Flinders Drama Centre Alumni

Index		STAFF
Julie Holledge		Julie worked as a professional actor and director in the British theatre for ten years before moving to Australia to lecture at the Flinders Drama Centre. She established a research centre for performance at Flinders, which has evolved into the *Australian Performance Laboratory* (APL). The current focus of the laboratory is intercultural performance and new technologies; two of its most notable productions were collaborations between Australian and Japanese artists: *Masterkey* (Adelaide Festival of Arts 1988 and Perth Festival 1988) and *Exile* (Sydney Spring Festival 2000 and the Shanghai Festival 2000). In addition to her activities as a professional director and university teacher, Julie Holledge has published extensively in the field of women’s performance. Major publications include her ground breaking study Innocent Flowers: Women in Edwardian Theatre (Virago) and her most recent work co-authored with Dr Joanne Tompkins *Women’s Intercultural Performance* (Routledge) which won the Rob Jordan Book Prize. She was the artistic director of the Third International Women's Playwrights Conference held in Adelaide in 1994, the convenor of the Art, Technology and New Performer Symposium, Shanghai 2002, and has convened the Australian delegations for the IWPC in Manila 2003, and Jakarta 2006.
Michael Morley		Educated at the Universities of Auckland, Zurich and Oxford (Christ Church), Michael Morley taught German at Auckland, before moving to Flinders University, Adelaide, where he has been Professor of Drama since 1984. He has published articles on Brecht's poetry and drama and on his collaborations with Kurt Weill and Hanns Eisler, as well as contributing translations and editorial material to the Methuen edition of Brecht's poems and plays. He has been President and Vice-President of the International Brecht Society, is a member of the advisory board of the Complete Kurt Weill Edition, and is the Australasian correspondent for the International Harms Eisler Gesellschaft. Over many years he has written theatre and music reviews and articles for a variety of publications including *Theatre Australia, The National Times, The Australian, The Australian Financial Review, Opera News* (New York), *The Kurt Weill Newsletter* and *The Adelaide Review. As a professional musician he has been musical director and pianist for performances of Happy End, The Mother, The Threepenny Opera, Happy Birthday Brecht* (Artaud Theatre, San Francisco), and was dramaturge and musical advisor for the double bill *The Decision* (Eisler/Brecht) and *The Second Hurricane* (Copland) for the 2000 Adelaide Festival of Arts. He has also worked on numerous cabaret shows, ranging from the music of Jacques Brel and Rodgers and Hart to *Sing Your Own Musicals* (Melbourne Festival 2004, Adelaide Cabaret Festival 2006 & 2007). With Robyn Archer he has collaborated on a number of cabaret performances since 1977, presented throughout Australia, as well as in Hong Kong, Bourges and Ljubljana.
Mary Moore		Mary is an established theatre designer whose career spans 30 years and 3 continents. Between 1968- 1981 her work was seen in many of the major English theatre companies, including The Royal Shakespeare Company, The Mermaid Theatre, The Royal Court; she was also part of the new wave of radical alternative companies such as Gay Sweatshop, Monstrous Regiment, and The Women’s Theatre Group. Between 1974-1980 she designed three productions for The Low Moan Spectacular in New York, San Francisco and L.A. In 1981, she came to Australia and continued a successful freelance career creating designs for all the major theatre, dance and opera companies. She has also been involved in many projects produced outside the mainstream industry and in recent years she has been experimenting with the interface between electronic moving images and live performance. She was awarded a Mid Career Fellowship from the South Australian Dept of Arts in Jan 2001 to develop a new work on the subject of Twins. Her design work has won awards in Europe, America, and Australia.
Richard Back		Richard began his career in theatre and film in the early eighties, studying cinematography at university and working for theatre companies all over Australia on the technical aspects of performance. Since 1994 he has specialised in the interface between electronic and live performance firstly working in a creative partnership with Lisa Philip-Harbutt in their company *d.pix images* and later through projects associated with the Flinders University Drama Centre. He has worked with choreographers Graham Murray, Jonathon Taylor and Leigh Warren and with theatre companies including Vitalstatistix, Patch and Adelaide & Melbourne Festival on projects that integrate moving images with live performance. Richard worked with Mary Moore on The Masterkey presented at the 1998 Adelaide and Perth Arts Festivals and on the 2000 production *Exile*, which was presented at the Sydney Spring and Shanghai International Arts Festivals. He continues to work as a cinematographer, mainly in short films, and is currently co-Vice President of the Australian Cinematographers Society, South Australian Branch.
