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Artwork for The Jungle and the Sea
Artwork for The Jungle and the Sea
Artwork for The Jungle and the Sea
Artwork for The Jungle and the Sea
Artwork for The Jungle and the Sea
The Jungle and the Sea

14 Aug — 15 Sep 2026

Southbank Theatre, The Sumner

★★★★★ Time Out
★★★★★ Suzy Goes See
★★★★★ The AU Review
★★★★★ Standing Innovation
★★★★★ What's the Show
★★★★1⁄2 Limelight
★★★★ The Guardian
★★★★ The Age

S. Shakthidharan and Eamon Flack’s moving follow-up to the much-lauded Counting and Cracking follows one family’s epic journey to retain their dignity and their safety against the backdrop of Sri Lanka’s civil war.

Approx. 2 hours and 50 minutes, including 2 intervals.

SEASON EXTENDED

Due to popular demand, we've added two new final performances. Monday 14 and Tuesday 15 September are now on sale. 

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This is rated 5 out of 5 stars

‘The Jungle and the Sea is vital theatre.’

Time Out
This is rated 5 out of 5 stars

‘An epic theatrical triumph.’

Standing Innovation
This is rated 5 out of 5 stars

‘A profoundly moving work.’

Suzy Goes See
This is rated 5 out of 5 stars

‘Intensely moving and deeply personal.’

The AU Review
This is rated 5 out of 5 stars

‘A three hour journey and worth every minute of it.’

What's the Show
This is rated 4.5 out of 5 stars

Limelight
This is rated 4 out of 5 stars

The Age
This is rated 4 out of 5 stars

The Guardian
This is rated 0 out of 5 stars

WINNER OF THE PRIZE FOR DRAMA

2024 Victorian Premier's Literary Award

ABOUT THE SHOW

From the visionary team behind the multi-award-winning Counting and Cracking – S. Shakthidharan and long-time collaborator Eamon Flack – comes ‘another achievement of sustained feeling and empathy’ (The Guardian).

When an unexpected act of destruction splits her family apart, Gowrie takes a radical vow of defiance: she blindfolds herself, refusing to see the world again until her loved ones are reunited. This sets the stage for one family’s epic journey to retain their dignity and safety, as they live through Sri Lanka’s decades-long civil war.

Grand in scale and deeply human at its core, this touching work honours those who endured unimaginable loss – and upheld their capacity for love, connection and pride, even amid devastation. Built out of real-life testimonies from the war and woven through with elements of seminal Indian text the Mahābhāratha and the Greek myth of Antigone, The Jungle and the Sea is a theatrical epic of resilience and the pursuit of justice through love.

Featuring live Carnatic music and a cast including Bharathanatyam dancer Anandavalli and Counting and Cracking alumni Prakash Belawadi, Nadie Kammallaweera, Shiv Palekar, Dushan Philips and Rajan Velu, this evocative theatrical monument is a stirring meditation on survival.

Producer

Co-producers: Kurinji and Lingalayam

 

Accessibility

  • 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 29 August at 1.30pm
Tuesday 1 September at 6.30pm
Tactile Tour
at venue 		Saturday 29 August at 1.30pm (Tactile tour commences at 12.30pm)
Open Captioning
via screen 		Saturday 5 September at 1.30pm
Closed Captioning
GoTheatrical App 		Saturday 5 September at 1.30pm
Auslan Interpreted More information here.
Artwork for Anandavalli

Anandavalli

Gowrie – Amma

Anandavalli is a veteran classical Indian dancer with an international career spanning over 50 years. Born in Sri Lanka, she performed as a young prodigy across India and Europe under the tutelage of dance luminaries. In 1985 she migrated to Australia and founded the Lingalayam Dance Academy and Company, which incorporates dance, live music, text and design. Anandavalli is deeply committed to advancing the course of Indian dance as well as the broader scope of artistic development in Australia. Today Lingalayam’s choreographic vocabulary far transcends the boundaries of its original performative paradigms, and presents contemporary work founded on its classical origins. Anandavalli was the pivotal actor/dancer in Belvoir Street Theatre & Lingalayam Dance Company’s 2022 co-production of The Jungle and The Sea, which won four Sydney Theatre Awards, including Best Mainstage Production. She has been the Cultural & Costume Advisor and Choreographer for Belvoir/Kurunji for Counting and Cracking since its inception.

