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Artists and ensembles featured in the 2010 Crack Theatre Festival include:

Applespiel
Applespiel is a collective of young artists who studied together at the University of Wollongong. Formed out of an interest in dodgy (yet hilarious) aesthetic ideals and the intellectual rigor of prog-rock concept albums, they have pursued these concerns through installation, curatorial and performance works.

Anthony Arblaster
Anthony is an independent lighting designer, production and stage manager from Canberra and works as a casual technician and technical manager in the ACT. Anthony is completing a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Law at the Australian National University.

Van Badham
Van Badham is an Australian playwright and Literary Manager of the Finborough Theatre, London. Her first novel, Burnt Snow, has just been published by Pan Macmillan Australia.

Max Barker
Max Barker is a performer, actor, writer, tutor, maker, player, yeller, drawer, brother, drinker, dancer, cooker, laugher, lover and rock n roller based in Melbourne.

Bron Batten
Bron Batten is a Melbourne based theatre-maker, producer, choreographer and performer. Bron premiered her long awaited solo work Welcome to the Jungle at the 2009 Melbourne Fringe Festival and is a theatre reviewer for Australian Stage and Artshub.

Simon Binns
Simon Binns is a Performer/Director who recently graduated with a degree in Performance from the University of Wollongong. He is a founding member of the performance collective Applespiel, who you can see in action in Applespiel’s Morning Commercial Breakfast Radio Show, and writes a theatre blog called The Perf.

Paul Black
The Sydney alt-culture’s once-favoured amateur Frank N. Furter insists that he has played in bands, generated sound effects, film soundtracks and soundscapes for the last twenty years, which comes as a surprise to anyone other than people who know him, and even then, who can tell?

Daniel Brine
Daniel Brine is the Artistic Director and CEO of Performance Space, one of Australia’s leading organisations for the development and presentation of interdisciplinary art.  Previously he was Associate Director at the Live Art Development Agency, worked for Arts Council England and the Australia Council, and in 2000 was co-director of the NOW Festival.

Red Button
The Red Button makes performances based on dreams, ideas and images. We make these shows out of the objects, materials, artists, artforms that are available. We do this because we want to see what happens. Do not push the red button. The beautiful, shiny red button! The jolly, candy-like red button… A Melbourne-based physical theatre company, sprung from the overactive imaginations of circus performers Ivan Smith and Shaun Plumtree.

Pete Butz

David Clapham
David is a director, performer and a former Associate Director of Crack Theatre Festival. He recently completed his PhD in Literature and Theatre Studies.

Spill Collective
Spill produces art and events which showcase experimental and hybrid works from Australia’s most esteemed emerging artists, having devised works for Federation Square, fortyfive downstairs, Cream Fields and Boroughs Festival, and curating Melbourne’s infamous Spill Party and Llips events. Spill creates sensory and visceral art experience plummeting through the senses.

BURN Collective
BURN Writers Collective is a southeast Queensland-based organisation dedicated to developing innovative performance, publication, and collaborative opportunities for young and emerging writers in Queensland. BURN was established in 2008 and in its inaugural year produced Writing – The Fringe Festival, a three-day program of literary events to coincide with (and endorsed by) the Brisbane Writers Festival. BURN has continued to grow with over thirty young and emerging writers in active artistic control, all of whom are engaged in a variety of capacities in Australia’s literary scene.

Benjamin Crowley
Ben is the Finance Manager and a key member of the performance troupe of Impro ACT. In 2010, he was a cast member of 1st Scene Last Seen that performed at the Adelaide Fringe Festival, Producer and performer in Impro Secret and The Target, and a Finalist in Canberra’s National Impro Challenge. Ben was also a key organiser for the inaugural Improvention, Australasia’s 1st ever Improvisation Convention which brought together the Artistic Directors of all the leading improvisation companies around Australia as well as Australia’s best improvisers to discuss the craft and present a festival of shows.

Michaela Dabson

Kerri Dibben

Tom Doig
Tom Doig is a writer, performer and serial TiNA attendee. He is currently making a documentary about his cycle trip from Mörön to Mörön, and writing a climate change comedy show about selling ice to the remains of the Eskimos. You will find him sitting under a tree in Civic Park reading out Spalding Gray’s Swimming to Cambodia.

