STAGES with Peter Eyers

John Gaden is one the theatre’s cherished elders, having contributed to the Australian stage over several decades as actor and director. 

He commenced his career studying arts and law at the University of Sydney, but when he joined the Sydney University Players, he was bitten by the theatrical bug - chiefly through the works of William Shakespeare. All thoughts of the bar were abandoned for the bard!

Early forays in the theatre saw John work during the foundation days at the Octagon Theatre in Perth. Working with Sir Tyrone Guthrie there, he toured with King Oedipus and then joined the Old Tote in 1972, playing in many productions including The Taming of the Shrew, Tartuffe, Love Labour’s Lost, Love For Love and Richard II.

He’s been a part of seminal chapters in a developing Australian theatre including the early days of Nimrod, the Paris Theatre Company (with productions of Visions and Pandora’s Cross) and the experimental Actor’s Company at the Sydney Theatre Company.

He spent three years as associate director of the new Sydney Theatre Company, including the direction of their celebrated production of Nicholas Nickleby. From 1986-1990, John was Artistic Director of the State Theatre Company of South Australia. 

His performances as actor are lengthy and legendary and include The Sunny South, Close of Play, The Man From Mukinupin, Hamlet, Amadeus, As You Desire Me, The Way of the World, Kold Komfort Kaffee at Nimrod (with Robyn Archer), Patrick White’s Signal Driver (the first production at the Belvoir), Pericles and Henry IV for Bell Shakespeare, Cloudstreet with Company B, The War of the Roses for STC and No Man's Land. He’s played King Lear at three different times in his career.

John has appeared in the premieres of many new Australian plays including Flash Jim Vaux, Kabul, An Awful Rose, A Handful of Friends, The Man Who Shot The Albatross and Money and Friends.

Most recently there have been productions of Uncle Vanya, Do Not Go Gentle and Mr Bailey’s Minder. But soon, he is back on the boards in Damian Ryan’s new adaptation of Shakespeare’s History plays in Player Kings with Sport For Jove.

The STAGES podcast is available to access and subscribe from Spotify and Apple podcasts. Or from wherever you access your favourite podcasts. A conversation with creatives about craft and career. Follow socials on instagram (stagespodcast) and facebook (Stages).

www.stagespodcast.com.au

In this Vale episode of the STAGES podcast, we replay a conversation with actor Nicholas Eadie (1958 - 22nd January 2025). 
When STAGES spoke with Nick in 202, he was enjoying a stint as an Uber driver - a sobering reminder of just how precarious the life of an actor can be - even one of our finest.
Nick’s resume boasts an impressive list of high-profile television production that we affectionately embrace as key moments in Australian television consumption.  
He gained success and fame in Australian television series’ such as Cop Shop, The Henderson Kids, A Country Practice and Medivac.
He won the Australian Film Institute's Best Actor in Mini-Series award in 1987 for Vietnam, in which he co-starred with Nicole Kidman. He played a rich would-be suitor in The Man from Snowy River II and was nominated again for his portrayal of World War II Academy Award-winning cameraman Damien Parer in John Duigan's Fragments of War, and in 2002 for Halifax f.p.
His father was Australian Broadcasting Commission radio announcer Mervyn Eadie, and Nick was a graduate of the National Institute of Dramatic Art.
Nick worked with all the major Australian theatre companies and had over 45 credits to his name. He has appeared in leading roles in plays as diverse as Tennessee Williams: The Glass Menagerie as The Gentleman Caller in a highly acclaimed performance, and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof as Brick. He played John Proctor in three separate productions of The Crucible.  
In Sydney's Botanical Gardens, he performed for three seasons as Oberon in A Midsummer Night's Dream. He played Sam in the original cast of Mamma Mia! in Australia for two years. He has been in the world premiere productions of Michael Gow's Furious, Hannie Raison's Two Brothers, Tommy Murphy's Holding the Man and the highly acclaimed Myth, Propaganda and Disaster in Nazi Germany and Contemporary America by Stephen Sewell.
It was a career of many triumphs but was without its challenge and incident. Nick talked candidly about the work he navigated and reflected on a career that both rewarded and disappointed.  
Vale Nicholas Eadie.

