| Marvellous Melbourn | |
| Director: | Alfred Dampier |
| Setting: | Melbourne, Australia |
| Premiere: | 1889 |
| Place: | Alexandra Theatre, Melbourne |
| Orig Lang: | English |
Marvellous Melbourne is a 1889 Australian stage play by Alfred Dampier and J.H. Wrangham. It was hugely popular in Melbourne and is one of Dampier's most iconic plays.[1] [2]
The Age said "The drama itself seems to be composed of scraps taken from half the sensational plays which have been produced in this city during the last 20 years."[3]
The Argus said "The drama is unsatisfactory in that too much superilous matter is introduced, so that the plot does not stand out with sufficient force, and that it is not without incongruity. In its construction there has been too great a desire to provide sensation. Every attempt has also been made to create fun by local allusions fit only for burlesque, and the so called "working man" of Australia, the Chinese question, and the land boom afforded convenient agencies for obtaining the laughter of the audience, whose extra ordinarily appreciative mood may thus to some extent be accounted for."[4]
The play was later published in book form.
The script was rewritten for Sydney in 1893 as Slaves of Sydney by Dampier and J.H. Wrangham.[5]