Picnic at Hanging Rock (2018) Program

PICNIC AT H A N G I NG ROCK 6 – 14 FEB

6 – 14 FEB MERLYN THEATRE

AN EXPERIENCE DESIGNED TO BEGUILE – HERALD SCOTLAND

BY / Joan Lindsay

LIGHTING DESIGN / Paul Jackson

ADAPTED FOR THE STAGE BY / Tom Wright

COMPOSITION / Ash Gibson Greig

DIRECTION / Matthew Lutton

STAGE MANAGER / Tia Clark ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER / Lyndie Li Wan Po

SET & COSTUME DESIGN / Zoë Atkinson

A Malthouse Theatre and Black Swan State Theatre Company production.

This project is supported by the Victorian Government through Creative Victoria.

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SOUND DESIGN / J. David Franzke

CAST / Harriet Gordon-Anderson Arielle Gray Amber McMahon Elizabeth Nabben Nikki Shiels

MALTHOUSE THEATRE INVITES YOU INTO THE AUSTRALIAN MYTH OF HANGING SEASON 2018

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MATTHEW LUTTON THE RETELLING OF AN ENDURING AUSTRALIAN MYTH This production of Joan Lindsay’s novel is told by five schoolgirls. They know the myth as if they were there in 1900, as if they are schoolgirls trapped in the wrong time. They have access to the mystery, and will play for us the moments we might be able to understand.

locks, whom he saw only for a moment, hanging in the air, leaping across a creek.

The central character of Picnic at Hanging Rock however is nature.

It releases and disturbs all the characters. There is no literal representation of the Rock in this production; it is a presence, frequently evoked by language. But sometimes we see nature thinking in the sign over the stage, or glimpse a physical manifestation hanging in the shadows, or sense its infiltrating presence in the darkness.

The production begins with a recitation of the fateful day in 1900 when Miranda, Irma, Marion and Miss McCraw disappeared. They speak about the malleability of time, of crossing creeks and sleep, and of colonialism, of the white Australian ignorance of what surrounds them, the land we are foreigners in, the land we fail to listen to, the land we have tried to tame with ‘Englishness’ and ‘naming’.

Malthouse Theatre invites you into the Australian myth of Hanging Rock, one that has been in our national imaginations for decades, and one that will undoubtedly be retold for many decades to come.

The disappearance of the girls is a horror beyond comprehension for the community at Appleyard College.

It is a trauma that all respond to. The girl from the orphanage, Sara, her body contorts from the horror of being left behind. The Headmistress, Mrs Appleyard, insists on more vigilant teachings of restraint to help Australia ‘mature’. The young English visitor, Michael, sheds his ‘Englishness’ because of an obsession with Miranda, a girl with golden

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A NOTE FROM THE DIRECTOR

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F PICNIC ASN’T RITTEN, E WOULD AVE HAD TO SEASON 2018

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TOM WRIGHT SERIES OF MEDITATIONS St Valentine’s Day, 2016. A day of portals, of opening the heart to love, of new affairs, of secret ones, of opening delicate lace cards like doors, to find enigmatic poems written within.

A country of lost children.

Waifs weeping in McCubbins.

Children moving silently through bush that never changes until they vanish utterly. From the beginning the white experience of the land was one of trepidation; it seemed nature would take our innocents ... if we didn’t watch them. Maybe there was suspicion in the ether that this land needed to be watched too, that it changed, did odd things when unobserved. This lonely continent, which would alter itself when your back was turned …

A pair of university students, far from Osaka, are meandering up Hanging Rock. For some reason, ludicrous parasols are daintily propped on their shoulders. One stops, pouts, mock-coquette; the other takes out her phone and starts filming. The girl further up the Rock turns to profile, stares into a very dark shadow, and trills ‘Miranda! … Miranda!’

She vanishes into the cool dark.

The girl with the camera giggles self-consciously.

—— But this land isn’t empty, and never was. It wasn’t unknown to human minds, in fact minds had concentrated so hard on it for so long that a complex web of myths, rites, songs, wisdoms had been spun, so dense the crossover space between human body and land became blurred, unfocussed, itself a song …

‘Miranda’ she softly repeats as she checks the screen.

—— Why do some tales mutate into myths?

Since it came to light in 1967 Picnic at Hanging Rock has hung in the collective mind. Mention it casually and people frown, ‘They went missing didn’t they?’

—— In this case, not lost children but lost adolescents, in the liminal space between girlhood and womanhood.

The country that will not grow up, cannot grow up, trapped in a landscape which it cannot comprehend.