Artwork for Prakash Belawadi

Prakash Belawadi

Siva (Sivapalan) – Appa

Prakash is an Indian theatre, film, television and media personality, teacher, urban ecology activist and journalist from Bengaluru, India. Born in a family of theatre and cinema artistes, he obtained a degree in mechanical engineering from University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering, Bengaluru in 1983, but has devoted the most part of his years to the stage, cinema, journalism and teaching. Belawadi has acted in 10 web series and over 90 feature films in six Indian languages, and English. He received the Helpmann Award, Australia (2019) for Best Actor in Counting and Cracking (Belvoir). Belawadi's debut film Stumble, which he wrote and directed, won the National Award for Best Film in the English language, 2003. Belawadi has represented India as a delegate in many seminars, conferences and festivals around the world.

Artwork for Emma Harvie

Emma Harvie

Lakshmi – Thangachi

Emma Harvie’s stage credits include No Pay? No Way!, A Cheery Soul, The Harp in the South Parts 1 and 2, A  Midsummer Night’s Dream (Sydney Theatre Company); The Jungle and the Sea, My Brilliant Career, The Wolves (Belvoir); Counting and Cracking (Belvoir UK Tour); Wherever She Wanders (Griffin Theatre Company); Dance Nation (STCSA/Belvoir); The Last Wife, Taking Steps (Ensemble Theatre); The Astral Plane (Belvoir 25A); Wrath (KXT/JackRabbit); The Hypochondriac (Darlinghurst Theatre); The Players (Bell Shakespeare). Her screen credits include Meggles in Colin from Accounts (CBS/Binge), Chaya in RFDS (Seven Network), and Destiny in the comedy, Ground Up (ABC). Other screen work includes In Limbo, Frayed, Diary of an Uber Driver and The Letdown. She was named a 2023 Rising Star by the Casting Guild of Australia. A graduate from the Actors Centre Australia,  Emma also studied at The Atlantic Acting School in New York.

Artwork for Nadie Kammallaweera

Nadie Kammallaweera

Madhu – Akka

Born in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Nadie Kammallaweera is a theatre, film, and television actor. Theatre credits include Drive your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead, The Wrong Gods (with Melbourne Theatre Company), Counting and Cracking, The Jungle and the Sea, Cherry Orchard (Belvoir); Kalumali (Stage Theatre Group Colombo); The House of Bernarda Alba, Blood Wedding, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and Mother Courage and Her Children (Somalatha Subasinghe Play House Colombo). TV credits include Separated at Birth and Wakefield (ABC) and Bump (Stan), and overseas, The Young Pope and The New Pope (HBO), Bedde Kulawamiya (SLRC Sri Lanka), and Sansasre Piyasatahan (ITN Sri Lanka). Film credits include Asoka Handagama’s This is My Moon, Prasanna Vithanage’s August Sun, Visakesa Chandrasekaram’s Pangshu, Malith Hegoda’s Strange Familiar, and Mother Teresa of Calcutta. She has won Green Room Awards for her performances in Counting and Cracking and The Wrong Gods. In Sri Lanka, she has won multiple awards including the BUNKA Award of Recognition for Valuable Contribution to Sri Lankan Theatre.

