Trent Dalton revisits Boggo Road before the premiere of the play Boy Swallows Universe

Filming an introduction to the world premiere of Boy Swallows Universe at Boggo Road Gaol seemed fitting for Trent Dalton.

Trent Dalton, author of Boy Swallows Universe, at Boggo Road. Picture: Steve Pohlner

Boggo Road Gaol might seem like a funny place to film an introduction to a play but not when the play is Boy Swallows Universe.

The stage version of former Courier-Mail journalist and author Trent Dalton’s much loved novel of the same name opens in the Playhouse at QPAC next week as part of Brisbane Festival.

A collaboration between Queensland Theatre, QPAC and the festival it’s the most highly anticipated theatrical event of the decade and it seemed fitting for Dalton to film his introduction, which will be screened on the big night, at Boggo Road.

The notorious prison features in the book as it did in Dalton’s boyhood.

“The first time I came here was when I was a kid coming to visit my mum who was in the women’s prison,” Dalton reflects as he strolls the ghostly grounds. “

That building doesn’t exist anymore.”

Dalton’s childhood in a housing commission home in Brisbane’s north was a colourful one. Heroin addiction, drug dealing and crims were part of his boyhood landscape.

His babysitter was the famous Boggo Road prisoner and escapee, the convicted murderer Arthur “Slim” Halliday, known as the Houdini of Boggo Road.

Dalton was in The Courier-Mail archives researching cricketer and commentator Bill Lawry when he came across five folders detailing the history of Halliday, Queensland’s most notorious jail-breaker, who features in the book and is played by Anthony Phelan on stage.

Trent Dalton, author of Boy Swallows Universe, at Boggo Road, the place that inspired his novel. Picture: Photo Steve Pohlner

Halliday was a family friend and is a surprisingly inspirational character in the book which Dalton says is “60 per cent true”.

“My mum says it’s only 50 per cent true,” he adds.

The play, which opens in the playhouse next week, is directed by Sam Strong and features rising star Joe Klocek as Eli Bell, the protagonist based on Dalton who says Klocek is nothing short of “brilliant”.

“We’ve got this guy who is right on the cusp of stardom,” Dalton says. “His wave is about to crash across the world.”

Dalton, 42, followed up Boy Swallows Universe with another bestseller, All Our Shimmering Skies and he has another book, Love Stories, coming out in October.

But at the moment it’s all about Boy Swallows Universe coming to the stage and Dalton is thrilled and worried.

“I’m a little bit terrified,” Dalton says. “I mean it was fine when it was just me and my thoughts and my computer. Now it will be me and my thoughts in front of hundreds of people. The one person I’m most worried about is my mum. I called her and said ... mum, this sh-t’s gonna get real now so brace yourself. I just want people to know that I wrote the book to show the world that she is my hero,.”

Heroin addiction, crime bosses, the mean streets of Brisbane, Boggo Road, it’s all in Dalton’s story and soon it will be on the stage. But what if the play is better than the book?

Joe Klocek who plays Eli Bell with Trent Dalton. Picture: David Kelly

“That’s a high possibility,” Dalton laughs. “There are things they can do on stage that I could never convey in the book.”

After the play there’s Joel Egerton’s film of the novel which will starts shooting next year. Dalton showed Egerton around Boggo Road where tour operator and author Jack Sim says people are now asking to do a Boy Swallows Universe tour.

“Our Escapes Tour focuses on the men who got out of the jail,” Sim says. “Slim Halliday is the only man to escape maximum security twice.”

The prison is one of the state’s top tourist attractions nowadays. Dalton is happy to help make it even more popular.

“I love that people are celebrating the darker aspects of Brisbane’s history,” Dalton says. “They can come here and see Slim’s cell and realise that it’s all too real.”

Boy Swallows Universe, August 30 to October 3, Playhouse, QPAC; qpac.com.au,