Europeans crawling over it like ants.

The news that the whole story is an invention is greeted with perplexed surprise. ‘No, no, I was sure it really happened …’

If Picnic wasn’t written we would have had to invent it.

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NVENT IT.

A NOTE FROM THE WRITER

SEASON 2018

Taxonomy, endless taxonomy. Every species, every stone, every dot on the map, labelled. New words for new things. But in the end only the things that could be seen could be named.

There was no name for the things that could not be seen. And there was no time against which things might be measured. No temporal landmarks, no key dates of history; what is a hundred, a thousand, a million years when there’s no history?

Oh, wonder! How many goodly creatures are there here!

Exclaims Miranda, but a different Miranda, in a different story of exile and dreams. A story of the sea of love, where Mrs Appleyard dreams of her late husband’s caresses, where Michael FitzHubert dreams of mermaids and gentle laughing female voices.

Miranda, whose name means wonder.

Miranda, who has been kept from herself, who is secreted away in a cave, deep in a rock.

In England everything had been done before: quite often by one’s own ancestors, over and over again. #PICNICATHANGINGROCK

Miranda, the beauty that does not know her beauty for lack of any culture with which to compare herself.

But here? What did ‘Time’ mean when yesterday and tomorrow seemed to collude against the present?

Miranda, the European who knows nothing of Europe.

Irma climbs the Rock, wading through a morass of verdure in the heat:

Miranda, enchantress. Miranda, the naïf.

Oh, what a wonderful new world, that has such people in it!

Whoever invented female fashions For nineteen hundred Should be made to walk through bracken In three layers of petticoats.

—— In Picnic at Hanging Rock, Miranda has transmuted again. Now she is a cipher.

She isn’t of nineteen hundred, she is of now. She is watching herself. In the Rock’s terms, 1900 and now are the same. It dreams in millions not split fractions. It is hanging—in time, in space. (Maybe it is also the Hanging Rock, a place of killing, of removal from the world? After all, why is that coachman staring at the girls’ calves, gently wetting his lips? Nature is cruel, very cruel … )

The girls yearn for her return when she will redeem their suffering. Sara the orphan carries a devotional icon in her underwear. When the girls in their gym class transmogrify into maenads, one girl prays to Saint Valentine: Let them leave Irma alone, for Miranda’s sake, for Miranda’s sake …

Miranda starts to fade from real life, become myth; her hair more golden with every memory, her smile more beatific.

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SEASON 2018

Miranda the spirit guide, who jumps down from the cart and opens the gate into the Hanging Rock picnic area, ushering them all in, like a pied piper.

initiation, so making it female space.

Young people that came here for thousands of years went up children and came down adults. It has always been a zone of metamorphosis. Sexual, physical, social, and more …

Or, Miranda as Australia. The emotional intuitive. Not necessarily anti-intellectual but definitely not intellectual. Pulchritudinous, in an Australian idiom; like the land, beautiful, but impassive. Difficult to read, destined to be endlessly discussed.

When Major Mitchell first started the drawing of white lines on the black map, he passed through these volcanic ghosts. It was 1836. He climbed Geburhh, and glimpsed Port Phillip.

In a cerebral game of fevered wordassociation he renamed the mountain Macedon, after another Phillip’s homeland. And radiating out, a pattern of classicism darkened and spread; Mount Alexander for Alexander the Great, Phillip’s son; a river Campaspe for Alexander’s concubine. And our little mamelon of trachyte, brooding on the plain? Some years later Robert Hoddle scribbled Mount Diogenes on his map, in keeping with the Major’s fancy, named for the philosopher of cynicism, conscience of Alexander’s age. It was said that when the Great Man came across the cynic, the philosopher was staring attentively at a skeleton. The emperor stood above, the thinker squatted below. ‘And what are you doing?’ Alexander asked finally.

‘I am searching for the bones of your father. But the trouble is, I cannot tell them apart from the bones of a slave.’

Or, Miranda as a conduit. A lightning conductor. She magnetises air, things are drawn to her, animal, vegetable, mineral. Maybe she precipitates time, and events as well …

—— Names for things that have not been named, no names for things that were once named. The Kulin name for Hanging Rock is lost. The Kulin wisdom of the Rock has no role in Lindsay’s text. In fact the only indigenous figure is a tracker, brought in to find the girls, then dismissed with all the other failed search methods. But under the text, secreted between the words, there are presences. The thick bush on the Rock is described as having no tracks; Or if there have been tracks, they are long since obliterated.