Artwork for Shiv Palekar

Shiv Palekar

Ahilan – Thumbi

Shiv Palekar was born in India, raised in Hong Kong and is now based in Sydney. Since graduating from NIDA, Shiv has appeared in The Sound Inside (Melbourne Theatre Company); Counting and Cracking (Belvoir); 4000 Miles, The Tempest, The Real Thing, The Beauty Queen of Leenane, and Disgraced (Sydney Theatre Company); The Great Gatsby (Queensland Theatre Company); The Almighty Sometimes (Griffin Theatre Company); and has toured nationally in The Merchant of Venice and The Players (Bell Shakespeare). Select television credits include a series regular role on Amazon’s remount of Neighbours, as well as Apple TV/Paramount’s Shantaram. For The Beauty Queen of Leenane and Counting and Cracking, Shiv received Sydney Theatre Award nominations for Best Supporting Actor, and Best Actor. For The Sound Inside was nominated for Outstanding Performance at Melbourne’s Green Room Awards and won for Outstanding Ensemble in Counting and Cracking. Shiv is an associate artist and founding member of theatre ensemble The Corinthian Food Store Collective.

Artwork for Dushan Philips

Dushan Philips

Kishan

Dushan Philips played the role of Raoul in Bernardt/Hamlet for Melbourne Theatre Company, Niv in Stay Woke (Malthouse and Darlinghurst Theatre) and more recently tread the boards in Bighouse Dreaming (Arts Centre Melbourne) and the Green Room Award-winning Counting and Cracking (Belvoir). Other stage credits include Romeo & Juliet and Macbeth (Australian Shakespeare Company); Fury, The Antipodes (Red Stitch Actors’ Theatre); Right Now, The Crocodile (Malthouse Theatre Company). Television credits include ABC's Glitch, Channel 10's Offspring, Foxtel's Wentworth, Stan's Romper Stomper and the American TV Series Hunters, ABC’s Fires and Jack Irish - Hell Bent, Stan original series The Gloaming, Channel Ten's My Life is Murder and Channel 31's Sonnnigsburg. He also worked on the independent feature The Returned and Stan Original film Jones Family Christmas. Dushan won a Green Room Award for his performance in Angels In America (Dirty Pretty Theatre).

Artwork for Kalieaswari Srinivasan

Kalieaswari Srinivasan

Abi (Abirami) – Akka

Kalieaswari Srinivasan is an actor and writer based in Pondicherry, India. Her theatre credits include: The Jungle and the Sea – 2022, Counting and Cracking (Belvoir); BIRIYANI (Winter Arts Festival); The Prisoner (The Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord in Paris); Land of Ashes and Diamonds & Kunti Karna (Indianostrum Theatre). Her film credits include Dheepan, which won the Cannes 2015 Palme’d Or and Sivaranjaniyum Innum Sila Pengalum, which garnered national awards and international accolades. She had been individually involved in theatre with and for children, specifically from the south of India, in rural areas and cities alike, working with a wide spectrum of children. She is also a somatic practitioner working with the interconnection of body and emotions.

Artwork for Rajan Velu

Rajan Velu

Himal

Rajan is a graduate of the Actors Centre in Sydney. His theatre credits include Counting and Cracking, The Jungle and the Sea, Life of Galileo (Belvoir); Emerald City (Ensemble Theatre); Norm and Ahmed (Australia Theatre Live); Friends in Transient Places (Fresh Produce'd, Los Angeles); Lost: The Musical (Chinless Productions, Los Angeles); The Changeling, Henry V (Independent Shakespeare Company, Los Angeles); The Last Highway (Urban Theatre Projects, Sydney Festival); Fearless N (Theatre Kantanka) and The Drum (Sydney Opera House). His TV credits include The Disposables (Photo Play), Savage River (ABC TV), Born To Spy (Aquarius Films), Doctor Doctor (Nine Network), RFDS (Seven network), Diary of an Uber Driver (Revolver Films), Reef Break (ABC Studios International), Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders (CBS), Scandal (ABC), Brooklyn Nine Nine (CBS), Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (CW) and Hollywood Heights (Nickelodeon). Rajan’s film credits include This Little Love of Mine, Bug, Eat Spirit Eat, Honeyglue, Superman Returns and the award winning short film, You Can't Curry Love.

