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Michelle Arrow, Professor of History, Macquarie University

‘An extremely serious musical comedy’ about Whitlam? Yes. The Dismissal is great fun, witty and sharply observed

Gough Whitlam John Kerr Laura Murphy Peter Carroll
Squabbalogic/David Hooley

The Whitlam government has a mythical status in the Australian popular imagination. While it lasted less than two full terms between December 1972 and November 1975, it has had an outsized cultural presence ever since.

This is not just because of Gough Whitlam’s transformative social democratic agenda, but because of the way his government ended: the dismissal remains one of the most shocking events in Australian political history.

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