Caravan of Dooom
The Caravan of Dooom are a three person performance collective based in Melbourne. Formed in the lead up to the 2008 This Is Not Art festival, they utilise their broad range of skills to create work which is a bastard blend of circus, sideshow, absurd comedy and physical theatre. They have also been Peru’s favourite blend of Marmalade since 1987. Enjoyed on toast, as well as at major music and art festivals around Australia.

Di Drew
On-again/off-again Novocastrian, a mere & modest spring duckling at 21; freelance event coordinator, musician, drag king/queen, novice gardener, poltergeist. Answers all complaints re: Penis Tower Anti-Slam, faux-gypsy band Men Who Drip with Germs amongst others, & is also currently acting as Festival Director of Short+Sweet Newcastle.

xs Entertainment
XS Entertainment is connecting local community with the Entertainment and Performing Arts Industries on a global scale, changing the way creative people work and network on the Sunshine Coast. XS Entertainment is the catalyst for innovative creative change in the region, having come to the conclusion that for years, the Sunshine Coast has been losing many of our most talented creative people to our larger cities, where networks and support for artists is part of established tradition. We honour all art forms and encourage artists to work and play outside of their comfort zones, across multiple styles and genre, in a collaborative, organic way that challenges artists and audiences alike.

Hayley Forward
Hayley Forward is a sound designer and engineer, and one half of Sydney-based collaboration with Jess Olivieri and the Parachutes for Ladies. Their work sits at the juncture of visual art, performance, sound and video installation. Most recent work includes “I thought a musical was being made”, for Melbourne’s 2010 Next Wave festival.

The Ghost of 29 Megacycles
Greg Taw creates a sensual audio fantasy experience. It is designed to help you relax and reach fulfillment through guided imagery. As you go further and further into this state of deep relaxation, you will feel more and more comfortable and peaceful.

Pat Gordon

Kylie Gral
Kylie Gral is a dreamer, eater, thinker, believer, teacher, cleaner, dancer, writer, designer, improviser, observer, operator and explorer of all things sensory and stimulating.

Declan Greene
Declan Greene is a writer and theatre maker from Melbourne. His plays include Rageboy, A Black Joy, and Moth, and have been performed at the Storeroom, the Malthouse and the Sydney Opera House among others. He has won the Malcolm Robertson Prize, the R.E. Ross Trust Playwright’s Awards, and has been commissioned by Arena Theatre and Melbourne Theatre Company.

Jane Grimley
Jane is a performer and maker of funny and serious things. Her recent works are Faster Lady Godiva Faster, The Witness in the Wall (2009), A Night In Sargasso (2009) and BIRD (2008). She is currently experimenting with making and presenting live work outside conventional art spaces. Jane has studied theatre theory and practice at the University of Western Sydney and undertook contemporary performance training through PACT in 2006. Following her interests in the politics of working in public spaces, she participated in workshops with Mexican performance group La Pocha Nostra and site specific performance artist Marilyn Arsem, at the National Review of live Art Glasgow, 2008.

Sisters Grimm
QWEER D.I.Y TH3ATR3 TROUPE SIST3RS GRIMM (AKA!1!!! ASH FLANDERS & DECLAN GREENE) R A R3LATIEVLEY MINOR CUM-STAIN ON TEH FABRIC OF OSHTRAYAN TH3ATR3!1!!11!1 WTF LOL TH3Y R RESPONSIBLA FOR HIGHLEY DISPOSABLE TRASH-THEATR3 WASTE SUCH AS MOMMIE & DA MINISTER, CELLBLOCK BOOTAY, LITTL3 MERCY AND THEYRE BIGAST HIT 2 DAET BUMTOWN DA MUSICAL!!!11!1 HAETZ BAK OF CUZ WE R HELLA HOT BIATCHAS N WA JUZT DONT CAER!!!!!111!11!1!1!1!1!!!!11

Jane Gronow
As editor of Lowdown Magazine, Australia’s only publication dedicated to performing arts for, by and with young people, Jane Gronow is responsible for the entire Lowdown program. Once upon a time Jane emerged as a CCD practitioner and was responsible for Artwork Magazine – the national community cultural development journal and ccd.net the national CCD website and portal.

Hadley
Hadley is an ACT based performance poet, writer, actor, drama tutor, theatre maker, story teller, event manager, dogsbody, squid enthusiast, MC, and wild eyed, incoherent rummy. This is his third year co-facilitating the awful Sunday night party, and looks forward to more lube-boarding, dance fighting and paint related mishaps.

