STAGES with Peter Eyers

Tune in to a Broadway Spotlight edition of the STAGES podcast. A Spotlight replay brought to you by Academy Travel - a leading specialist in small-group cultural tours.
In January 2024, Academy Travel will be leading a 10 day tour to sample the best of Broadway and New York - alongside a host of cultural experiences at museums and galleries populating The Big Apple.
Find further information at the Academy Travel website … academytravel.com.au and search Theatre in New York - Best of Broadway tour.
To whet the appetite, STAGES will be revisiting conversations with Australian artists who have conquered The Great White Way in a series of Broadway SPOTLIGHT episodes - brought to you by Academy Travel.
Showbiz icon Caroline O’Connor has played Broadway 3 times - in Chicago, A Christmas Story and Anastasia. They are but 3 of her theatrical triumphs contributing to a career of star turns in a vast resume of stage roles.
Caroline O’Connor was a guest on the STAGES podcast in January 2019.

Tune in to a Broadway Spotlight edition of the STAGES podcast. A Spotlight replay brought to you by Academy Travel - a leading specialist in small-group cultural tours.
In January 2024, Academy Travel will be leading a 10 day tour to sample the best of Broadway and New York - alongside a host of cultural experiences at museums and galleries populating The Big Apple.
Find further information at the Academy Travel website … academytravel.com.au and search Theatre in New York - Best of Broadway tour.
To whet the appetite, STAGES will be revisiting conversations with Australian artists who have conquered The Great White Way in a series of Broadway SPOTLIGHT episodes - brought to you by Academy Travel.

Hayden Tee is currently touring Australia in the new Musical phenomenon - & Juliet. But he is no stranger to appearing on the stages of the West End and Broadway.

His triumphant turn as Inspector Javert in Les Miserables won many accolades around the globe before Hayden played the role on the Broadway stage.

Hayden Tee joined STAGES in December 2019.

When STAGES caught up with Hayden Tee, he had just released an exciting album called Hayden Tee: Face To Face. The recording features a full orchestra backing with Hayden delivering musical theatre favourites and also capturing a few of the dynamic performances he has given in a stellar career.

Tune in to a Broadway Spotlight edition of the STAGES podcast. A Spotlight replay brought to you by Academy Travel - a leading specialist in small-group cultural tours.
In January 2024, Academy Travel will be leading a 10 day tour to sample the best of Broadway and New York - alongside a host of cultural experiences at museums and galleries populating The Big Apple.
Find further information at the Academy Travel website … academytravel.com.au and search Theatre in New York - Best of Broadway tour.
To whet the appetite, STAGES will be revisiting conversations with Australian artists who have conquered The Great White Way in a series of Broadway SPOTLIGHT episodes - brought to you by Academy Travel.
Maree Johnson opened the premiere Australian production of The Phantom of the Opera in Melbourne in 1990 as a member of the ensemble and a cover for Christine …. later becoming the Christine Alternate. 
In the most wonderful serendipity, a couple of decades later, Maree rejoined The Phantom of the Opera - on Broadway. This time Maree played the role of Madame Giry - a role she relished from 2017 through to the closure of the production earlier this year.
Maree Johnson was a treasured addition to the STAGES podcast … joining us in March 2020.

Tune in to a Broadway Spotlight edition of the STAGES podcast. A Spotlight replay brought to you by Academy Travel - a leading specialist in small-group cultural tours.
In January 2024, Academy Travel will be leading a 10 day tour to sample the best of Broadway and New York - alongside a host of cultural experiences at museums and galleries populating The Big Apple.
Find further information at the Academy Travel website … academytravel.com.au and search Theatre in New York - Best of Broadway tour.
To whet the appetite, STAGES will be revisiting conversations with Australian artists who have conquered The Great White Way in a series of Broadway SPOTLIGHT episodes - brought to you by Academy Travel.
Theatre great, Tony Sheldon triumphed as Bernadette in the musical PRISCILLA QUEEN OF THE DESERT ……following an extensive tour the production played Broadway and garnered a TONY Award nomination for Sheldon, and along the way, a slew of accolades for his spell-binding performance.
Tony Sheldon joined the podcast in November, 2018 and reflected on his brilliant career - and the realisation of a dream - playing Broadway.