As if Miranda, Marion, Irma, are remaking some lost path, finding some lost sequence of events that unlock a key, a song, a rite.

This is, of course, only a story.

But history treats it as if it happened.

We have a habit of doing this…

The Kulin treated the Rock with reverence. It was a site for male

——

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SEASON 2018

What is this Rock? A portal to other worlds, if only you have the password, the key, the combination? Maybe the characters who do pass through have some capacity to glimpse the noumenal: Miss McCraw, who sees the world through calculus as a study of Change; Marion, who can grasp the abstract idea of Time; Miranda, who feels, and loves.

sheet. Time changed shape and mood depending on circumstances and, of course, place.

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Her novel is one of these places; time is elastic, or compressed. No-one is sure how long they are on the Rock; what feels like a sweep of seasons in Woodend is only moments up high.

The Rock’s warping and vibrating of time increases as you near it until it resonates like a million cicadas. Like the zone in the Strugatsky Brothers’ Roadside Picnic (1971). Perhaps this is another way of understanding our weird fable; in this novel the picnic is an analogy. It is suggested that there are certain places where something not of this universe has visited. The best way to understand these visitations is to imagine a picnic. Perhaps a group of girls have arrived, eaten, gossiped, sung, snoozed, then packed up and left. But behind them, the residue; crumbs, hairpins, a pair of spectacles, a book of equations, a teaspoon, a silk stocking. Once the girls leave, timid creatures come from their burrows.

They investigate, crawl over the objects left behind but can never comprehend their purpose.

Joan Lindsay possessed the remarkable ability to stop time.

Or, more precisely, she claimed her presence caused watches to halt. For her time was not linear but like an oddly-hued cloud which hung all around her. She didn’t have a physicist’s understanding, it was an artist’s sense; felt, not calculated with a pencil on a white

The little animals are Western rational humans who stray into the picnic’s residue, finding that the world has changed incomprehensibly. Maybe the other entities have never noticed humans, any more than humans notice lizards and ants and spiders during their picnics. We are small animals, caterpillars, centipedes, moths. And we will never understand.

Those rejected: Edith, a materialist who lacks the imagination to inhabit a bigger world; Michael, who is unreconciled to the land and himself; Irma, who is worldly, not other-worldly. #PICNICATHANGINGROCK

—— What is this Rock? A site of transformation, a magic box in which objects can be made to disappear, or turn into something else? An antipodean monster park of Bomarzo, a sort of anti-Eden, where Nature is littered with grotesqueries and grottoes, caverns where the living may speak to spirits, and sometimes, if the mood is right, the spirits may whisper back?

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SEASON 2018

—— St Valentine’s Day, 1900.

A liminal year, between one century and another, between a Victorian era of colonisation and the era of nationhood, of wrestling with whom we really are. Are we in that time still? Or are we now in some new liminal time?

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The two students from Osaka are coming back down the mountain. Their faces give nothing away. Have they found what they came for, up there, up on the rock ledge? What was this strange pilgrimage they were on?

What exactly did they think they might find up there, among rocks dripping slowly back into the earth? They sit on a fallen tree; one of them has worn completely inappropriate shoes.

I understand nothing of what they say; it is melodious and beautiful. Girlish, songlike. But one word is clear; ‘Miranda … Miranda … Miranda …

Miranda … ’

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WHAT IS THIS ROCK? A SITE OF TRANSFORMATION, A MAGIC BOX IN WHICH OBJECTS CAN BE MADE TO DISAPPEAR, OR TURN INTO SOMETHING ELSE?

CAST & CREATIVE BIOS

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Joan Lindsay AUTHOR

Tom Wright WRITER

Matthew Lutton DIRECTOR

Joan Lindsay was born Joan à Beckett Weigall in Melbourne in 1896. She attended Clyde Girls Grammar School, the model for Appleyard College in Picnic at Hanging Rock, then studied painting at the National Gallery of Victoria Art School. On Valentine’s Day 1922 she married Daryl Lindsay in London.

She chose Valentine’s Day 1900 as the setting for Picnic at Hanging Rock, her best-known work.

First published in 1967, it is the basis for the 1975 film of the same name by Peter Weir. She died in Melbourne in 1984.

Tom has written a number of award-winning plays and adaptations, including The Real and Imagined History of the Elephant Man, Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Caucasian Chalk Circle, The War of the Roses, The Lost Echo, Lorilei, Medea, Babes in the Wood, Baal, Optimism, On the Misconception of Oedipus, The Histrionic, and Black Diggers.