Cathy Hagarty
Catherine began her working life as a High School Drama Teacher. During this time she was performing for ImproACT, a Canberra improvised theatre group. In 2009 she left teaching to pursue an acting career. She became the education co-ordinator for ImproACT and one of their key performers. In this role she performed alongside Daniel Cordeaux from Thank God you’re here and Jay Lai’gia from Playschool and Water Rats.

Sam Henning
Sam Henning is a visual artist and performer who has worked with The Deep Sea Astronauts theatre troupe on many delightfully wicked plays as they have toured festivals including High and Dry, Peates Ridge, The Secret Garden and Imagine. The Deep Sea Astronauts are a scalable group of artist, actors and musicians managed by Alli Sebastian Wolf.

Richard Higgins
Richard Higgins is one half of Barry award nominated duo ‘The List Operators’ (with Matt Kelly) and is the usual host of ‘The Last Tuesday Society’. He is also a Clown Doctor.

Brenna Hobson
Brenna Hobson is the General Manager of Company B Belvoir. Previously she has been General Manager of Jigsaw Theatre Company and Production Manager for both Bangarra Dance Theatre. She has also produced a number of independent productions and lists wrangling Australian artists in obscure parts of the globe whilst on tour as among her favourite pursuits.

Michal Imielski
Polish born director Michal Imielski began his career as an illusionist, puppeteer and a composer before becoming the artistic director of Shh. Michal has worked internationally in film, theatre and opera with artists/companies including Philippe Genty, Barrie Kosky, Christoph Schlingesief, Opera Australia, STC, Komische Opera, Leszek Madzik (KUL) and Andrzej Woron (Kreatur Theater).

Hunter Impro Network
The Hunter Impro Network was established in 2008 to help create improvisation based activities such as training, workshops and theatresports competitions in regional and rural areas of the Hunter Valley.

Dee Jefferson
When she’s not editing the BRAG, Dee is mostly watching films, often watching theatre/dance/cats, and only occasionally sleeping. The best part of her job is getting to explore Sydney’s cultural jungle, and conducting convoluted interviews with interesting creative people. In nine years of reviewing films, she’s never worked out a consistent system for remembering a pen and paper.

Dead DJ Joke
Dead DJ Joke is the pseudonym of Reuben Ingall. Most of the time he makes fairly-serious-bedroom-computer-guitar-music. As a DJ he creates absurdist party mashups from the internet bargain bin of oblivion. Think ringtones, youtube rap, beats from dubstep to breakcore and trashy pop zombification. reubeningall.com

Mitchell Jones
Mitchell has been training and performing in Circus since he was 14. His training includes a stint in youth troupe Trick Circus, Physical Theatre with John Bolton, Bouffon with Eric Davis, and most recently he was a participant in the Andante project with La Fura Dels Baus director Younes Bachir. He has performed for major festivals in almost every state of Australia. As well as performing sideshow, acrobatics and clowning, Mitch works as a theatre technician in lighting, rigging and tent construction for companies such as Circus Oz and The Garden of Unearthly Delights. He likes punk music, causing mischief and fast motorcycles.

Alex Kelly
Alex is a media/arts/ratbaggery producer based in Alice Springs. Alex is passionate about stories, justice and change. Alex was Creative Producer of Big hARTs acclaimed Ngapartji Ngapartji project for 6 years and is currently dreaming up her next project which may involve boats or a comedy tv series for a post apology Australia.

Dan Koop
Dan Koop works variously as an Artist and Producer of new performances and events. As an artist Dan has collaborated to create several performance events in Australia and the UK for various locations such as a laundrette, caravan, church, meat market, bar, indoors and outdoors, often as part of festivals. With his Producer cap on, Dan has worked in the Programming teams at BAC (London), Brisbane Powerhouse and Sydney Festival. Dan is presently undertaking a Masters of Art In Public Space at RMIT.

Lian Low
Lian Low is a Chinese-Malaysian-Australian writer and performing artist. She has been published by ArtsHub Australia, Melbourne queer street press and independent media magazines and websites. She is Peril’s Prose Editor.

Peter Matheson
Before going freelance in 2002, Peter Matheson worked for 13 years as literary manager with Melbourne Theatre Company. Since then he has assessed scripts and/or worked dramaturgically with most of the major mainstage (as well as many smaller and regional) theatre companies and all the assessment agencies in Australia.