Artwork for Arjunan Puveendran

Arjunan Puveendran

Musician (Until 26 Aug)

Arjunan is a vocalist and percussionist. He has co-presented and performed in various arts projects including: Atma: Music and Movement (2017), Bhakti: Art and Devotion (2018), Bhoomi: Woman and Earth (2019), Re-imagining Dance: Brown Bodies on the Global Stage (2020) along with Bhoomi: Our Country for Sydney Festival 2021. He was Composer and Musician on the critically acclaimed The Jungle and the Sea (Belvoir, Lingalayam Dance Company), for which he won the Sydney Theatre Award for Best Original Score. He also featured in the multi-award-winning play Counting and Cracking (2019) by Belvoir and Co-Curious. He has sung for digital works: short film Anthi (2021) by Iqbal Barkat; ABC series The Disposables (2023); and Monica Rani Rudhar's work for Sydney Biennale (2026). He performed dramatic monologue and vocals for Idam: Place (2022). Arjunan was named by the Australia Council in its cohort of 25 Arts Leaders in 2020. He currently serves on the Board of Company B Limited (Belvoir).

Artwork for Aswin Selvanathan

Aswin Selvanathan

Musician (From 27 Aug)

Aswin Selvanathan is a Melbourne-based percussionist and music producer. He initially trained in mridangam under Balasri Rasiah before undertaking advanced training with preeminent Chennai-based artist T R Sundaresan. Aswin presented his mridangam debut recital (arangetram) with internationally acclaimed vocalist Sandeep Narayan, and has become a regular performer in Melbourne’s Carnatic music scene and has had the opportunity to perform in Chennai’s famed December music season. Aside from mridangam, Aswin also plays other Carnatic percussion instruments, namely ghatam, kanjira and morsing. The Jungle and the Sea (2026) marks his debut as an onstage musician for live theatre. Aswin is involved in electronic music production, exploring intersections between Western electronic forms and Carnatic music traditions. His work focuses on blending traditional culture with modern dance music, and is released under the moniker AZWN. Beyond solo and ensemble performance, Aswin teaches mridangam and performs with the Melbourne-based Rhythm Riders Ensemble.

Artwork for Hari Sivanesan

Hari Sivanesan

Musician

Composer, producer, orchestrator and multi-instrumentalist, Hari Sivanesan is an internationally acclaimed Indian classical–contemporary artist, known for singing while playing the Veena. Trained in the UK and India, with Naarm (Melbourne) now home, his practice brings together Sri Lankan Tamil heritage with South Indian and Western classical traditions. His work has been presented through landmark platforms including BBC Radio & TV, BBC Proms, Royal Opera House, Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, WOMAD and major international festivals. He has premiered significant 'firsts', including the first classical Veena concertos with symphony orchestras, the first Carnatic performance at the BBC Proms, and first Veena solos at the Royal Albert Hall and Sydney Myer Music Bowl. Much of his own work is inspired by the struggles, displacement and resilience of Sri Lankan Tamils. Across theatre, dance and concert stages, his composition and performance connect cultures, traditions and contemporary artistic practice through his unique music, storytelling and collaboration.

Artwork for S. Shakthidharan

S. Shakthidharan

Co-Writer/Co-Director

S. Shakthidharan is an Australian storyteller with Sri Lankan heritage and Tamil ancestry. His plays Counting and Cracking, The Jungle and the Sea and The Wrong Gods have won critical, commercial and community acclaim. Counting and Cracking has toured extensively and won a New York Times Critics Pick. Gather Up Your World In One Long Breath, with Powerhouse Publishing, is his debut book. It will be accompanied by a year-long, companion artwork with the Museum. Shakthi’s debut feature film The Laugh of Lakshmi is currently in production, coming to cinemas in 2027. He has plays, TV series and multi-disciplinary works in development. He’s the Director of Kurinji, was previously Director of Co-Curious, and was Founder and Artistic Director of CuriousWorks from 2003-2018. Shakthi is a Creative Australia and Sidney Myer Fellow, and a recipient of the Phillip Parson’s and Kirk Robson awards. In 2026 he won the prestigious global Windham-Campbell Prize for Drama.

