Category: Featured

For featured posts

Posted on

Michael Gow to leave Queensland Theatre Company

After more than 10 years at the helm, Michael Gow, the Artistic Director of Queensland Theatre Company has declined a further contract with the Company, and is leaving to pursue freelance writing and directing.  The announcement was made jointly today in a media release by Mr Gow and Dr Kate Foy, Chairman of the Board.

Michael Gow has noted how much he enjoys running the Company, and that he was honoured and excited by the offer of a further contract.  However, he added ‘after an intense period of reflection,’ and ‘a growing need to get back to myself as a writer,’ he had ‘sadly declined’ to continue in the state theatre company’s top job.

Kate Foy noted the Board’s natural disappointment at Michael’s decision, but that it understood and supported his decision completely.  ‘The Board has been delighted with Michael’s performance during the past ten years; he’s been a fine leader, and a hard-working and visionary Artistic Director.’  She noted Mr Gow’s programming boldness and the many initiatives he has brought to the Company during his period as AD.  She went on

The Company’s writing development and education programs are not always as visible to the general public as is its mainstage work, but the success of these significant developmental initiatives under Michael Gow, as well as his other achievements, has meant that his tenure as Artistic Director will undoubtedly be seen as one of enduring importance in the development and maturation of Queensland’s theatre.

Mr Gow will program the major part of the 2011 season, and continue his relationship with the company as a freelance artist.

Dr Foy noted that the Company will be looking to appoint a new Artistic Director by the middle of the year.  It will be an open recruitment process, and is anticipated to take up to five months.

Posted on

Indie Launch Day … Indie Pride!

La Boite Theatre
Image by Bandido of Oz via Flickr

Today is not only St Valentine’s Day, but also, and perhaps even more importantly for Brisbane’s theatre-lovers, the launch of the La Boite Theatre Indie season, which we’re hoping will be enormously successful for everyone concerned.

A perhaps overused word right now when talking about the wider artistic environment is its ‘ecology’ …

ecology
noun
1 the branch of biology that deals with the relations of organisms to one another and to their physical surroundings.
• (also human ecology) the study of the interaction of people with their environment.
2 (also Ecology) the political movement that seeks to protect the environment, esp. from pollution.

and the theatre ecology of Brisbane and beyond requires a robust independent sector to keep it fit and healthy.

We thought we’d post up this little video taken last year by one of Brisbane’s leading independent companies, 23rd Productions.  It was shot to celebrate World Theatre Day 2009, and has gone beyond Brisbane around the world as their contribution.  If you haven’t seen it yet, you should; there’s much in here that celebrates what independent means in a theatre eco-system.

And congratulations 23rd Productions and Artistic Director Kathryn Fray and Associate AD Christopher Sommers on your inclusion in the La Boite Independents season with Blackbird by David Harrower.

Posted on

40 Years On: Queensland Theatre Company’s Repertoire

This week Groundling blog produced two posts which compared the annual repertoire of the state theatre company’s inaugural decade and the one just past. This fairly simple bit of quantitative research was inspired/prompted by similar research and a current debate in the US following the publication of a new book Outrageous Fortune.   The book claims the US institutional theatre is, by and large, not producing new works by American playwrights. 

Queensland Theatre Company celebrates its 40th birthday in 2010, so a stocktake seemed appropriate.  Rather than look over the Company’s 40 seasons Groundling took the bookend repertoires and did a breakdown of the historical and geographical origin of the plays selected for the decade of the 1970s and that of the 2000s.

You can read both posts here:

And the outcome in chart form shows how this company has always had the production of contemporary and brand new plays top of its repertoire.

Chart of Comparative Repertoire QTC 1970s & 2000s

Groundling has suggested that other Queensland companies might care to do the same stocktake of their work to provide a fuller picture of the kinds of theatre we think we are producing in the state.

Related articles by Zemanta
Posted on

Flloyd Kennedy (Interview 3)

Image of Flloyd Kennedy

Brisbane has the right to a healthy layer of DIY theatre – partially supported and encouraged, venue or company based – in professional, independent companies that evolve.  People need to be empowered to work outside the prevalent bureaucratic funding model. My passion is theatre where performers do their thing – performers in an empty room – not big sets and costume stuff.  Then the audience brings its own life, energy and imagination to it; that’s the kind of theatre I love – that’s fringe.

I spoke a little while back with Flloyd Kennedy actor, blogger, voice-coach, theatre-maker and enthusiast.  She’s so committed to the importance of theatre-making that she (initially) single-handedly organised the inaugural one-day Bits Festival of fringe theatre held in Brisbane last November.  I was intrigued by the concept and keen to talk with Flloyd about what brought her to do such an extraordinary thing – creating a fringe festival event from scratch is hardly for the faint of heart, but then that’s not a label that would stick long to Flloyd.

… there is still not the opportunity here for audiences to experience new ideas or for rough, raw, experimental work to get a first showing. There’s still a missing layer.. Continue reading “Flloyd Kennedy (Interview 3)”

Posted on

Theatre conference? You want to be in Cats or something?

This post was contributed by Xanthe Coward, a COE09 conference delegate. Many thanks also to Xanthe for her live-tweeting during the sessions. You can catchup with all the hashtagged contributions to the Twitter stream by searching for #coe09

Why are doing a theatre  conference? Why are you doing theatre? Do you want to be in Cats or  something?!

Last weekend Brisbane’s !Metro Arts played host to 100 independent theatre practitioners, including professional and emerging  playwrights, performers, directors, producers and promoters from all over Australia.  In what turned out to be a particularly conversational 3 day program !Metro Arts, in cooperation with Jute and Playlab, set about challenging the definition of what it is to be an artist in the independent theatre sector in Australia, and asked, “How will it – and you – survive?”  The question in the block-quote above was put to one of the delegates by a friend, and it seems to sum up the attitude of many of the broader population who aren’t aware of theatre – apart from the blockbuster musical –  or who don’t really understand how and where else this thing called theatre gets made.  Last weekend, however, pedestrians on Brisbane city’s Edward Street, as well as visitors to New Farm’s Powerhouse might have noticed that theatre is something that attracts an extremely eclectic crowd. Continue reading “Theatre conference? You want to be in Cats or something?”