Never Have I Ever

This is rated 4 out of 5 stars

‘A very entertaining night in the theatre.’
ArtsHub

This is rated 4 out of 5 stars

‘A clever, deliciously uncomfortable satire.’
Limelight

ABOUT THE SHOW

A night to remember? More like a nightmare to forget.

Simon Gleeson (Les Misérables), Chika Ikogwe (Heartbreak High), Katie Robertson (Five Bedrooms) and Sunny S Walia (Shantaram) star as two couples sharing one last meal in honour of their doomed restaurant venture. As the wine is uncorked, secrets flow.

Fuelled by simmering tensions and top shelf booze, things boil over when a drinking game uncovers the real dynamics driving their relationships: power, resentment, envy and fear. And that’s just the entrée.

Beneath the in-jokes and flirting, self-care and teasing is a seething stew of money, sex, race and class. Stirred through with a wicked sense of humour, Never Have I Ever is delicious proof that the most personal form of politics is also the most explosive.

Wheelchair Accessible
Hearing Assistance
Audio Described
Tactile Tour
Open Captioning
Closed Captioning
Auslan Interpreted

Performance Type	Performance Date(s)
Audio Described by Vision Australia	Saturday 8 March at 2pm Tuesday 11 March at 6.30pm
Tactile Tour at venue	Saturday 8 March at 2pm (Tactile tour commences at 1pm)
Open Captioning via screen	Saturday 15 March at 2pm
Closed Captioning via GoTheatrical App	Saturday 15 March at 2pm
Auslan Interpreted	More information here

Talks & Events

Forum Nights

Stay after the show to join an enlightening conversation with the cast and creative team.

Monday 24 February

Donor Night

Donors ($1,000+) enjoy access to informative and engaging post-show events.

Tuesday 4 March

Content Warnings

This production contains frequent coarse language, sexual content, drug and alcohol use, the use of herbal cigarettes, strobe lighting and haze effects. For detailed information about the production’s content click here.

Programme

Want to learn more about Never Have I Ever? View our interactive digital programme.

Attendance Information

To learn more about our health and safety measures before you attend the venue, click here.

Photography by Jo Duck

Chika Ikogwe

Adaego

Simon Gleeson

Tobin

Katie Robertson

Jacq

Sunny S Walia

Kas

Deborah Frances-White

Writer

Tasnim Hossain

Director

Zoe Rouse

Set & Costume Designer

Rachel Lee

Lighting Designer

Sidney Millar

Composer & Sound Designer

Mark Wong

Voice & Dialect Coach

Aubrey Flood

Assistant Director

Lyndall Grant

Fight Choreographer

Isabella Vadiveloo

Intimacy Coordinator

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Chika Ikogwe

Adaego

Chika is an award-winning Nigerian-born actor and writer. This is her debut with Melbourne Theatre Company. Stage credits include Fangirls, Dance Nation and The Wolves (Belvoir); and the lead role of Cleo in Seven Methods of Killing Kylie Jenner (Malthouse), for which she won Most Outstanding Performer at the 2024 Green Room Awards. On screen Chika can be seen in Heartbreak High (Netflix), ABC's Mikki vs the World, feature Land of Bad alongside Russell Crowe, and Mix Tape alongside Teresa Palmer and Jacqueline Mckenzie (Binge). Awards include the 2018 BBM Youth Support Award in Drama, the 2018 Leslie Walford AM Award, Best Newcomer at the 2019 Sydney Theatre Awards, 2020 ATYP Rose Byrne Emerging Female Leader in the Arts scholarship and the 2022 Glorias Award. She has a deep passion for equity and representation and strives to bring authentic Afrocentric stories to the forefront of Australian stages and screens.

Current as of January 2025.

Simon Gleeson

Tobin

Simon Gleeson returns to the Melbourne Theatre Company stage following An Ideal Husband, Hay Fever and Rupert. Other stage credits include The Republic of Myopia, Harbour (Sydney Theatre Company); Splinter (Griffin Theatre Company); A Little Night Music (Victorian Opera); Oklahoma!, Curtains, Chess (The Production Company); Imagine This (New London Theatre, West End); Les Misérables (Cameron Macintosh, West End & Australia); Love Never Dies (Gustave Stage Productions); Southwark Fair (Royal National Theatre); Three Sides (Finborough Theatre); The Far Pavilions (Shaftesbury Theatre, West End); Certified Male (Edinburgh Festival); Shoes (Sadler’s Wells); The Silver Lake (Wexford Festival, Ireland). His screen credits include City Homicide S4, Kombat Opera Presents, EastEnders, Blue Heelers, Seachange 3, Neighbours and feature film My Life In Ruins. Simon is also a co-writer and Associate Producer on Better Man (Paramount Pictures). He won a Helpmann Award for Best Male Actor in a Musical for Les Misérables.