He was Associate Director of Sydney Theatre Company from 2004 to 2012. He is currently Artistic Associate at Belvoir (Sydney) and has worked as an actor and director at Playbox (now Malthouse Theatre), MTC, State Theatre Company SA, La Mama, Company B (now Belvoir), Anthill, Gilgul, Mene Mene, Bell Shakespeare, Chunky Move, Black Swan, and Chamber Made Opera.

Matthew Lutton is Malthouse Theatre’s Artistic Director and Co-CEO. Prior to this, he was Malthouse Theatre’s Associate Director, and the Artistic Director of ThinIce in Perth. For Malthouse Theatre, he has directed Black Rider: The Casting of the Magic Bullets, The Real and Imagined History of the Elephant Man, Away, Edward II, Picnic at Hanging Rock, I Am a Miracle, Night on Bald Mountain, The Bloody Chamber, Dance of Death, Pompeii, L.A., On the Misconception of Oedipus, Die Winterreise and Tartuffe.

For STC he has directed The Trial, The Mysteries: Genesis, and The Duel. Other directing credits include Love Me Tender for Belvoir and Don’t Say the Words for Griffin Theatre Company. His opera directing credits include Make No Noise for the Bavarian State Opera, Strauss’s Elektra for Opera Australia and West Australian Opera, and Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman for New Zealand Opera.

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Harriet Gordon-Anderson CAST

Arielle Gray CAST

Amber McMahon CAST

Picnic at Hanging Rock is Harriet’s Malthouse Theatre debut. Her other theatre credits include Kindertransport (Darlinghurst Theatre Co), Leaves (Kings Cross Theatre), Moving On Inc. (Perth Fringe), Never Hurt Anyone (Griffin), The Merchant of Venice (Genesian Theatre), The Staffroom (Sydney Fringe). Her West Australian Academy of Performing Arts [WAAPA] credits include Tender Napalm, All My Sons, Pride and Prejudice, Measure for Measure, Macbeth, and Punk Rock. Her screen credits include The Greenhouse; Love Child; The Secret Daughter; Little Girl Lost; Your Mob, Our Mob; Swiss Avalanche; and Splendours of a Mind. Harriet is a Green Room Award and Performing Arts WA Award nominee, and won the 2015 WAAPA Leslie Anderson Award for Excellence in Acting.

Arielle Gray is a performer, theatre-maker, puppeteer, improviser and co-founder of The Last Great Hunt. Arielle co-created and performed in Helpmann Award nominated It’s Dark Outside (ArtsHub Critics’ Choice Award winner), Falling Through Clouds (Sydney Festival) and Helpmann Award nominated New Owner. In 2017 she also co-wrote and performed in The Advisors.

Other recent shows include Monroe & Associates (Sydney Festival), My Robot (Barking Gecko Theatre Co.), Laika: A Staged Radio Play (Blue Room Theatre Award Winner) and many more.

Amber trained at Flinders Uni Drama Centre and won the Adele Koh Scholarship to study at the Stella Adler Company & SITI Company in NYC. Her theatre credits include Picnic at Hanging Rock, Optimism (Malthouse Theatre), North by Northwest (MTC/Kay & McLean), Atlantis, Twelfth Night, Angels in America, The Power of Yes (Belvoir), Windmill Theatre Co’s Girl Asleep, and School Dance. Amber was also a founding member of STC’s Actors Ensemble, appearing in productions including The War of the Roses, Season at Sarsaparilla, and The Lost Echo.

Amber’s screen credits include the film of Girl Asleep, and a host of short films. Amber has two Helpmann Awards for Best Supporting Actress for her work in School Dance and Girl Asleep.

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CAST & CREATIVE BIOS

CAST & CREATIVE BIOS

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Elizabeth Nabben CAST

Nikki Shiels CAST

Elizabeth is a 2010 graduate of the VCA. Her theatre credits include Antigone, ‘Tis a Pity She’s a Whore and Picnic at Hanging Rock (Malthouse Theatre), In Real Life (Darlinghurst Theatre), The Rover (Belvoir), Othello (Bell Shakespeare), Dance Better at Parties (STC; nominated for Sydney Theatre Award for Best Newcomer), The Crucible (MTC), as well as Triangle and The Trouble with Harry for MKA, and the national tour of Agatha Christie’s A Murder is Announced. Elizabeth has been nominated for Green Room Awards for Female Performer in TheatreWorks’ THERESE RAQUIN, and for Best Ensemble as part of Malthouse Theatre/Black Swan’s Picnic at Hanging Rock. Elizabeth’s screen credits include Childhood’s End, Winners and Losers, Neighbours, The Doctor Blake Mysteries, Restoration and the US feature film Truth.