Artwork for Eamon Flack

Eamon Flack

Co-Writer/Co-Director

Eamon Flack is the Artistic Director of Belvoir St Theatre. He trained as an actor at WAAPA from 2001 to 2003 and has since worked as a director and writer around Australia and internationally, from the Tiwi Islands to Sri Lanka, London and New York. He has directed numerous award-winning productions for Belvoir, including Counting and Cracking with S. Shakthidharan (Helpmann Award for Best Play, Best New Australian Work, and Best Direction of a Play, Sydney Theatre Award for Best Play), Angels in America (Helpmann Award for Best Play), August: Osage County (Sydney Theatre Awards for Best Director and Best Show), and The Glass Menagerie (Helpmann Award for Best Play). His collaborations with S. Shakthidharan have won the Victorian Premier's Literary Prize, The Nick Enright Prize for Playwriting, and Victorian Premier's Prize for Drama. Eamon has adapted numerous works including Olga Tokarczuk’s Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead, Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita, Helen Garner’s The Spare Room, Hendrik Ibsen’s Ghosts, and Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard and Ivanov.

Artwork for Dale Ferguson

Dale Ferguson

Set & Costume Designer

Dale Ferguson’s most recent credits for Melbourne Theatre Company include 37, Come Rain or Come Shine, Emerald City, Cosi, An Ideal Husband, Born Yesterday, The Weir, The Speechmaker, The Crucible and Top Girls. Other recent credits include Julius Caesar (Pinchgut Opera); the Melbourne Rising Festival, Counting and Cracking (Belvoir, transferred to New York), Lucia Di Lammermoor (Melbourne Opera), Death of a Salesman (GWB Entertainment); A German Life (STCSA/Adelaide Festival); L’Appartement (Queensland Theatre); The Jungle and the Sea, Sami in Paradise, The Blind Giant is Dancing, Brother's Wreck and The Judas Kiss, the latter of which transferred to West End (Belvoir); Because the Night, Away, Night on Bald Mountain, Dance of Death (Malthouse Theatre); Exit the King (Broadway); Les Liasions Dangereues (Sydney Theatre Company). Dale received Helpmann Awards for August: Osage County and Counting and Cracking. He has also received a number of Green Room Awards, most recently in 2022 for Because the Night, as well as Tony and Drama Desk nominations for Exit the King on Broadway.

Artwork for Damien Cooper

Damien Cooper

Lighting Designer

Damien designs lighting for dance, theatre, opera a film. Select designs include Golden Shield (Melbourne Theatre Company); Into the Woods, Light Shining In Buckinghamshire, Wayside Bride, Things I Know To Be True, Counting and Cracking, Mark Colvin’s Kidney, The Dog/The Cat, Radiance, The Glass Menagerie, Coranderrk, Miss Julie (Belvoir); Blithe Spirit, White Pearl (with National Theatre of Parramatta), Top Girls, Dinner, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Disgraced, Arcadia, Orlando, The Golden Age, Suddenly Last Summer, The Women of Troy, The Lost Echo, Riflemind, Tot Mom, King Lear, The Shape of Things, These People, Morph, Thyestes, Far Away, Bed, This Little Piggy, Julius Caesar, Summer Rain, Boy Gets Girl, The Metamorphosis, Bloodland (with Queensland Theatre, Adelaide Festival and Bangarra), Pygmalion (Sydney Theatre Company). Damien also designs lighting for other forms of performance art, including over 150 opera, ballet and dance productions. He has been awarded three Sydney Theatre Awards, three Green Room Awards and two Australian Production Designers Guild Awards.