Margaret Mayhem
Margaret Mayhem has been performing as Schappylle Scragg in Sydney since 2005, and in Melbourne since 2009, flying the Aussie flag at Mori Gallery, Artspace, VCA and lesbian porn magazines. After scraping off the fake tan and flag tattoos, Dr. Mayhem makes art, writes about art, reads philosophy and works in research with culturally and linguistically diverse communities.

Jeff McCann

Nick McCorriston

Chris Mead

Naomi Milthorpe
Naomi Milthorpe is a Canberra writer and arts worker. Among her several jobs are publicist at The Street Theatre, tutor of literature at the ANU, invigilator and (until recently) editor of Exhibitionist in BMA Magazine. She has directed shows in Canberra since 2001; in 2010 she directed a production of Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost.

Brendan O’Connell
Brendan O’Connell is a director, theatre maker, performer and arts worker who is currently the Artistic Director of Tantrum Theatre.

Holly Orkin
Holly Orkin is a 2009 Performing Arts Graduate from Wollongong University, since graduating she has worked as a performer, researcher and reviewer and is hoping to learn how to be a producer so she can help facilitate other peoples creative work.

Penis Tower Anti-Slam Collective
Tightly-woven sweater of the well & not-so-well spoken, born & bred in Newcastle; those who whimper, those who howl.

Natalie Randall
Natalie is an emerging performance maker working across forms of installation, time-based performance, and physical theatre. Natalie graduated with a BCA from the University of Wollongong (2008). Since graduating Natalie has worked mainly collaboratively as a performer and devisor in Team Mess at Quarterbred 08, Underbelly 08, Cab Sav 09 as part of Imperial Panda Festival and most recently in Killing Don, as part of the 2009 season at Performance Space. Natalie is a co-founder of Tiger Two Times who have presented work at Nighttimes #7, PACT Theatre and the Melbourne Fringe 2009.

Versificator Regis
Poet Laureate Steve Smart’s stately word-meanderings blended seamlessly with the art/punk/noise post-wave explosion of feedback manipulator Transmissions. Together they take aim at the proletariat and finish with a game theory-influenced bout of Russian roulette.

Candy Royalle
Candy Royalle has been writing and performing an arresting blend of poetry, storytelling and song for over ten years. Variously described as ‘intensely passionate’, ‘unique’ and ‘mesmerising’, Candy Royalle draws on the world around her for inspiration. Using experiences gathered during her lifetime, her subjects range from love to politics, people she’s met along the way and occasional rants.

Catherine Scobie
Cat (hero) has worked as a performer and artist since her eruption on the Australian and European Festival circuit at the Glastonbury Festival in 1999. Combining training in Visual Arts and Theatre, Cat worked as a Stencil Artist at the Glastonbury Festival 2009, a Lantern builder and performer for Woodford Folk Festival favourites Light N Up 2007, and as a Lighting Director for Next Wave festival 2008 (Four Rogues). As a performer with strong technical abilities, she enjoys combining these talents to create rich visual on-stage scenarios. She would love to have a magical teleporting Unicorn, please, thank you.

Laura Scrivano
Laura Scrivano is a director and writer from Shellharbour, NSW and is of Italian-Australian heritage. Laura currently lives in Sydney and spends her time directing, writing or creating work for the stage, screen and web. Current projects include Leviathan, a new cross cultural work for Sydney Theatre Company, the world premiere of Sweet Bird andsoforth by Laura Naumann and The Boy Sat, a new work in development with poet and hip hop artist Omar Musa. In her spare time, Laura plays a mean tambourine for Blues/Soul band The Hungry Mile and blogs at collisionprojects.wordpress.com.

Surgical Sideshow
Quite possibly mad. All of them.

Steve Smart

Ivan Smith
Ivan Smith is a physical theatre practitioner, graduate of NICA, co-creator of The Red Button, and has been performing locally and internationally since 2001.

The Masters of Space and Time
The Masters of Space and Time.

Spartak
hellosQuare label head Shoeb Ahmad (guitar, computer, voice, woodwinds) and Evan Dorrian (drum kit, percussion, computer, field recordings) have spent the last three years exploring a hybrid sound of ‘indie’ rock, free jazz, electronic music and modern composition through improvisation, both live and on record.