Tune in to a Broadway Spotlight edition of the STAGES podcast. A Spotlight replay brought to you by Academy Travel - a leading specialist in small-group cultural tours.
In January 2024, Academy Travel will be leading a 10 day tour to sample the best of Broadway and New York - alongside a host of cultural experiences at museums and galleries populating The Big Apple.
Find further information at the Academy Travel website … academytravel.com.au and search Theatre in New York - Best of Broadway tour.
To whet the appetite, STAGES will be revisiting conversations with Australian artists who have conquered The Great White Way in a series of Broadway SPOTLIGHT episodes - brought to you by Academy Travel.
Carmel Dean is a composer/lyricist, arranger, music supervisor/director, and conductor of musical theatre, based in NYC. 
Carmel’s composition credits include Renascence, produced Off-Broadway by Transport Group in 2018. 
Her Music director/arranger credits include the Broadway productions of Funny Girl, If/Then, Hands on a Hardbody, American Idiot, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, and ….. The Notebook ….. coming to New York in the near future.
Carmel Dean joined the STAGES podcast in June 2020.

After graduating from the National Institute of Dramatic Art in 1971, Steven Tandy landed the role of Tom Sullivan in the iconic Australian television series The Sullivans. Subsequently, he has carved a career in a succession of film and stage roles. He returned to NIDA in 1995 to study directing.
With the Melbourne Theatre Company, Steven has appeared in productions of Translations, Three Sisters, The Winter’s Tale and The Maid’s Tragedy. 
For Queensland Theatre his credits include Bastard Territory, Happy Days, Romeo & Juliet, 25 Down, Loves Labours Lost, Who Cares?, Love For Love, The National Health, Juno and the Paycock, Expresso Bongo, The Badly Behaved Bunyip, The Man, The Spirit Fish and The Rainbow Snake. 
Steven’s other theatre credits include Oklahoma!, Guys and Dolls, Cats and Jesus Christ Superstar (Harvest Rain Theatre Company); Amigos, Last Drinks, Summer Wonderland, James and Johnno and The White Earth (La Boite Theatre Company); Dad’s Army, Run For Your Wife, The Rocky Horror Show, “ ‘Allo ‘Allo” (Twelfth Night); The Speakers (Nimrod Street); What If You Died Tomorrow?, See How They Run and When We Are Married (Marian Street Theatre); Who Was Harry Larsen? (New England); and The Threepenny Opera (Riverina). 
Television and film credits include Sons and Daughters, Mortified and Gettin’ Square. 
Steven is the Co-Founder of the Victorian Green Room Awards for Excellence in Theatre. 
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

Blake Erickson has worked throughout Australia, Asia, Britain, and the United States as a writer, actor, and singer. He studied drama and musical theatre at the University of Sydney and The Actor’s Connection New York. 

Previous to this, he studied Political Science and International Relations. He is the co-writer of the new Australian musical The Dismissal: An Extremely Serious Musical Comedy. Other writing credits include Pearls Before Swine and Hold Me Closer Logies Dancer (Gooding Productions, Hayes Theatre)

Acting credits include Shrek (GFO), the international tour of Cameron Mackintosh’s Les Misérables (Michael Cassel Group), Mamma Mia! (Packemin Productions), CRY-BABY, High Fidelity, Melba, and his acclaimed cabaret Hold Me Closer Logies Dancer (Hayes Theatre Co.); the Australia & New Zealand tour of Madiba, Of Thee I Sing at the Sydney Opera House; Grey Gardens, Title of Show, Forbidden Broadway, and Sondheim on Sondheim (Squabbalogic). 

Blake is presently on stage in Tina - The Tina Turner Musical at the Theatre Royal, Sydney.  The Dismissal: An Extremely Serious Musical Comedy plays The Seymour Centre, Sydney from August 26th.

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

Anna O’Byrne has established an international career spanning opera, theatre, concert and film. 

Well known for her performance as Eliza Doolittle in Opera Australia’s My Fair Lady, Anna received the 2017 Helpmann Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical. 

Andrew Lloyd Webber cast Anna as Christine Daaé in Love Never Dies, his sequel to The Phantom of the Opera. Anna made her West End debut as Christine in The Phantom of the Opera at Her Majesty’s Theatre, London. 

Subsequent West End credits include The Woman in White, Strangers on a Train, Kings of Broadway, and A Little Night Music. 