Current as of January 2025.

Katie Robertson

Jacq

Katie graduated from Sydney Theatre School’s Diploma of Arts (Acting) in 2008. She is best known as Grace in ABC/Sundance TV’s critically acclaimed series Rosehaven, and as Ainsley in all four seasons of Five Bedrooms. In 2023 she burst onto screens internationally playing Vanessa Latham in the award-winning crime-comedy Deadloch. Other TV credits include White Fever, Kettering Incident, True Story With Hamish & Andy, Get Krack!n and Ms Fisher’s Modern Murder Mysteries. Most recently she has been Director’s Assistant to Cherie Nowlan (Suits, Riverdale, Grey’s Anatomy) on The Survivors (Netflix). Katie will also be seen in the upcoming ABC series, Bay of Fires. In 2016 she won the Tasmanian Theatre Award for Best Performance for her role as Vanda in Loud Mouth Theatre Co’s debut production of Venus in Fur and the same award again in 2018 for her performance in the Tasmanian Theatre Company’s sell-out season of e-baby.

Current as of January 2025.

Sunny S Walia

Kas

Sukhbir Singh Walia (known as Sunny S Walia) is an Indian Australian actor based in Melbourne. Never Have I Ever is his Melbourne Theatre Company debut. Other theatre credits include Counting & Cracking (Belvoir), both the 2024 Melbourne, Sydney, NYC tour and the 2022 U.K tour. Feature film credits include Together premiering at Sundance Film Festival 2025, Godless: The Eastfield Exorcism, Blacklight and Ice Road 2: Road to the Sky. Television credits include Shantaram, Neighbours, Swift Street, Bad Behaviour and Preacher. Sunny was the recipient of the 2020 Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts Pitch award. Sunny is proud to be part of the South Asian diaspora in Australia and continues to work in bringing strong, leading South Asian characters to our stage and screens both locally and internationally.

Current as of January 2025.

Deborah Frances-White

Writer

Deborah Frances-White is a writer and comedian best known for her hit podcast The Guilty Feminist. With over 150 million downloads, it has toured venues including The Royal Albert Hall, The Wellington Arena, The Sydney Opera House and Hamer Hall. Her debut play, Never Have I Ever, was first produced at Chichester Festival Theatre in the UK. It is her first production with The Melbourne Theatre Company. Deborah won The Writers’ Guild Award for her BBC radio show Deborah Frances-White Rolls the Dice. Her first feature film was Say My Name, produced by Electric Entertainment. She’s currently writing Bad Fairies, an animated feature film, for Warner Brothers and Locksmith Animation for release in 2027. She has a television series in development with Australia’s Lingo Pictures. Her book The Guilty Feminist was a Sunday Times Bestseller and her new book, Six Conversations We’re Scared to Have, will be published by Virago in April 2025.

Current as of February 2025.

Tasnim Hossain

Director

Tasnim Hossain is an Associate Artist at Melbourne Theatre Company, where she has directed English and I Wanna Be Yours, and been assistant director on Seventeen, Bernhardt/Hamlet and Bloom. Her independent production of Yellow Face was nominated for six Sydney Theatre Awards, winning two, including Best Direction. She co-directed and dramaturged Lost in Shanghai (CAAP) and has directed for NIDA, VCA and WAAPA. As a writer, she was co-recipient of the inaugural NSW Musical Theatre Fellowship (CreateNSW/Hayes Theatre Company). Her scripts have been produced by Q Theatre and shortlisted for the Griffin Award. Tasnim was a creator, writer, and actor for Carpark Clubbing (ABC iView), which won Best in Writing at Stareable Fest and Best Ensemble at Die Seriale. Tasnim has been Artistic Associate at NIDA, STC-CAAP Director, Griffin Studio Artist, and ATYP Resident Playwright. She received the 2022 Women’s Agenda Award for Emerging Leader in Arts and Entertainment, was a 2021-2022 Creative Australia Future Leader, and a Melbourne Theatre Company Women in Theatre alumna.

