by Robert Ingpen, outside the club's entrance, depicting Wills holding a football. A statue of Wills umpiring an 1858 football match was erected outside the Melbourne Cricket Ground in 2002.

Wills is the subject of a series of paintings by Archibald Prize nominee Martin Tighe.

Literature

Martin Flanagan's 1998 historical novel The Call is a semi-fictional account of Wills' life. In it, Wills is cast as a tragic sporting genius,[1] and the dingo is used to symbolise his identity as an "ambiguous creature" caught between indigenous and non-indigenous Australia.[2] In The Paddock That Grew, released that same year, Keith Dunstan imagines Wills as a ghost touring modern Melbourne.

Music

Wills has inspired numerous songs including "Tom Wills" (2002) by Mick Thomas of Weddings Parties Anything fame; "Tom Wills Would" (2004) by the Warumpi Band's Neil Murray;[3] "The Ten Rules" (2010) by folk rock band The Holy Sea;[4] and "Tom Wills" by Goanna frontman Shane Howard, written and performed exclusively for The Marngrook Footy Show.

Film and television

Plans for a feature film about Wills were made in 1989 but later abandoned.

A docudrama on Wills' life, shot in 2008, had its premier at the Arts Centre Melbourne in 2014, and was subsequently shown on Australian television.[5] Portions of the docudrama also form part of an exhibit on Wills' life at the International Cricket Hall of Fame. Wills is portrayed by Nathan Phillips.[6]

Wills and the origins of Australian rules football are the subject of an episode of Australia: The Story of Us (2015), produced by Yahoo!7.

Theatre

In 2004, Bruce Myles adapted Flanagan's novel The Call into a play of the same name for the Malthouse Theatre.

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References
  1. Flanagan, Martin (6 November 1998). "The Summer Game". The Sports Factor (Interview). Interviewed by Amanda Smith. ABC Radio National. Archived from the original on 22 July 2012. Retrieved 29 August 2013.
  2. Judd 2007, pp. 154–156, 336.
  3. Flanagan, Martin (23 May 2003). "Songs of a defiant heart", The Age. Retrieved 18 October 2013.
  4. Schaefer, René (5 October 2010)."The Holy Sea – Ghosts of the Horizon", Mess+Noise. Retrieved 4 April 2013.
  5. Flanagan, Martin (5 August 2016). "Tom Wills one hell of a story", The Age. Retrieved 5 August 2016.
  6. Morreti, Daniel (1 December 2010). "Short Film Big On Action" Archived 2012-03-28 at the Wayback Machine, Film Ink. Retrieved 22 September 2015.
  • Quotations related to Tom Wills at Wikiquote
  • Media related to Tom Wills at Wikimedia Commons
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