The STAGES podcast is available to access and subscribe from Spotify and Apple podcasts. Or from wherever you access your favourite podcasts. A conversation with creatives about craft and career. Follow socials on instagram (stagespodcast) and facebook (Stages).

www.stagespodcast.com.au

Foundation Theatres is a wholly Australian owned theatre owner, operator and production investor. Their current venues are two of Sydney’s premier large commercial theatres, the Capitol Theatre and Sydney Lyric, as well as a new intimate theatre, Foundry Theatre. 

Foundry Theatre at Sydney Lyric opened triumphantly in February with five sold out performances by Tim Minchin, with audiences blown away by the venue’s incredible sound, its intimate nature, and the unique and theatrical entry through backstage passageways.

The Chief Executive Officer of Foundation Theatres is Graeme Kearns. He has led the company since 2009. Prior to joining Foundation Theatres, Graeme was Commercial Director of one of the world’s leading event production companies. 

Whilst overseeing the organisation’s theatre operations, Graeme’s primary role focuses on the development of the organisation, strategic operations, theatrical investments and programming.

He joins STAGES to discuss Sydney’s theatrical temples, his own career trajectory and the business of show.

The STAGES podcast is available to access and subscribe from Spotify and Apple podcasts. Or from wherever you access your favourite podcasts. A conversation with creatives about craft and career. Follow socials on instagram (stagespodcast) and facebook (Stages).

www.stagespodcast.com.au

After graduating from NIDA in 1976, Tom Burlinson’s early work in various productions for the Queensland Theatre Company, the Old Tote Theatre Company, and the State Theatre Company of South Australia included roles in The Merchant of Venice, Da and The One Day of the Year. He co-starred in Tribute for Peter Williams Productions in Sydney and Brisbane and played continuing roles in the TV series Kirbys’ Company (ABC) and The Restless Years (Grundy Organisation).

In 1981 Tom was cast in the title role in the feature film The Man from Snowy River. It was an enormous box office success, and led to Tom being offered a succession of leading roles in Australian and international films and mini-series over the next several years. These included Phar Lap, Eureka Stockade, Flesh and Blood, Windrider, Piece of Cake, and The Legend of Kootenai Brown (aka Showdown at Williams Creek) as well as The Man from Snowy River I I (aka Return to Snowy River).

In 1991 Tom sang the voice of the young Frank Sinatra in the Warner Brothers mini-series Sinatra. This was his first professional singing engagement! Soon thereafter he returned to the stage to star in the Gordon Frost production of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. He was soon working on the international scene again in the mini-series The Way to Dusty Death, filmed in Europe.

In 1995 renowned theatre director Gale Edwards cast Tom in a leading role in the acclaimed workshop production of the Australian musical Miracle City for the Sydney Theatre Company. The following year he was given another chance to further develop his musical abilities in Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along, again for the STC.

In 1997 Tom hosted the TV series Animal Hospital for the Nine Network. He then appeared in concert at Taronga Zoo in A Tribute to Frank Sinatra. This prompted Tom to create Frank – A Life in Song, under its original title of Frank – The Sinatra Story in Song. On screen, Tom again provided the voice of Frank Sinatra, this time for the Australian feature film The Night We Called It A Day, starring Dennis Hopper as Frank.

Tom was cast in the role of Leo Bloom in the Mel Brooks’ musical The Producers, which played for more than 500 performances in Melbourne, Brisbane and Sydney during 2004 and 2005.

In May 2006, Tom was asked to return to the Star City Showroom with Frank-More from a Life in Song, a sequel to the first show, with lots of new songs from the marvellous Sinatra repertoire as well as many of the all-time favourites. 

In 2019 Tom returned to the musical theatre stage as an actor in the role of the unscrupulous lawyer Billy Flynn in the musical Chicago in seasons at the Capitol Theatre in Sydney and the Lyric Theatre, Brisbane. 

Tom Burlinson performs Still Swingin’ at the  Frankston Arts Centre on Sunday March 9th. 

The STAGES podcast is available to access and subscribe from Spotify and Apple podcasts. Or from wherever you access your favourite podcasts. A conversation with creatives about craft and career. Follow socials on instagram (stagespodcast) and facebook (Stages).

www.stagespodcast.com.au

A milestone passed in 2024 - one that STAGES had every intention of acknowledging… but time just got away.