A graduate of the VCA, Nikki’s Malthouse Theatre credits include Night on Bald Mountain, The Dragon, and Elizabeth: Almost by Chance a Woman. Her other theatre credits include The Cherry Orchard, True Minds, Top Girls, and Don Parties On for MTC; The Unspoken Word is ‘Joe’ (Griffin/MKA/La Mama); The Dream (Bell Shakespeare); M + M (Melbourne Festival); and The Dollhouse and Peer Gynt for Daniel Schlusser Ensemble, of which she is a core member.

Her screen credits include Neighbours, Perfect Pair, Childhood’s End, The Greatest Love of All, and Little Acorns.

She was a recipient of the 2015 Marten Bequest Travelling Scholarship, and is a two-time Green Room Award nominee.

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Zoë Atkinson SET & COSTUME DESIGNER Zoë studied design for performance at The Prague Academy of The Performing Arts, The International Institute of Figurative Theatre (Czech Republic), and the Institute International de la Marionette, France. For Malthouse Theatre she has designed costumes for The Odyssey (2006 Helpmann Award Best Costume Design), set and costumes for On The Misconception of Oedipus, Picnic at Hanging Rock (Black Swan, 2017 Edinburgh Festival), Black Rider: The Casting of the Magic Bullets (Malthouse Theatre and Victorian Opera). Other work with Matthew Lutton includes the operas Elektra and The Flying Dutchman. Zoe has been Artistic Associate and Designer for both the 2016 and 2017 opening events for Perth Festival, and in 2018 is the Designer for The Museum of Water and the Set and Costume Designer for Ghost in My Suitcase (Barking Gecko Theatre), and Set Designer for Xenides: the Musical (Black Swan).

Paul Jackson LIGHTING DESIGNER

J. David Franzke SOUND DESIGNER

Ash Gibson Greig COMPOSER

Paul is a multi-award winning designer who has worked with Australia’s leading arts organisations. Credits include: The Testament of Mary, The Real and Imagined History of the Elephant Man, Black Rider, Away, I am a Miracle, Blaque Showgirls, Picnic at Hanging Rock, Meow Meow’s Little Mermaid, Edward II, Night on Bald Mountain, Antigone, Timeshare, Hello, Goodbye and Happy Birthday, Little Match Girl, Die Winterreise, The Threepenny Opera, Vamp, The Tell-Tale Heart, Sleeping Beauty (also co-creator), The Odyssey (Malthouse Theatre). Love and Information, The Histrionic, The Trial (STC/ Malthouse Theatre), True West, The Mysteries: Genesis (STC).

Merchant of Venice, Othello, As You Like It, Phedre, Tartuffe, Julius Caesar (Bell Shakespeare).

Seventeen, Nora, Oedipus Rex, Happy Days, It Just Stopped (Belvoir). Three Little Words, Hay Fever, Di, Viv and Rose, Private Lives, Miss Julie, Endgame, Ghosts, The Crucible (MTC). Awards: Helpmann Award (2012), five Green Room Awards, a Sydney Theatre Award and two APDG awards. He is a Churchill Fellow and an Australia Council Fellow.

Paul has lectured in design and associated studies at the University of Melbourne, RMIT and VCA.

Malthouse Theatre credits include: Away, Picnic at Hanging Rock, Night on Bald Mountain, Pompeii, L.A., The Odyssey. STC: Australia Day (with MTC), The Wonderful World of Dissocia, Venus & Adonis (with Bell Shakespeare/ Malthouse Theatre). Ranters Theatre: Come Away with Me to the End of the World, Song, Intimacy, Holiday. MTC: The Odd Couple, The Beast, The Joy of Text, The Grenade, August: Osage County, Don Juan in Soho, Birthrights, The Recruit.

Balletlab: Aviary.

Film: X, Acolytes. Awards: 2017 Green Room Award for Composition & Sound Design (Picnic at Hanging Rock), 2012 Green Room Award for Composition & Sound Design (Pompeii, L.A.), 2000 Green Room Award for Outstanding Contribution to Design & Technology (Skin Flick).

