Perfect Stranger - June Season of Student Productions 2021

STUDENT PRODUCTIONS June 2021 nida.edu.au/june-2021

WELCOME I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands on which we learn and tell stories, the Bidjigal and Gadigal people of the Eora nation.

We pay our respects to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander elders past and present who have cared for land, water and story on these lands for generations. We also recognise the work and strength of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists, workers and creatives within the NIDA Community.

Sovereignty was never ceded.

Always was, always will be Aboriginal land.

It gives me enormous pleasure to welcome you to another outstanding June Season of Student Productions at NIDA. The focus on digital and emerging technologies is now embedded in NIDA’s core practice as we commit to creating and nurturing the world’s best storytellers and unlocking the power of the performing arts across stages, screens, future media and beyond.

These four, fully-staged NIDA productions tell stories that will surprise and shake. With live cinema, an urban mystery, an urgent demolition and a flagship partnership – this is a season of shapeshifting.

Change is in the air. Certainties are challenged. The past and present collide.

Eat Me is a series of four short new Australian plays in one night, devised and produced in a unique collaborative process with NIDA, Sydney Theatre Company’s Emerging Writers Group, and Contemporary Asian Australian Performance (CAAP) with leading writers and directors. Metamorphosis is a big and bold interpretation of a classic Franz Kafka, directed

by NIDA Course Leader Dr Benjamin Schostakowski. We’re delighted to welcome Kate Champion back to NIDA, directing Hilary Bell’s confronting Perfect Stranger, where the world of audience and performer collides in a revolving world. Award-winning Heather Fairbairn disrupts accepted modes of storytelling with Alice Birch’s exposure of patriarchy REVOLT. SHE SAID. REVOLT AGAIN. This season gives all our students the opportunity to push boundaries and engage with industry representatives, agents, theatre and event companies, film, and television producers.

The state-of-the-art performance spaces they work in, as well as the experts they have access to at every step of the creative process, are what makes NIDA one of the world’s top performing arts educators.

It is fantastic to see the outcomes of the hard work of the incredible group of talented and passionate students and practising artists from diverse backgrounds and from all over Australia.

We couldn’t present any of these high-calibre productions without support from the Australian Government, our Principal Partner for Property Services ARA, our Major Partners Technical Direction Company and Canon Australia, our Corporate Partner YouTube, our Supporters Tempus Two, Young Henrys, Media Super and Screen Australia, our Legal Services Supporter Kay & Hughes, our Event supporter Fourth Wall and the trusts and foundations and the generous individuals who make up our donors and supporters.

We hope you enjoy these live productions.

– Liz Hughes, CEO

June Season of Student Productions 2021 Rehearsals

Perfect Stranger

By Hilary Bell Directed by Kate Champion NIDA Theatres, Space 10,11,15–18 June, 7.30pm 18 June, 1pm Running time 75 minutes Perfect Stranger will be performed in one act with no interval.

Perfect Stranger is the most personal play I have written. While it abounds in strange and impossible imagery, the emotional core is very real, and in fact many of the transactions are taken from life. Any play one writes is a kind of kaleidoscope of lived experience, pilfered stories, dreams, memories. As I wrote, I read about castaways and sleepers – Robinson Crusoe, Rip Van Winkle; legends and myths; the fatal glamour of fairyland.

It’s a play about the fleetingness of the here-and-now, about waking up to find what you thought was ahead is behind you. Carpe diem.

– Hilary Bell, Writer

I think most of us will admit, even if fleetingly, to having had the desire to walk away from our responsibilities and the mundane minutiae of daily life. To escape, even just for a day, to get off the treadmill, to break away.

In Perfect Stranger Ruth does just this but the consequences cause her to reevaluate what she swam away from in the first place.

Perfect Stranger looks at what signifies our sense of belonging and evokes our often fragile grasp on reality. It questions who we choose to really see or listen to in our daily lives and asks whether it’s ever possible to go back to who we once were. In a destabilised world what and who do we yearn to hang on to?

I first read Hilary Bell’s play four years ago and its themes have stayed with me over time, as did the remaining considerable challenge of how to stage a work with 35 characters and 23 locations as a live theatrical experience.

Then the opportunity arose to present it at NIDA and with it a solution to its staging.

– Kate Champion, Director

Presented by NIDA BFA Design for Performance, BFA Costume, BFA Properties and Objects, BFA Scenic Construction and Technologies, BFA Technical Theatre and Stage Management, MFA Directing and final year BFA Acting students.