Quinn Stacpoole
Hailing from Melbourne, Quinn is a writer, singer/songwriter, musician and piano teacher. He regularly collaborates with the Melbourne poetry/spoken word scene and is a member of two bands.

Shasta Sutherland

Ssh
Shh is a company specialising in object/puppet works, as well as hybrid and interactive theatre. Shh has received many prestigious awards and has toured nationally as well as internationally, the highlight being a performance at the Sydney Opera House in 2005 with the self titled show: ‘Shh’.

Svelt
Svelt are a band that does experimental live beats. They use squelchy synths, stabbing guitars and live drums. They create lush wonky beats, manic disco, jungle, dub and dark techno. They are influenced by a range of artists, from Flying Lotus to Jean Michel Jarre to Aphex Twin to Modeselektor, and local artists Pivot and The Bird.

Emily Taylor
Emily is a Melbourne based actor, singer, theatre teacher and musician. Largely from a theatre background, she has trained extensively in physical, improvised and exploratory theatre, and has appeared in numerous short films and commercials.

Surface Tension Quintet
Surface Tension Quintet is a five piece marching band whose steam punk inspired instruments play bubbles rather than music. Catch their colourful performances as they march through the festival delighting young and old with their visual representations of musical notes. Created by Sam Henning and brought to you by the Deep Sea Astronauts this is music as you have never seen it before.

Tantrum Theatre
Tantrum Theatre is Newcastle’s leading youth arts organisation. It creates bold new work, and provides innovative workshop programs and professional industry pathways for young people and emerging artists. Its Emerging Writers Program consists of three young playwrights from the Hunter region: Dean Blackford, Penelope Kentish and Bradley McDonald.

Wazzadeeno Wharton-Thomas
Wazza (not warren) has been involved in the theatre/performance art community of Melbourne since his first performance with the Museum Of Modern Oddities in Edinburgh gardens, 1999, and the London International Festival of Theatre in 2000. As the lead singer in Melbourne band “The Filthy Bourgeois” he is experienced in the lethal mixture of music, theatre and circus. Wazza has also performed in shows such as Mercury Fur by Little Death Productions (Theatreworks St Kilda; The Griffin Theatre, King’s Cross Sydney), Fake Porno by Ride On Theatre (Lupa, Westgarth; Powerhouse, Brisbane) and his latest show Glasoon with The Black Lung theatre company. Has hair and eyes and wears pants, but sewing skills are not quite up to standard; Wazzadeeno is a multi-faceted being, perhaps because he is a Gemini (or at least his mother had one when he was 14). Dined with Yeltsin, Arm-wrestled Putin. Over and out.

Martin White
Martin works in Melbourne as a director, dramaturge and theatre teacher. He has directed repeat seasons of the award winning cabaret “The Beautiful Losers” and “The Suicide Show” (a cabaret he co-wrote and directed) was nominated for 4 Green Room Awards in 2010.

Crack Theatre Festival Artists 2009
Anna Barnes
Cathy Petocz
Matthew Kneale
Daniel Koerner
Zoe Meagher
Zackari Lovelorn
Dragonfly and Julez
Hanna Cormick
Charles Martin
Benjamin Forster
Julian Fleetwood
Seung Baek
Andrew Galan
Steve Smart
Erin Kelly
Alli Sebastian Wolf
Jane Grimley
The DeConverters
Quarterbred
Sensitive New Age Gang
Arran Mckenna
Dan Jobson
Jack Lloyd
Mick Bailey
David Shaw
Reuben Ingall
Svelt
Josh Inman
The Tragic Troubadours
Yolande Norris
Dee Jefferson
Mark Rogers
Simon Binns
Holly Orkin
Lachlan Tetlow-Stuart
Mish Gregor
Jeff Khan
Annette Madden
Jennifer Hamilton
Jon Thomsen
Chris Carmody
Leah Shelton
Jackson Castiglione
Sam King
Emma Kelly
Grahame Thompson
Min Mae
Amy Turton
Ella McDonald
Tom Doig
Infinite Other
Isle Adore
Grant Hunter
Paul Gough
Laine Stewart
Dan Koop
Chloe Gordon
HaiHa Le
Carl Nilsson-Polias
Lovelorn Living Party
Emma Ramsay

Festival Production 09
David Finnigan
Gillian Schwab
Anthony Arblaster
David Clapham
Adam Hadley
Thomas Henning
Nick McCorriston
Peter Butz
Hanna Cormick
Lina Andonovska