Ash has composed the music for over 70 plays, over 130 hours of TV, and in many other mediums. Ash previously worked with Matthew Lutton at Malthouse Theatre on The Trial. Recent theatre work includes Switzerland with Black Swan, and Once In Royal David’s City with Queensland Theatre; recent screen work includes the award-winning feature documentaries Whiteley, and Blue. Ash also composed the music to the Perth International Arts Festival’s 2017 opening show Boorna Waangini: The Trees Speak, and the PC/Console game Battlestar Galactica: Deadlock. Ash has won two AACTA Awards (three further nominations), two APRA/ Australian Guild of Screen Composer Awards (nine further nominations), and a Green Room Award.

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CAST & CREATIVE BIOS

Tia Clark STAGE MANAGER

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A WAAPA graduate, Tia has worked as a stage manager across the entertainment industry. Malthouse Theatre credits include: The Testament of Mary, The Real and Imagined History of the Elephant Man, Revolt. She said. Revolt again., Edward II, Picnic at Hanging Rock (with Black Swan), I Am a Miracle, Timeshare, Hello, Goodbye and Happy Birthday, Walking into the Bigness, Ugly Mugs (with Griffin), The Government Inspector (with Belvoir), The Bloody Chamber, Dance of Death, Hate, A Golem Story and Baal (with STC). Tia has also worked on Anti—Gravity (Chunky Move), Grease, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (GFO), Every Breath (Belvoir), The Rake’s Progress (Victorian Opera), Scooby Doo Live (Entertainment Store Group), The King and I, The Boy from Oz, Sugar (Some Like It Hot), Anything Goes, Kismet, Grey Gardens (The Production Company) and various live events in Melbourne and around Australia.

Lyndie Li Wan Po ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER Lyndie graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts in 2013. Selected Malthouse Theatre shows include Picnic at Hanging Rock, Timeshare, I Am a Miracle and The Good Person of Szechuan. Recent shows for The Production Company include Funny Girl, Curtains, Dusty, Hello Dolly and Jesus Christ Superstar. Lyndie has worked internationally in theatre and live events and regularly stage manages for Windmill Theatre (Grug, Grug and the Rainbow) and Polyglot Theatre (Separation Street, Cerita Anak).

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SEASON 2018

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ABOUT MALTHOUSE THEATRE

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STAND TOGETHER WITH MALTHOUSE THEATRE. At Malthouse Theatre we collaborate with local and international artists to create inventive performances that cut to the core of the human experience.

Theatre has the power to interrogate, disrupt and to be an agent of change—and we think it always should.

At Malthouse Theatre the work we produce explores the world personally, socially and politically.

Based in a dedicated venue, The Coopers Malthouse in Melbourne, we are a home for live experiences that entertain and provoke a dialogue with and within audiences.

Welcome to Malthouse Theatre.

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OUR PARTNERS

GOVERNMENT

VENUE

EDUCATION

MAJOR

ACCOMMODATION

MEDIA

CORPORATE

INDUSTRY

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TRUSTS AND FOUNDATIONS

OUR SUPPORTERS

CALLIOPE—MUSE OF POETRY—$50,000+ Mary-Ruth & Peter McLennan, Craig Reeves, Maureen Wheeler AO & Tony Wheeler AO URANIA—MUSE OF THE STARS—$25,000+ Annamila Fund, Carrillo Gantner AO CLIO—MUSE OF HISTORY—$10,000+ Roseanne Amarant, Debbie Dadon AM, Jennifer Darbyshire & David Walker, Colin Golvan QC, Michele Levine, James Penlidis & Fiona McGauchie, Janine Tai, The Vera Moore Foundation, Anonymous (1) THALIA—MUSE OF COMEDY—$5,000+ John & Lorraine Bates, Gjergja Family, Sue Kirkham, The Pratt Foundation, Richard Leonard & Gerlinde Scholz, Mary Vallentine AO, Anonymous (1) MELPOMENE—MUSE OF TRAGEDY—$2,500+ David Bardas, Rosemary Forbes & Ian Hocking, Sue Prestney, Elisabeth & John Schiller, Dr Jenny Schwarz, Fiona Sweet & Paul Newcombe, Leonard Vary & Dr Matt Collins QC, Jon Webster, Jan Williams, Anonymous (1)