It was 40 years since we saw the Australian premiere of a dynamic new production of Gilbert & Sullivans - The Pirates of Penzance.  A legendary production in the   repertoire of musical theatre on our stages, for it marked the first for many young performers - and also happened to be the first musical to occupy the Victorian Arts Centre during their Summer season.

Co-produced by Victorian State Opera, The Australian Elizabethan trust and the Victorian Arts Centre the production boasted a stellar creative team that included Noel Ferrier and Ken McKenzie Forbes as Executive Producers, Roger Barratt overseeing Lighting, Andrew Greene as Musical Director, John Scandratt on Sound, Ray Golden as Wardrobe Master and Americans John Ferraro and Craig Schaefer as Director and Choreographer.

The production showcased the extraordinary talents of Jon English as The Pirate King, Simon Gallaher as Frederic, June Bronhill as Ruth, David Atkins as the Police Sergeant and in her breakout role as Mabel Stanley, the glorious Marina Prior.

In Australia, The Pirates of Penzance has enjoyed a multitude of productions with State and National Opera Companies, G&S Societies, School productions, Amateur theatre and a further reimagined and triumphant production with Simon Gallaher’s production house - Essgee productions.

Like the STAGES celebration episode of the original Australian production of the musical vaudeville CHICAGO at 40 … here’s another STAGES composite episode garnered from conversations with many of the pirates, policemen and sisters who were a part of the legendary production of The Pirates of Penzance.

The STAGES podcast is available to access and subscribe from Spotify and Apple podcasts. Or from wherever you access your favourite podcasts. A conversation with creatives about craft and career. Follow socials on instagram (stagespodcast) and facebook (Stages).

www.stagespodcast.com.au

STAGES returns Sunday March 2nd! 

The STAGES podcast is available to access and subscribe from Spotify and Apple podcasts. Or from wherever you access your favourite podcasts. A conversation with creatives about craft and career. Follow socials on instagram (stagespodcast) and facebook (Stages).

www.stagespodcast.com.au

Haul out the holly it’s the time we adore, it’s STAGES season finale for 2024.

Throughout Season Seven we featured 81 Episodes showcasing an exciting array of stellar guests covering the gamut from on stage and back stage, to behind the scenes and front-of-house. All captivating conversations with celebrated creatives about craft and career.

In the 2024 finale episode we welcome back various STAGES regulars to acknowledge the conclusion of the seventh season of the podcast. A perfect addition to your Christmas Eve as you ready for the festivities this week and an exciting new year ahead.

This season finale episode features Mitchell Butel, Rhonda Burchmore, Trevor Ashley, Lauren Schmutter (music by Ron Creager & Tina Messina), Geraldine Turner and STAGES festive co-host, Kate Fitzpatrick. All more ready than ever to embrace exciting new adventures.

And thank you dear listeners for joining us in another year of the STAGES podcast. We wish you a very Merry Christmas and the best of times in 2025. The STAGES podcast will be back in March 2025.

The STAGES podcast is available to access and subscribe from Spotify and Apple podcasts. Or from wherever you access your favourite podcasts. A conversation with creatives about craft and career. Follow socials on instagram (stagespodcast) and facebook (Stages).

www.stagespodcast.com.au

Emma Matthews is currently head of Classical Voice and Opera Studies at the West Australian Academy of Performing Arts. She is Patron of the Wesfarmers Young Artist Program at West Australian Opera and is a highly acclaimed and awarded soprano. 

She has performed with all the state opera companies and the major Australian symphony orchestras; and at the Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, Adelaide and Huntington Festivals, with conductors including Vladimir Ashkenazy, Marko Letonja, Sir Charles Mackerras and Simone Young.

Emma has sung the title roles in Partenope, Lucia di Lammermoor, Lakmé, The Cunning Little Vixen and Lulu. Other roles have included Leila (The Pearlfishers), Amina (La Sonnambula), Philomele (The Love of the Nightingale) by Richard Mills, Ilia (Idomeneo), Juliette (Roméo et Juliette), Marie (La Fille du Regiment), Cleopatra (Giulio Cesare), Konstanze (Die Entführung aus dem Serail), Zdenka (Arabella), the four heroines (The Tales of Hoffmann), Pamina (The Magic Flute), Almirena (Rinaldo), Sophie (Der Rosenkavalier), Giulietta (I Capuleti e i Montecchi) and Cunegonde (Candide).