Anne Thompson		Anne Thompson was a founding member of Dance Works; the company established in 1983 by Nanette Hassall to develop Australian contemporary dance choreographers. She worked for the company as a dancer, choreographer, teacher and community artist. During that time she co-founded the theoretical journal, *Writings On Dance, with Elizabeth Dempster and Jude Walton and taught contemporary dance in tertiary institutions in Victoria. She was thus involved in the importation of American post-modern dance ideas and techniques to Australia and in establishing a theoretical dialogue between feminist ideas, contemporary cultural theory, philosophical theories of the body and contemporary dance. She started part-time lecturing in movement for actors at the Victorian College of Arts Drama School in 1988 and became Head of Movement in 1990. She was nominated for a Green Room award for her Daughter Solo* in 1990. She also completed a Graduate Diploma in Movement and Dance and was part of a pilot dance therapy program in Melbourne. In 1994 she moved to Adelaide to complete a MA in Directing at Flinders University with Professor Julie Holledge. In the theoretical component of her Masters she focused on how theories of subjectivity which locate the body at the centre of the ‘self’ were being used in contemporary dance practice. In the practical component she studied directing text based theatre. She has also worked at Flinders as a Lecturer in Theories of Performance, supervisor of student productions, coordinator of the movement course and researcher. She works in the theatre industry as a dramaturg and director primarily in visual and physical theatre and with independent artists and small companies. She has worked with Garry Stewart, Artistic Director of ADT as a dramaturg on three projects. She has reviewed dance in Adelaide for Real Time. She has also been on the Artistic Advisory team for Vitalstatistix since Maude Davey became Artistic Director. In 2001 she co-founded the Eleventh Hour Theatre project in Melbourne with William Henderson, Fiona Todd and David Tredinnick. The company has focused on juxtaposing poetic and dramatic language in theatre performances and reframing classic texts. It has presented seven shows. In 2006 the company won two Green Room Awards (the Victorian Industry Awards) for their 2005 productions of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible and Shakespeare’s *King John* - Best Adaptation and Best Drama Production. In November 2005 she was awarded her Ph.D. which examines the project of Reconciliation from a white Australian perspective including how nationalism, the arts and the government’s political agenda too often intertwine to perpetuate a ‘white Australia’. In 2007 she was appointed a part-time Lecturer in directing and acting at Flinders University Drama Centre and Eleventh Hour won four Green Room Awards in the Independent Theatre category for their 2006 homage to Samuel Beckett – Best production, Best director, Best male actor (Peter Houghton) and Best design (Julie Renton).
Wojciech Pisarek		Wojciech Pisarek was born in Poland. He trained as an actor at The Leon Schiller State Film, Television and Theatre Academy in Lodz from 1967-1971, and as a director at The Ludwik Solski State Academy of Theatre Art in Cracow from 1974-1978. From 1971-1983 he worked in Poland as an actor and director, and received a number of awards from the Ministry of Culture. In 1984 he migrated to Australia and settled in South Australia. Initially he worked as a free-lance actor, but in 1984 he created a young people’s puppet company, Carouselle Theatre. In his capacity as the artistic director, he produced over twenty original productions in thirteen years. The most notably works Break Down, Waiting For …Beckett and Don Quixote were performed across Australia and were invited to international puppetry festivals in Europe. In 1998 Wojciech was awarded an Australia Council Fellowship which allowed him to experiment with new technologies and the creation of new forms of digital puppetry. He is currently teaching alternative performance at the Flinders Drama Centre, where he is conducting research into the real time performance of digital characters. He is the Deputy Chair of the Theatre Board and a member of ACMAC.
Catherine Fitzgerald		Catherine is a performer, writer and director and is currently a freelance artist. She has worked for most theatre companies in SA over the last twenty years. Recently she directed Frozen by Bryony Lavery for State Theatre Company SA. and wrote Boo!, a co-production with Windmill and Mainstreet Theatres and was produced last year at Carrick Hill and toured to Regional SA and Victoria. She has directed David Williamson’s *Third World Blues, Peta Murray’s Salt, David Auburn’s Proof* and David Mamet’s Boston Marriage for State Theatre Company of South Australia. She was Artistic Director of Vitalstatistix National Women’s Theatre from 1996-2002. Some of her directing credits for Vitalstatistix include *Svetlana in Slingbacks* by Valentina Levkowicz, Whispering Demons by Heather Nimmo, Spool Time by Alana Valentine, Titbits, Margie Fischer Live at the Lion, and *Bull Bar Tours* - co-written with Eva Johnson. She has been Artistic Director of Mainstreet Theatre and has worked as a freelance writer/director for Centre for Performing Arts, Port Youth Theatre, Living Voice Theatre and Murray River Performing Group. Catherine has worked as an actor for Troupe Theatre, Vitalstatistix, State Theatre of SA, Mainstreet, Junction Theatre and ABC Television. Catherine has written and produced her own one-woman show *Just a Little Crooked Around the Edge* and performed it nationwide. She also appeared in Rolf De Heers award winning film Dance Me to My Song.