EUTERPE—MUSE OF MUSIC—$1,000+ Marc Besen AC & Eva Besen AO, John & Sally Bourne, Sally Browne, Beth Brown & Tom Bruce AM, Ingrid & Per Carlsen, Tim & Rachel Cecil, Min Li Chong, Prof John Daley & Dr Rebecca Coates, Jason Craig, Andrew Curtis, Mark & Jo Davey, Dominic & Natalie Dirupo, Roger Donazzan, Rev Fr Michael Elligate AM, Dr Sian Fairbank, Brian Goddard, Val Johnstone, Fiona Kelly, Michael Kingston, Julie &Michael Landvogt, Susan Nathan, Rosemary & Roger Redston, Carol & Alan Schwartz AM, Robert Sessions & Christina Fitzgerald, Maria Solà, Toby Sullivan, Kerri Turner & Andrew White, Rosemary Walls, Pinky Watson, Henry Winters, Anonymous (1) TERPSICHORE—MUSE OF DANCE—$500+ Frankie Airey & Stephen Solly, Graham & Anita Anderson, Greg Andrews, Michael Arnold, Rowland Ball OAM, Sandra Beanham, David & Rhonda Black, Bruce R Butler, Ros Casey, MaryAnne Carroll, Chris Clough, Alan Connolly, Peter & Roxane Fearnside, Evelyn Firstenberg, Lynne Frid, John & Helen Gibbins, Taleen Gaidzkar, Linda Herd, Leonie Hollingworth, Brad Hooper, Dr Irene Irvine, Joan & Graeme Johnson OAM, Irene Kearsey, Angela Kirsner & Dr Richard Kirsner,

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Simone Lourey, Jayne Lovelock & Dr Neal Harvey, Virginia Lovett, John McCallum, Victor McConvey, Ian McRae AO & Åsa Hasselgard-Rowe, Jan Owen AM, Viorica Samson, Tom Smyth, Tim & Lynne Sherwood, Janice Taylor, Naum Tered, John Thomas, Neil Waters, Phil & Heather Wilson, Anonymous (4) ERATO—MUSE OF LOVE—$250+ Simon Abrahams, Jennifer Bourke, Dr Rob Brown & Dr Lynne Millar, John & Alexandra Busselmaier, Siu Chan, Diane Clark, Fiona Clyne, Georgie Coleman, Carolyn Creswell, William Donaldson, Brian Doyle, Dr Bronwen Evans, Carolyn Floyd, Orla & Rachel, Mary Garcia, Damyn Gordon, Joanne Griffiths, Peggy Hayton, Ted Hocking, Russell Hooper, Susan Humphries, Arechea Hounsell, Sarah Hunt, Ann Kemeny & Graham Johnson, Mira & Dr David Kolieb, Kim Lowndes, Judith Maitland-Parr, Robert Peters, Ian Manning & Alice De Jonge, John Millard, Dr Kersti Nogeste, Linda Notley, Tony Oliver, Kaylene O’Neill, Anda Petrapsch, Gerard Powell, Dr Suzy Redston, Gavin Roach, Pauline Robert, Rae Rothfield, Dr Michael & Jenny Rozen, Jennifer Senior, Andrew Stocker, Evelyn Tadros, Chris Teh, Lee-Ann Walsh, Jan Watson, Jillian Wells OAM, Gary Westbrook, Gayl Morrow & Gib Wettenhall, Joanne Whyte, Barbara Yuncken

BOARD OF DIRECTORS Fiona McGauchie (Chair), Debbie Dadon AM, Colin Golvan QC, Michael Kantor, Jan Owen AM, Sue Prestney, Pamela Rabe, Nick Schlieper, Kerri Turner & Mary Vallentine AO. ARTISTIC & PROGRAMMING

TICKETING & BOX OFFICE

VENUE MANAGEMENT

Artistic Director & CO-CEO / Matthew Lutton

CRM & Ticketing Manager / Prue Sutherland

Venue Manager / Aaron Rowlands

Executive Producer & CO-CEO / Sarah Neal

Box Office Manager / Allie Stapleton

Front of House & Events Manager / Anita Posterino

Resident Dramaturg / Mark Pritchard

Box Office Team Leaders / Fiona Wiseman Kate Gregory

Front of House Manager / Leah Milburn-Clark

Resident Artist / Declan Greene Director In Residence / Sapidah Kian Producer / Toby Sullivan Associate Producer / Jason Tamiru

Box Office Staff / Abby Barnes, Jacqui Bartlett, Jacqui Bathman, Simon Braxton, Paul Buckley, Esther Crowley, Bronya Doyle, Fran Hefferman, Lachlan Hywood, Ian Michael, Liz White PRODUCTION

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Company Manager / Alice Muhling

Production Manager / David Miller

FINANCE & ADMINISTRATION

Technical Manager / Baird Mckenna

Finance Manager / Mario Agostinoni Finance Administrator / Liz White General Manager / Annie Bourke MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS Marketing & Communications Manager / Caraline Douglas