She is equally in demand on the concert platform, embracing a wide repertoire including the Requiems of Mozart, Brahms and Fauré, Mahler’s Symphony No. 2, masses by Poulenc, Villa Lobos, Haydn and Mozart, and Handel’s Messiah. Emma has also appeared as a special guest with José Carreras at the Sydney Opera House, and the New Year’s Eve Gala concerts for Opera Australia.

Career highlights include her Royal Opera House Covent Garden debut in the title role of The Cunning Little Vixen under the baton of Sir Charles Mackerras, Mahler’s Symphony no. 4 with Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte Carlo conducted by Yakov Kreizberg and with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and Vladimir Ashkenazy, and Ismene (Mitridate) for Sydney Festival.

More recent roles include Violetta (La Traviata), Fiorilla (Il turco in Italia), Gilda (Rigoletto), the Queen of the Night (The Magic Flute) and Donna Anna (Don Giovanni) for Opera Australia and Rosina (The Barber of Seville) for West Australian Opera. 

Her recent concert appearances include the Strauss Gala for State Opera South Australia, the national tour of From Broadway to La Scala, Les Illuminations with Ensemble Liaison, Mozart arias with Sydney Symphony, Melbourne Symphony Orchestra’s Sidney Myer Music Bowl Concert and Eight Poems of Emily Dickinson (Copland) (released on disc for MSO Live in March 2014), and the ‘Jewel Song’ from Faust (Gounod)  and the ‘Mad Scene’ from Hamlet (Thomas), also with the Melbourne Symphony, Mozart Requiem and arias with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, and recitals at Government House Sydney, with Ensemble Liaison and Sydney Omega Ensemble, featuring at Musica Viva’s Huntington Festival, Sydney Philharmonia Choirs’ Christmas concerts and Voices in the Forrest, Canberra as well as Duparc Songs with Simone Young and the ANAM Orchestra.

Further engagements have included The Space between the Notes, written especially for Emma by Paul Grabowsky and Steve Vizzard, at the Victorian Arts Centre; An Evening in Vienna with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra; Leila (The Pearlfishers) and the New Years’ Eve gala concert for Opera Australia; Violetta (La Traviata); a national tour of Voyage to the Moon – a baroque opera pasticcio for Musica Viva and Victorian Opera; Messiah with Melbourne Symphony Orchestra; Stonnington Opera in the Park and recitals at Kangaroo Valley Arts Festival, Perth Town Hall, the Melbourne Recital Centre and for Recitals Australia at Ukaria. Emma also portrayed Nellie Melba, in a new play, Melba: An Operatic Drama, by Nicholas Christo, presented at the Hayes Theatre, Sydney.

Emma’s album of bel canto arias, Emma Matthews in Monte Carlo, was released by Deutsche Grammophon / ABC Classics to critical acclaim. Her album of Mozart arias with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra and Marko Letonja conducting was released by ABC Classics in February 2014, and her most recent recording of bel canto arias with ABC Classics and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra (Andrea Molino conductor), “Agony and Ecstasy” was released in September 2016.

Emma Matthews returns to the Opera Australia stage in the New Year - as the Fairy Godmother in Massenet’s CENDRILLON. Marking the first time OA performs Massenet’s Cinderella (Cendrillon), Laurent Pelly’s highly acclaimed production will make its Australian debut after seasons at New York’s Metropolitan Opera and Covent Garden’s Royal Opera House, playing the Sydney Opera House from January 2nd to March 28th.

The STAGES podcast is available to access and subscribe from Spotify and Apple podcasts. Or from wherever you access your favourite podcasts. A conversation with creatives about craft and career. Follow socials on instagram (stagespodcast) and facebook (Stages).

www.stagespodcast.com.au

Pamela Rabe is one of Australia’s most highly regarded and awarded actors, recognised for her immense body of work on stage and screen. Canadian born, she is a graduate from the Playhouse Acting School, in Vancouver, and for the past several decades she has worked constantly in theatre across the country and around the world. 