Company

Ruth Amy Joyce

Writer Hilary Bell** Long Director Kate Champion** Donkey/Richard/ Ari Maza

Assistants Director Eve Beck Len/Gravedigger May Madeleine Diggins Old Woman/Owen/ Braydon

Kurt/Boy

Set Designer Hayden Relf Adam/Father/ Connor Reilly Costume Designer Hannah Tayler Mark/Shaun

Lighting Designer Leia Loisa Grace/Skye/Janice/ Ebony Tucker

Sound Designer and Jessica Pizzinga Gilda/Dawn

Sound Systems Roberto/Dean/ Gabriel Alvarado

Voice Coach Jennifer White* Duane/Carer George/Horatio/Scott/ Harrison Quast

Production Stage Manager Krystelle Quartermain Charlie/Dev

Deputy Stage Manager Zoe Davis Barry/Miguel/David/ Shaw Cameron

Assistants Stage Manager Oliver Becroft Cyclist/Jesse India Lively Brenda Mema Munro

Head of Construction Zac White The Tour Group* Rachel Crossan Costume Supervisors Bethany Hewitt Kael D’Alterio Siobhan Nealon Struan Davidson Props Supervisor Zoe Manning Jesse Donaldson-Jarrett

Head Electrician Mia Barnes Declan Dowling Ryan Glasson

Props Makers Hunter Depalo Kieren Gregory Zachary Portelli Ruby Hawken

Minerva Khodabande Costume Assistants Michiru Encinas Max Macdonald Natalie De Palo Ashley McLaren

Design Assistants Paris Burrows Bronte Muir Cosette Mangas Georgia Oom Props Assistants Ari Gilbert Sienna Richardson Zali Kassi Hannah Stewart John Thomas

Revolve Operator Eryn Douglas Nathan Wheeler

Production Assistant Alexis Worthing

Technical Assistants Maddison Craven Kirsten Drake

*Diploma of Musical Theatre students **Guest artist

Thank you to Tom Johnston, Kelly Johnston and Adam Mada.

Perfect Stranger was commissioned by Yale Rep.

Graduating students 2021 Bachelor of Fine Arts (Acting)

G abriel A lvarado

H annah Julii A nder s on

Fly nn B arnard

Julie B et tens

O liv ia B ourne

S haw C ameron

R yan Ennis s

A my Joyce

Libby Kay

A lfre d Kouris

A shan Kum ar

A ri Ma za Long

Charlot te L uc a s

Philip Ly nch

Wern M ak

B raydon May

Riley McNam ara

A lyona Pop ova

Harrison Q ua s t

C onnor Reilly

Mem a Munro

Chris t y Tran

Eb ony Tucker

Adolphus Wayle e

L ucy Jauris to

S am antha Manning

S iobhan Nealon

A ngelina Meany

H ayden Relf

Bachelor of Fine Arts (Costume)

Elsb eth C ameron

B ethany Hew it t

O ri His er

Bachelor of Fine Arts (Design for Performance)

S oham A pte

B lake He dley

Hannah Tayler

H annah Yardley

A my Jack s on

Pho eni x Mckay

Is ab ella S altearn

Bachelor of Fine Arts (Properties and Objects)

Hunter D epalo

Danielle G uyot

Rachel Hallet t

Is ab ell de L aurentis

Zo e M anning

Rhyanna M ar tinus s en

Z achar y Por telli

Bachelor of Fine Arts (Scenic Construction and Technologies)

C atherine Imer

M at thew Hinton

Z achar y W hite

Bachelor of Fine Arts (Technical Theatre and Stage Management)

Elif A kgul

Is a ac B arron

K aitly n Cro cker

S ophie Jone s

Leia Lois a

Alex Makaronopoulos

Jo el M allet t

K r ys telle Q uar term ain

Jame s Rawlings

S aint Clair

Nathan Sandy

Z achar y S aric

Mellit a Ver tigan

Trillian V ieira

Sy billa Wajon

S ophia Wallace

Rik iah L izarraga

A my S ole

A lexei Ymer-Welsby

Master of Fine Arts (Directing)

Eve B e ck

Madeleine D iggins

S amuel Jing

STUDENT PRODUCTIONS JUNE 2021

NIDA employs a wide range of industry professionals on both a part-time and casual basis who teach students across all the courses. NIDA would like to acknowledge and thank all members of staff who have shared their expertise with the 2021 students.

NIDA is grateful for the support of our corporate partners, trusts and foundations, supporters and donors.

Principal Partner for Property Services

Major Partners

Corporate Partner

Legal Services

Supporters

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The National Institute of Dramatic Art is supported by the Australian Government