School teacher Meg wants to start a new festival called “Euphoria” to celebrate everything her country town has to offer. Former student Ethan doesn’t think there’s much to celebrate at all, until he meets Annie and hatches a plan for a campervan escape. Meg’s husband Nick wants Meg to slow down, but there’s still so much to do – get grants, make run sheets, hurry to Adelaide to win the support of the Premier. She’s spinning fast. And the rest of the town is noticing.

An Antipodean Under Milkwood, Emily Steel’s Euphoria brings to life a South Australian regional community, full of love, pain, complexity and humour, with two virtuosic actors playing a range of idiosyncratic characters.

Informed by real conversations between Steel and people who live in these communities, Euphoria is a sharply observed play about the human habit of distracting ourselves from our most vulnerable parts.

How wonderful that Emily Steel’s delightful and deeply affecting work also rises from the 2020 ashes. I know that audiences will adore finally seeing James Smith and Ashton Malcolm shine on stage, as they give life to a host of unforgettable South Australian characters. A giant hug of a play. Mitchell