Artwork for Arjunan Puveendran

Arjunan Puveendran

Composer

Arjunan is a vocalist and percussionist. He has co-presented and performed in various arts projects including: Atma: Music and Movement (2017), Bhakti: Art and Devotion (2018), Bhoomi: Woman and Earth (2019), Re-imagining Dance: Brown Bodies on the Global Stage (2020) along with Bhoomi: Our Country for Sydney Festival 2021. He was Composer and Musician on the critically acclaimed The Jungle and the Sea (Belvoir, Lingalayam Dance Company), for which he won the Sydney Theatre Award for Best Original Score. He also featured in the multi-award-winning play Counting and Cracking (2019) by Belvoir and Co-Curious. He has sung for digital works: short film Anthi (2021) by Iqbal Barkat; ABC series The Disposables (2023); and Monica Rani Rudhar's work for Sydney Biennale (2026). He performed dramatic monologue and vocals for Idam: Place (2022). Arjunan was named by the Australia Council in its cohort of 25 Arts Leaders in 2020. He currently serves on the Board of Company B Limited (Belvoir).

Artwork for Steve Francis

Steve Francis

Sound Designer

Steve has worked extensively in theatre, dance and screen. His Melbourne Theatre Company credits include: The Children, The Weir, and The Sublime. His other theatre credits include Cursed, My Brilliant Career, Packer & Sons, Things I Know To Be True, Winyanboga Yurringa, Every Brilliant Thing, The Sugar House, The Book of Everything, The Power of Yes, Ruben Guthrie, Baghdad Wedding, and Capricornia (Belvoir); No Pay No Way!, Appropriate, Still Point Turning, The Father, The Hanging, Disgraced, Battle of Waterloo, Switzerland, The Long Way Home, The Secret River, Machinal and Bloodland (Sydney Theatre Company); Hamlet, Henry V (Bell Shakespeare); and Between Two Waves, This Year’s Ashes, Speaking in Tongues (Griffin Theatre Company). For dance, Steve has composed music for Wudjang, Sandsong, Dark Emu, Bennelong, Belong, True Stories, Skin, Walkabout, Bush (Bangarra Dance). His awards include Helpmann Awards for Best Original Score in 2012 and 2003 and Best New Australian Work in 2003 and Sydney Theatre Awards in 2011 and 2014.

Artwork for Véronique Benett

Véronique Benett

Original Lighting Designer

Véronique is a lighting and set designer, and costume designer. In 2019, Véronique completed a Master of Fine Art (Design for Performance). She also holds a Bachelor of Fine Art (Technical Theatre and Stage Management) from NIDA. As a lighting designer, Véronique’s credits include The Jungle and the Sea, Tell Me I’m here, The Wolves (Belvoir); Banging Denmark (Sydney Theatre Company); The Great Divide (Ensemble Theatre); Sacre (Circa); The Smallest Hour (Griffin Theatre Company); John (Outhouse Theatre Co.); Lumen Machine, Psychadelic Frenzy (Ensemble Offspring); Eternal Light and Pleasures of Versailles (Pinchgut Opera). Véronique’s associate lighting designer credits include Scenes from the Climate Era, Cursed! (Belvoir); Julia (Sydney Theatre Company); Humans 2.0 (Circa); Prime Facie (Griffin Theatre Company); Cry-Baby (Hayes Theatre Co.). She has received four Sydney Theatre Award nominations for Exit the King, Ulster American, Happy Days and John. Véronique participated in Melbourne Theatre Company’s Women in Theatre Programme in 2020.

Artwork for Mehhma Malhi

Mehhma Malhi

Assistant Director

Mehhma Malhi is an up-and-coming director. She has experience in philosophy, bioethics, and journalism and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy and Politics from New York University and a Master of Science in Bioethics from Columbia University. At NIDA, she held the Animal Logic Entertainment scholarship. Her directorial work includes Ephemera by Anchuli Felicia King, Poof! by Lynn Nottage (Actors Centre Australia and NIDA); Dragonfly – Peach Fur Music Video (Triple J), which won Best Music Video at Prague Music Awards and Best Director at the LA Music Awards; ALL BOYS by Xavier Hazard (KXT Storytellers Festival); The Mountain Remembers by Daley Rangi (Lysicrates Prize); Kufa the Hero by James Elazzi (Martin Lysicrates ‘24), ALL BOYS (KXT Full Season) which was nominated for Best Ensemble at the STA Awards; Amber by Nikita Waldron, and Fitz Happens by Melanie Tait, Mary Rachel Brown, Louis Nowra, Kate Mulvany, and Nicholas Brown (Old Fitz). She was assistant director for Jessica Arthur on Kindness by Matthew Whittet.