Michaela Cantwell		Michaela has been actively involved in film, television and theatre. Some of her film and television credits include *Innocence, directed by Paul Cox, Driven* directed by Susan Miller and *McLeod's Daughters* as well as various television commercials and two series as the presenter for *Off the Vine. Her involvement with theatre, in particular Brink Productions of which she is a founding member, Board member and current ensemble member has been extensive. She has also worked other companies including Red Shed Playbox Theatre Company, Vitalstatistix and State Theatre Company of South Australia. Some of her major performances include The Ecstatic Bible, directed by Howard Barker and Tim Maddock, (Uncle) Vanya* also directed by Tim Maddock, Sweet Road directed by Aubrey Mellor, Third World Blues directed by Catherine Fitzgerald, *Killer Joe* directed by Hannah MacDougall, *4.48 Psychosis* directed by Geordie Brookman, Drums in the Night directed by Chris Drummond, *Translations* directed by David Mealor and *Noises Off* directed by Adam Cook. She has also been involved in play readings and developmental works such as, *The Rope Project* and *This Uncharted Hour* for Brink Productions, The National Playwrights Conference, “84” for 4 Bux progressive Art and a rehearsed reading, directed by Tony Ayres, of the screenplay Cut Snake, written by Blake Ayshford (Adelaide Int. Film Festival).
Alirio Zavarce		In 2000 Alirio worked with the Yaschin Ensemble in *Intimacy* and with Brink productions in Howard Barker’s Ecstatic Bible for the Adelaide Festival.. In 2001 Alirio performed the one man show Fronteras Americanas/American Borders for which Alirio won the Adelaide Critic Circle Emerging Artist Award and opened the International Festival of Monologues Migrating Souls in Singapore. In 2002 he performed in *Medea Material* as well as in Tangent production’s Edward II. In 2003, Alirio toured Fronteras Americanas as part of Kultour 03. (Adelaide, Melbourne, Perth). As a member of the Border Project, Alirio performed *Please Go Hop!* in the Adelaide Fringe and Next Wave Festival, played the role of Vince in the Feature film Life Story and performed the role of Talthybius in State Theatre’s *Trojan Women*. As a director Alirio has worked with the Nexus Multicultural Art Centre, Urban Myth, No Strings Attached, D’ faces of Youth Arts and the Flinders University of South Australia.
Michael Fuller		Michael arrived from the U.K. in 1972 and has worked at N.I.D.A. as a movement/dance teacher and also as a choreographer for The Sydney Theatre Company, A.T.Y.P. and as an actor/choreographer for The Sydney Theatre of The Deaf. In 1977 he moved to Adelaide where he worked as movement/dance lecturer at Flinders University's Drama Centre and as an actor/choreographer for The State Theatre Company and Troupe Theatre. He has also choreographed for State Opera, S.A. Film Corp, Patch Theatre, Doppio Teatro and Vitalstatistix to mention a few. Michael now works as a freelance choreographer, movement teacher and director and recently directed and choreographed Tomfoolery at La Boheme for the 2008 Adelaide Fringe Festival.
Robert Marchand (Postgraduate project in 2007)		Robert Marchand is a director and writer. He has specialised in television mini-series with an emphasis on performance and character. His credits include Fields Of Fire, Come In Spinner, Sun On The Stubble and *The Potato Factory* as well as the on-going TV drama *All Saints. Robert is a graduate of AFTRS - where he investigated the Mike Leigh improvisation method, working with actors over a three month period. He subsequently attended workshops conducted by Mike Leigh and has frequently used the process in his own work. Robert also runs a five day intensive workshop Investigating Performance* which explores in-depth character-based improvisations for actors and directors. His master-classes have now been featured at SPAA Fringe (Screen Producers Association of Australia); at the Australian Screen Director’s Conference and most recently at the AFC’s IndiVisions initiative. He is the advisor on several films using character-based improvisation techniques in development or in production.