Her work has encompassed State theatre companies and commercial theatre with dynamic performances in productions of new work and established classics that extend to God Of Carnage, Blithe Spirit, Dinner, The Misanthrope, The Marriage of Figaro, The Taming of the Shrew, A Moon for the Misbegotten, The Heidi Chronicles, The Cherry Orchard, Little Murders, As You Like It, Tristram Shandy, A Servant of Two Masters, Heartbreak House, Too Young For Ghosts, Visions, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Medea, Top Girls, 84 Charring Cross Road, The Winter’s Tale, The War of the Roses, The Serpent’s Teeth, Gallipoli, Season at Sarsparilla, The Lost Echo, Mother Courage and Her Children, The Beauty Queen of Leenane, Holy Day, The Rover, Private Lives, Three Tall Women, Lost in Yonkers, Much Ado About Nothing, The Ham Funeral, Stronger, Miss Julie, Woman Bomb, Boston Marriage, The Apple Cart, Cho Cho San, Do Not Go Gentle, The Marriage of Bette & Boo, The Glass Menagerie, Ghosts, Footfalls, Seventeen, The Children, Les Liaisons Dangereuses and Hamlet.

Forays into the musical theatre include stellar turns in Name, Grey Gardens, A Little Night Music, Into the Woods, My Fair Lady and The Wizard of Oz.

Pamela won the 1997 AFI Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role for the film The Well and also appeared in the films Cosi, Sirens and Paradise Road. Her work in television includes The Secret Life of Us, Mercury, The Bite, Rosehaven, CrashBurn, Stingers, Deadloch, Bay of Fires and Wentworth.

An equally accomplished Director, her productions have adorned the stages of the Sydney Theatre Company, Melbourne Theatre Company and Malthouse. They include Daniel Keene’s The Serpent’s Teeth: Citizens with The Actors Company, Elling, In The Next Room or The Vibrator Play and Solomon and Mary, Vanessa Bates’ Porn: Cake, and Jumpy by April de Angelis.

Pamela is presently on the Sydney stage with in Tracy Lett’s gothic family saga August: Osage County, playing Matriarch Violet Weston. The production plays at the Belvoir Theatre until December 22nd.

In 2025 she will direct and perform in Samuel Beckett’s Happy Days at the STC and deliver a delicious Mrs Danvers in Rebecca for the MTC.

The STAGES podcast is available to access and subscribe from Spotify and Apple podcasts. Or from wherever you access your favourite podcasts. A conversation with creatives about craft and career. Follow socials on instagram (stagespodcast) and facebook (Stages).

www.stagespodcast.com.au

Guy Noble is an Australian musical composer, conductor, pianist and broadcaster.

He studied piano in the early 1980s at the Sydney Conservatorium. On a scholarship from the Australia Council he travelled to London where he worked for four years, including a stint as presenter on BBC Radio 3. 

In 1984, he was pianist in the Sydney Youth Orchestra and from 1984 to 1986 in the Australian Youth Orchestra. Noble was the inaugural recipient of the Brian Stacey Memorial Trust Award for emerging Australian conductors in 1998; the trust, in collaboration with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, financed the composition and recording of Noble's Flute Concerto, written for Jane Rutter. In 2022 he was appointed as the conductor and host of the Queensland Symphony Orchestra.

Guy Noble regularly conducts the Adelaide, Sydney, Melbourne, West Australian, Tasmanian and Queensland Symphony orchestras and has worked with the Canberra Symphony, the Auckland Philharmonia and the Malaysian Philharmonic orchestras. He has been Musical Director and Musical Supervisor for musicals including Phantom of the Opera, Sunset Boulevard, Hello Dolly!, South Pacific, Man of La Mancha, How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Gypsy and the Music of Andrew Lloyd Webber.

He has recorded 12 CDs and ABC Classics in Australia has released his comedy sketch CD entitled The Guy Noble Radio Show.

He has also conducted and presented concerts with performers including Harry Connick Jr , Dianne Reeves, The Beach Boys, Ben Folds, Clive James, David Hobson, Yvonne Kenny, Teddy Tahu Rhodes and Randy Newman.

He is a former host of the ABC Classic FM radio breakfast program and he writes a regular column in Limelight magazine.

The STAGES podcast is available to access and subscribe from Spotify and Apple podcasts. Or from wherever you access your favourite podcasts. A conversation with creatives about craft and career. Follow socials on instagram (stagespodcast) and facebook (Stages).

www.stagespodcast.com.au