When Evonne Goolangong was three, she found an old brown, bald tennis ball down the backseat of her father’s car and was instantly fascinated by it. Her brother wanted to know what it was. “It’s mine!” she says in one of the opening scenes in Andrea James’s play Sunshine Super Girl.

Tennis balls would, of course, play a central role in Goolagong’s life, as she went on to become one of Australia’s greatest tennis legends: not only was she the first Indigenous woman to win a Grand Slam, but she won 14 Grand Slams, including seven singles titles, two of them at Wimbledon – the second after she had had a child (the first mother to win there in 66 years).

Tuuli Narkle as Evonne Goolagong Cawley, with Kyle Shilling, in Sunshine Super Girl. Photograph © Yaya Stempler

Andrea James, a Yorta Yorta/Gunaikurnai woman, tells the story of Evonne Goolagong Cawley’s life and career in Sunshine Super Girl, which she wrote and directs. The play, produced by Performing Lines with a number of co-commissioners, had its world premiere at Griffith Regional Theatre in Goolagong’s hometown in October 2020 and now has a season at...