Sam Haren (Postgraduate project in 2007)		Sam works primarily as a director, often designing and creating video for his own work. Sam is a founding member of The Border Project and has directed/co-directed all of the company’s work and his directing credits with them include Highway Rock ‘n’ Roll Disaster (Adelaide Fringe 2006), Please Go Hop! with Ingrid Voorendt (Adelaide Fringe 2004 and Next Wave Festival), *The War* (Gorge ’03 at the AFCT), *Despoiled Shore Medeamaterial Landscape with Argonauts, and the creative development of Disappearance. Sam has also founded the Remote Telemetry Dialogues, an ongoing creative conversation with director Steve Mayhew, and created and manipulated Super Dimension Fortress One* (Feast Festival 2004). In 2001, Sam directed Fronteras Americanas (American Borders), which toured to Singapore later that year, and was part of Kultour 2003 around Australia. Sam was awarded the Dame Ruby Litchfield Scholarship for 2002 and undertook a three-month internship with The Wooster Group in New York, working on their production of *To You, The Birdie!* and observed Forced Entertainment’s research and development of The Travels in the UK. He has also worked with Leigh Warren and Dancers and the Australian Dance Theatre as a dramaturg and researcher. He has worked as an Assistant Director to Simon Phillips on The Tempest (Melbourne Theatre Company), to Rosalba Clemente on *Holy Day* (State Theatre Company of SA/Playbox) and to Mary Moore for *The Memory Museum* (Centenary of Federation).
Tim Maddock		Tim has worked in the theatre for almost 20 years as a Director, Designer, Actor and Educator. He was a founding member of Adelaide's Red Shed and eventually became Artistic Director. For the Shed he worked on a number of world premieres for the Adelaide Festival including *The Architect's Walk* by Daniel Keene. Tim was part of a group that successfully established the South Australian theatre company *Brink Productions. He went on to direct numerous productions including (Uncle) Vanya* by Howard Barker at Belvoir St. In 2000 Tim co-directed with UK playwright Barker the epic 8½ hour production The Ecstatic Bible, involving the UK's The Wrestling School and Brink Productions. This was a major feature of Robyn Archer's 2000 Adelaide Festival and a triumphant artistic success. Over many years Tim has produced works for the Drama Centre including *Cultureshock* - an intercultural collaboration between Australian and Okinawan students performed both in Japan and Australia. At the Drama Centre Tim has also supervised on over 20 productions. Recently he directed *Cosi* for a graduating production at NIDA and in August he will direct a new work conceived by independent film-maker and composer Andree Greenwell for The Studio at the Sydney Opera House.
Sally Nimon		Dr Sally Nimon has worked in the Higher Education sector since 1998, in both academic and professional roles. After undertaking degrees in Arts and Physiotherapy she completed a PhD in 2002 whilst lecturing in voice at The Flinders University of South Australia. She is currently employed as the Business Analyst in Market Research at the University of South Australia.
Joh Hartog		Joh first moved to Australia in 1965 and worked as a director with Q theatre in Sydney in 1969. He then returned to Holland where he worked with several companies until 1974 when he took up work with the Music Hall in Neutral Bay, NSW. He continued to work on and off in theatre in NSW until coming to South Australia where he completed a Bachelor of Arts at Flinders University in 1992. The work he did for his PhD thesis, a cultural audit on events at the Festival Centre, translated into a national project, which eventually became AusStage. He is a senior lecturer at Flinders University, where he has directed numerous productions including *The Housekeeper, Massacre Games, Attempts on her Life, Mad Forest* and *Three Sisters. Productions outside the University include Dark Matter – A Diapasonic Trek* (original work), *And I’ll Give You All The Diamonds In My Teeth* and *The Bald Primadonna*. His most recent endeavour has been to help set up Short Theatre, which is designed as a coming together of local talent to review, discuss and present 10 minute works.
Matthew Carey		A graduate of the Elder Conservatorium, Matthew Carey has performed extensively around Australia and overseas. His passion for music theatre and cabaret has seen him work on a number of National and Local theatre productions and present cabaret shows in Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide. His musical theatre experience includes musical direction of local productions of *Chicago, Victor Victoria, Closer Than Ever, Company* and Hair, keyboard playing with *The Phantom of the Opera* orchestra, and repetiteur work with the State Theatre Company and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. His latest accomplishments include musical direction for Flying Penguin's production of *Assassins* at the Space Theatre and a Helpmann Nomination for best Musical Director for Matthew Robinson's Metro Street which also toured to Korea. Matthew teaches singing classes at Flinders Drama Centre.