Current as of February 2025.

Zoe Rouse

Set & Costume Designer

Zoë is a multidisciplinary artist with an expansive practice and her work as a set and costume designer, maker and stylist has included theatre, film, and photography. Based in Melbourne, Zoë is a VCA Production School alumni and an RMIT Textile Design Development graduate. She is a thrifting enthusiast, an avid collector of plants and has a passion for colour and contemporary styling. Zoë has worked with some amazing theatre companies and makers. Some of her recent design credits include WHO NO KNO GO KNO, The Hate Race, Hour of the Wolf, The Return, normal.suburban.planetary.meltdown (Malthouse Theatre); Straight from the Strait (Queensland Opera); Scar Trees (ILBIJERRI Theatre Company); Tiddas (Belvoir and La Boite Theatre); Emilia (Essential Theatre); Technique (Elbow Room); The Sky is Well Designed (Fabricated Rooms); Ground Control (Double Water Sign); Company by Stephen Sondheim (Watch This); Limbo (Strut and Fret);  and many more.

Current as of January 2025.

Rachel Lee

Lighting Designer

Rachel is a lighting designer and artist based in Naarm/Melbourne. She works primarily with new writing and is the co-creator of theatre collective MASHH (Mm And Something Happens Here), an award-winning collective that has been creating and presenting works since 2017. Recent works include I Am Seaweed and《落叶归根》(Luò yè guī gēn) Getting (Melbourne Fringe Festival). Rachel’s design credits include Topdog/Underdog, I Wanna Be Yours, Laurinda, The Heartbreak Choir (Melbourne Theatre Company); Manifesto, Escalator (Stephanie Lake Company); Death of A Salesman (GWB Entertainment and Red Line); The Hate Race, Telethon Kid, Stay Woke, Hello, World! (Malthouse Theatre); Gender Euphoria (Mama Alto and Maude Davey); Peacemongers, Security (Darebin Speakeasy); Single Ladies, Ulster American (Red Stitch Actors’ Theatre); Easy Riders (APHIDS) and various installation works across Flash Forward (City of Melbourne). She has been awarded the Green Room Award for Best Production.

Current as of January 2025.

Sidney Millar

Composer & Sound Designer

Sidney is an award-winning composer and sound designer for theatre, dance, music theatre and installations. Her unique style has emerged from her extensive experience as a performer and composer of classical and jazz music. She particularly enjoys using sound and music to create emotional states and subtle tensions in a work. Sidney studied a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Production) degree at the Victorian College of the Arts. Sidney’s prior sound designs include WILD, Girls & Boys (Melbourne Theatre Company); Bread Crumbs (Poppy Seed Festival); The Fence (Darebin Speakeasy), The Exact Dimensions of Hell (fortyfivedownstairs); Lou Wall’s Drag Race (Melbourne Fringe) and Bearded (Theatre Works). She also regularly works and designs at the University of Melbourne. In 2018 she participated in Melbourne Theatre Company’s Women in Theatre program.

Current as of January 2025.

Mark Wong

Voice & Dialect Coach

Aubrey Flood

Assistant Director

Aubrey Flood (she/her) is a Filipino-Australian director and performer based in Naarm. A graduate of the Ballarat Arts Academy in musical theatre, Aubrey has also trained extensively as an actor and theatre maker with Anne Bogart and the SITI Company in New York. She was a cast member of What If If Only (Melbourne Theatre Company) and participated in the 2023 Cybec Electric series alongside Trudy Dunn on Malacañang Made Us by Jordan Shea. Aubrey made her directorial debut with HOT.FAT.CRAZY (Melbourne International Comedy Festival/Melbourne Fringe Festival). The show won the South Australia Touring Award and received multiple Green Room Award nominations, including Outstanding Direction for Cabaret. Aubrey has also served as assistant director on Diwa and the new Filipino-Australian musical LOLA!. She is currently performing in Imagine Live!, which will tour nationally in 2025. Aubrey is excited to be part of the MinterEllison Future Directors 2025 cohort.

Current as of January 2025.