Artwork for Nigel Poulton

Nigel Poulton

Fight Director

Nigel Poulton is an award-winning movement director, fight and intimacy coordinator, SAG-AFTRA/MEAA stunt performer and actor with over 25 years of professional experience. Nigel’s choreography credits include Finnish National Ballet, The Australian Ballet, New York City Ballet, The Metropolitan Opera, Sydney Theatre Company, Bell Shakespeare, Washington Opera Company, Opera Australia, Circus Oz, Melbourne Theatre Company, Queensland Theatre, Belvoir, La Boite and Kooemba Jdarra. Nigel’s film and television work includes Deadlock, Nautilus, Poker Face, Thor: Love and Thunder, Escape from Spiderhead, Ding Dong You’re Gay, Occupation 2, Pirates of the Caribbean V, Deadline Gallipoli, The Water Diviner, The Bourne Legacy, Vikingdom and Winter’s Tale. Nigel is a certified Intimacy Director/Coordinator with Intimacy Directors and Coordinators and has been awarded Fight Master status with the Society of American Fight Directors. Nigel is also a certified Fight Director and past President of the Society of Australian Fight Directors Inc and an Honorary Fight Director with Fight Directors Canada.

Current as of March 2023.

Artwork for Laura Farrell

Laura Farrell

Vocal Coach

Laura Farrell is a voice and dialect coach living and working on Gadigal land. She holds a Masters of Fine Arts in Voice from NIDA, a Post Graduate Diploma in Voice from the Victorian College of the Arts, and a Bachelor of Music Theatre from the Victorian College of the Arts. A current lecturer from NIDA’s BFA, Laura has also taught on multiple Sydney training programs, including NIDA’s Diploma of Stage and Screen and Diploma of Music Theatre, Actors Pulse, Sydney Acting Studio, Actors Centre Australia and The University of Wollongong. Laura’s credits including Counting and Cracking, Never Close, Lose to Win, Holding the Man, At What Cost?, Miss Peony, The Master & Margarita, Into the Woods, Blue, The Jungle and the Sea, Tell Me I’m Here, Fangirls, Counting and Cracking (Belvoir); Pear Shaped (Rogue Projects); F*** It Bucket (LeftBank Productions); Reluctant Sea Shanty (UNHCR); Picnic at Hanging Rock, She Said. Revolt Again. (NIDA); and Paper Stars (Salty Theatre).

Artwork for Thinesh Thillainadarahjah

Thinesh Thillainadarahjah

Community Liaison

Thinesh is an Eelam Tamil queer lawyer and creative hailing from Toronto, Canada. Aside from his day job as a banking lawyer, he is the creator and co-producer of You Have Been Told A lie, a podcast that chronicles the journey of the Nadesalingam family and Tamil asylum seekers, geopolitics and border surveillance, and Australia's complicity in human rights violations both domestically and abroad. You Have Been Told A Lie won Best News and Affairs Podcast at the 2023 iHeart Australia Podcast Awards. He is also the creative producer of Hot Sauce, a gathering that aims to create an intentional space to celebrate the lives of queer people of colour. Thinesh has also been involved in community engagement with Belvoir, Sydney Festival and Artspace. He currently serves on the Board of Utp in Western Sydney and Passage Gallery in Haymarket.

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Southbank Theatre, The Sumner

140 Southbank Boulevard

Southbank, Victoria 3006

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