Anna debuted with English National Opera in Sweeney Todd the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, starring Emma Thompson. 

She recently completed the Australian Tour of Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap and touring with her one-woman show Becoming Eliza.

The show reflects on her unique experience and shares stories about working intimately with internationally adored icon Julie Andrews. 

Anna takes the show to Melbourne for a very special performance on August 26th.

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

Grace Barnes started her directing career as an assistant director at Sydney Theatre Company on Into the Woods and has since been a staff director at Opera Australia, and an associate or resident director on War Horse, West Side Story, Guys and Dolls, Sunset Boulevard, My Fair Lady, Fiddler on the Roof.  Originally from Scotland, she ran her own theatre company Skeklers Theatre Company for five years and her work as a playwright has been produced throughout Scotland including at the Citz in Glasgow, the Royal Lyceum and the Traverse in Edinburgh, and at Pitlochry Festival Theatre.

Grace has written the book for two musicals, Nevermore and Crossing, which premiered at the Tony Award winning Signature Theatre in Arlington.  A third musical The Blue Poppy should have premiered at Signature in 2020 but was cancelled due to the pandemic. 

Grace has a PhD from the University of Technology Sydney, and has published academic analysis on musical theatre in the journal Studies in Musical Theatre, and has contributed a chapter to the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of the Global Musical.  Her book on the place of women within musical theatre Her Turn on Stage was published in 2015, and in 2022 her book National Identity and the British Musical: from Blood Brothers to Cinderella was published by Methuen Drama.  Earlier this year, Grace’s creative biography of the first women to swim for Australia in an Olympic Games, In Search of Mina Wylie, was published.   

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

Passionate about interrogating, developing and devising new Australian work, Tim trained at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts and works as a writer, director, dramaturge and a devising theatre maker.

Tim is currently a commissioned writer for Riverside Theatres, Parramatta and The Art House Wyong to create a write a new play based on Colleen McCullough’s award-winning novel Tim due to hit the stage in 2023.

Most recently Tim saw his 2019 commission by Queensland Theatre to create a theatre script based on Trent Dalton’s Boy Swallows Universe come to life with a sold out production which premiered at the 2021 Brisbane Festival. In 2019 he was also commissioned by the Australian Chamber Orchestra (ACO) to write and direct a new work based on Margaret Wild’s There’s a Sea in My Bedroom which is due to hit the stage in July 2022.

In 2018 Tim stepped in as interim Director on Caleb Lewis’s Maggie Stone for the Eternity Playhouse, and wrote and directed Music for the Dreaming, a collaboration between ABC Classic FM and Sydney Opera House Presents. Tim also directed the ABC Classic FM/SOH Sounds like Australia earlier in 2018. He devised a new work for the SSO with Simon Tedeschi Who Needs A Conductor Anyway which premiered in March 2018. Tim was engaged by CDP to translate and write additional content for the Australasian version of Spot the Dog, set to tour nationally in 2019.

Between 2005-2017 Tim was a Creative Director and Producer at Monkey Baa Theatre Company, one of Australia’s largest touring companies for young audiences, where he co-wrote and produced nearly 20 new Australian works, including the critically acclaimed Goodbye Jamie Boyd, award winning Jackie French’s Hitler’s Daughter and Sonya Hartnett’s Thursday’s Child. Tim directed multi award winning The Peasant Prince – The True Story of Mao’s Last Dancer, which toured 36 theatres nationally. He assistant directed on Tim Winton’s The Bugalugs Bum Thief and was the remount Director on The Unknown Soldier, a new Australian play written by Sandra Eldridge. In 2017 he worked as dramaturgical consultant on Randa Abdel Fattah’s Where the Streets Had a Name.

In 2013 Tim was engaged by CDP Producers to write and direct several works for the Sydney Opera House Baby Proms Program including Swing Baby Swing featuring Wayne Scott Kermond and The Nutcracker (co directed with choreographer Adrian Burnett). He co-devised The Pirate Ship (script) for Urban Myth Theatre Company SA, A More Fortunate Life for Theatre Ink and EscapAIDS for the One Night Stand Theatre Company, a work which targeted both young people at risk and the WA prison population about HIV AIDS. He is devised a new work for the SSO Education with Simon Tedeschi called Who Needs A Conductor Anyway , which premiered in 2018.
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