Operations Manager / Dexter Varley Production Coordinator / Tia Clark Head Technician (Lighting) / Rob Ballingall Venue Head Mechanist / Ivan Smith

Head Of Wardrobe / Delia Spicer

Communications Coordinator / Alex Sadka

Wardrobe Assistant / Rebecca Dunn

Marketing Assistant / Jacqui Bathman

Workshop Manager / Goffredo Mameli

Publicist / TS Publicity

Head Carpenter / David Craig

DEVELOPMENT

Workshop Assistants / Elizabeth Whitton Mitch O’Sullivan

Philanthropy Coordinator / Belinda Locke Sponsorship Coordinator / Olivia Satchell

MARKETING & ADVERTISING /

AKA +61 3 8866 8335 AKA-AU.COM

ABORIGINAL & TORRES STRAIT ISLANDER COMMITTEE Uncle Jack Charles, Richard Frankland, Tony Briggs, Lisa Maza, Pauline Wyman, Melodie ReynoldsDiarra & Jason Tamiru We acknowledge the Land and Songlines of the Wurundjeri and Boon Wurrung peoples of the Kulin Nation.

Theatre Technician / Nathanael Bristow

Digital Marketing Coordinator / Alexia Jordan

Development Manager / Fiona Kelly

Front of House Staff / Gianni Agostinoni, Ben Anderson, Mitchell Brotz, Kate Calton, Georgia Cam, Ben Carollo, Gem Clarke, Emma Corbett, Alice Dixon, Amy Dowd, Sophia D’urso, Aly Grace, Sam Harrison, Mark Hoffman, Dirk Hoult, Kathryn Joy, Lara Kerestes, Hannah McKittrick, Daniel Moulds, Abi Murray, Daniel Newell, Leon Rice-Whetton, Sanne Rodenstein, Mick Roe, Lee Threadgold, Kenneth Waite.

Scenic Artist / Patrick Jones EDUCATION Youth & Education Manager / Vanessa O’Neill

PHOTOGRAPHY /

PIA JOHNSON

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DESIGN /

HOURS AFTER HOURSAFTER.COM.AU

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SEASON 2018

JASON TAMIRU / THE YUNG BALUG PERSPECTIVE OF HANGING ROCK

#PICNICATHANGINGROCK

Jason Tamiru—Dja Dja Wurrung, Yung Balug Mob. Photo Ngarra Murray.

At first, I refrained from naming the Rock due to the reality of seeing it listed differently in a number of different places. After speaking to family, the rightful name of Hanging Rock is Ngannelong.

Woi Wurrung and Taungurung would gather at that location for important Men’s Ceremony.

This is a place where big business was held: Corrobborees, Initiation Ceremonies, Songline Ceremonies, trade and relationship building and a place where laws were made and passed.

Picnic at Ngannelong.

The truth is my people were hit hard during the frontier wars. The Western region is known to us as the Killing Fields. The naming of the Rock is with all those that come in my dreams. Australia is starting to learn that there is a black history in this country that needs to be acknowledged and celebrated.

The mystique and spiritual essence of the rock has contributed to the story of our Dreaming which binds my people to our creator spirits and country.

We Sing, Dance and Paint our Country forever.

Long before the 1967 novel, 1975 film and the naming of Hanging Rock, Tribes of the Dja Dja Wurrung,

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WHAT’S UP NEXT

SEASON2018

A VITAL CONFRONTATION, EXTRAORDINARY – THE OBSERVER

A PACIFIST’S GUIDE TO THE WAR ON CANCER 7 – 18 MAR Bryony Kimmings wants to talk about cancer but she’s not getting very far. Instead, she keeps hearing about battles, survivors, fun runs and new leases of life. What’s everyone so scared of?

Complicité, the UK-based theatre company behind Malthouse Theatre’s 2017 hit The Encounter, team up with Kimmings in this funny and moving show that looks behind the poster campaigns and pink ribbons at the reality of cancer... with songs.

WRITTEN BY / Bryony Kimmings and Brian Lobel with Kirsty Housley

DIRECTION / Kirsty Housley MUSIC BY / Tom Parkinson

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Complicité Associates and Bryony Kimmings. Originally a co-production with the National Theatre.

SCENE & HEARD

Coordinating the quick scene changes in pitch black took hours of practice. The cast rehearsed with their eyes closed, and our backstage crew wear night vision goggles during the performance.

MalthouseTheatre MalthouseMelb MalthouseTheatre malthousetheatre.com.au Š Malthouse Theatre, the artists, designers, photographers, collaborators and contributors. All rights reserved, 2018.