BWW Update: Australian Artists Join Together To Keep Creating During The COVID-19 With HOPE. A NEW WORKS DEVELOPMENT INITIATIVE
By: Jade Kops Mar. 18, 2020
BroadwayWorld Sydney is delighted to share some good news of what Australian artists are doing during the forced shutdown of theatres worldwide. With the Australian government restricting gatherings of more than 100 people Australian writer/composer/actor James Millar came up with the idea of HOPE. A NEW WORKS DEVELOPMENT INITIATIVE to keep artists 'exercising' their creativity while the world and particularly the Arts industry waits for a recovery from COVID-19.
Millar, who Australian audiences will remember from is fabulous turn as Ms Trunchbull in the Australian tour of MATILDA THE MUSICAL, has gathered an incredible group of fellow creatives from around Australia, New Zealand and a few expats living in New York, to set up a number of online workshop sessions to help continue the development of a number of new works. Theatre writers and composers of all levels of experience have submitted draft and semi-draft new works for an ever growing team of actors and creators to read and play for a forum in the same way that development workshops occur, while still satisfying the need to socially distance and self-isolate as the case may be.
While Miller is still setting up some of the finer details of who the streamed audience will be and how Question and Answer feedback will be managed, this is a fabulous show of the solidarity and tenacity that lives within the Arts industry and its many practitioners who have found themselves without work in an unprecedented worldwide shutdown. It is also tantalizing to see what can emerge from this bleak time so that there may be wonderful new works to share with the world once theatres open again.
The works include both plays and musical works and so far the online workshops include:
PRINCESS by Luke Heath
A (M)OTHER LIFE by Amity Dry's
THE MENTOR by Josh White
ESTHER by Michael Riggs
TICKETS PLEASE by Paul Morrison
THE LORELEI AND THE SIREN by Geoff Wallis with Catie Spears
GOLD by Jess New, Lindenfelzer
COBURG, MELBOURNE by Michael Bingham and Nicholas Gentile
BEAU WANTS TO BE A BILLIONAIRE by Peele and Neylon
CONVERSATIONS WITH BERLIN through Jessie Monk.
The first live streaming team will present Amity Dry's A (M)OTHER LIFE with Jennifer Vuletic, Amanda Harrison, Natalie O'Donnell and Samm Hagen reading and singing the work with Jamie Burgess on keys and directed by Petra Kalive. They will be broadcasting the work from new venue The Palais in Geelong.
If you are an out of work artist interested in contributing to HOPE. A NEW WORKS DEVELOPMENT INITIATIVE please email James Millar at james@hopenewworks.com
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