Scott Castledine		Since 1997 Scott (better known to most as Scooter) has been a casual technician in the Drama Centre. He provides casual labour to support many of the student productions and also looks after the external hirers of the Matthew Flinders Theatre. Outside of the Drama Centre, Scott also works with Screen Production at Flinders University, and more broadly in the field of professional audio and lighting services. He also holds a sales position at Adelaide based firm Australian Audio & Lighting Technology. Scott also has a love of live music and has crewed for many international touring artists as they have passed through Adelaide, with some of the notables including John Farnham, Pink, Metallica, Killing Heidi, Jimmy Barnes and Nickelback.
Roz Hervey		Roz is a dance graduate of the Centre for Performing Arts. Over the last seventeen years she has worked for numerous dance and dance theatre companies including; One Extra Company, Sydney Front, Dance North, Theatre of Image, Sue Healey, Meryl Tankard Co, DV8, and Force Majeure. With these companies she has toured extensively throughout Australia, Europe and South East Asia. In the last five years she has also worked as an event co-ordinator on Adelaide Festival 2000 late night club and Opening Night Concert, Comeout 2001 Opening and Parade. She was Artistic Director for SA day 1999, 2003 Bundaleer Weekend - Sunday Walks and co director on the Comeout 05 Opening. In 2002 she won the Ausdance ‘Outstanding performance by a female dancer’ award for her performance in Force Majeures *Same but Different*. She continues her role as Associate Director with Force Majeure.
Tait Muller		Tait has worked in the television industry for 17 years, and in that time has written, directed and produced a variety of television programs. Recent credits include the Out of the Ordinary series for NWS9, SavvyTV for the TEN Network, plus a collection of vignettes for the ABC. Tait graduated from the Flinders University Drama Centre in 2003, with First-Class honours, and was awarded the inaugural Adelaide Bank Helpmann Academy Award. Since graduating, Tait has developed a number of projects for television and corporate interests, he has completed his fifth short film Fluffy Dice, and is currently collaborating with a writer on a feature length script.
Jenny Fewster		After leaving school, Jenny studied Business Marketing at the University of South Australia. Deciding that a career in Marketing was not for her, she spent the next few years working at the University of Adelaide Waite Campus where she developed a good grounding in IT. She worked briefly as a Stage Manager before gaining the position of Research Assistant at the Performing Arts Collection of South Australia at the Festival Centre. Here she worked with Flinders PhD student Joh Hartog on developing a database catalogue system for the Collection which at that time was still being card catalogued. Jenny left the Performing Arts Collection after the birth of her first daughter and worked on a Dance database for Dance Historian Meg Abbie Denton. In 2000 Jenny became the Assistant Project Manager of the AusStage: Gateway to the Australian Performing Arts Project. In 2003 she was appointed to the position of Project Manager. Jenny is also responsible for Arts Administration for both APL and Drama Centre.
Andrew Bailey		After graduating from the Centre for Performing Arts in 1994, Andrew spent the next two years working as a freelance theatre technician. He worked at the Red Square for the Adelaide Festival of Arts and ran The Little Theatre for the University of Adelaide. In 1996 Andrew became the Technical Coordinator of the Matthew Flinders Theatre and Flinders University Drama Centre. He was involved in the design of the new Drama Centre building which was opened in 2000. Some of his achievements since joining the Drama Centre staff include touring to South Korea with *Koala Lou, Lighting Design for Exile* (Sydney Spring Festival 2000, Shanghai Festival 2000 and Adelaide 2004) and Production Management for the Art, Technology and New Performer Symposium, Shanghai 2002.
Naida Chinner		Naida is a performer, teacher and choreographer. She has created and performed work independently, and for Australian Dance Theatre's Ignition. Naida directed 'a tiny piece of hope' for the 2002 Adelaide Fringe Festival and performed a trilogy of solo works at the Bakehouse Theatre in July. Naida teaches technique for Australian Dance Theatre and the Flinders Drama Centre.
Other Teachers		George Anderson, Lorraine Archibald, Bill Bamford, Gill Brealey, Judith Casley-Smith, Wal Cherry (d), Murray Copland, Peter Deane, Malcolm Fox, Helen Herbertson, Andy Hollitt, Mosher Kadem, Paul Lawrence-Jennings, Aiden Munn, Noel Purdon, Sue Ridgeway, Dale Ringland, Tim Robertson, Phyllis Jane Rose, Henry Salter (d), Helen Tiller, Triton Tunis-Mitchell, Velalien, Gus Worby, Zora Zemberova Revised: