The Drawing Room

"The first rule of a cult is that you are never in a cult. It's always them, not us."

So writes Daniella Mestyanek Young: former military intelligence officer; combat veteran; and survivor of a childhood spent growing up in the Children of God: isolated from the outside world in compounds across South America.

In the Drawing Room, Daniella shares her remarkable story and why she decided to tell it in a new memoir, Uncultured.

With sumptuous design and a clever use of modern pop songs, Baz Luhrmann's Moulin Rouge was a tremendous success, consolidating his reputation after Romeo and Juliet.

Almost two decades later, the stage musical, based on that film, created its own legend: packing out its Broadway theatre and winning 10 Tony Awards.

Justin Levine is the show's music supervisor, orchestrator and arranger, and in the Drawing Room he explains how he put the pieces together.

A leader in the work that led to the detection of gravitational waves, Distinguished Professor Susan Scott is one of the world's leading physicists.

A childhood interest in mathematics and gravity has led to remarkable discoveries around black holes and neutron stars.

Distinguished Professor Scott has become the first Australian to win the prestigious Blaise Pascal Medal, and the first Australian to be elected as a Fellow of the International Society on General Relativity.

In the Drawing Room, she shares her path to science and what it felt like to see the result of decades of work.

The Seekers were perhaps the first Australian band to truly capture the world stage, even dislodging The Beatles and The Rolling Stones from their positions at the top of the charts.

In the Drawing Room, founding member Keith Potger looks back on the last sixty years, the personal losses of 2022, and the band's final song together, Carry Me.

Sir Andrew Davis is one of the most highly regarded conductors in the world, with a career spanning decades and taking in a number of the leading opera companies and orchestras.

He's so well regarded in fact, that orchestras just can't let him go: he's the conductor laureate at the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, the Toronto Symphony Orchestra and the BBC Symphony Orchestra.

In the Drawing Room he talks about crafting his own take on Handel's Messiah and finding comfort in translating Virgil's Aeneid.

We all know the classic pieces of orchestral music, the Stravinskys, the Beethovens, and the Bachs; music that has stood the test of time and been performed on stages across the world.

But how does a composer, working today, begin to join those ranks and hear their work come to life on stage?

In the Drawing Room, composer Leah Curtis and conductor Jessica Cottis talk about their paths to music and the debut of Leah's new composition, Infinite Possibilities.

For more than a decade, Sharon Van Etten has been winning over fans across the world with her beautiful voice and raw, emotional songs.

Her journey has taken her from New York to California, with a stop at the Roadhouse in Twin Peaks along the way and her new album, We've Been Going About This All Wrong, is music for our times: reflecting on the darkness, but with a spark of hope.

In the Drawing Room, Sharon talks about finding a community in California, reflects on the joys of touring with friends, and pays tribute to Low's Mimi Parker.

Is money a means to an end for you or a goal in itself?

And, if you're worried that you might not always be making the best decisions when it comes to your finances, is it possible to change?

Evan Lucas is the chief market strategist at InvestSMART, and in his new book, Mind Over Money, he's looking at how we can learn about ourselves and our investments.

In the Drawing Room, Evan talks about the nature of time, the challenges of envy, and why it's important to see the whole elephant.

In May last year, the Taliban once again took control of Afghanistan, following the withdrawal of US military forces.

The regime promised to respect women's rights, but the reality has been a return to earlier restrictions: on jobs, study and basic human rights.

In 2001, the Canadian author Deborah Ellis wrote the first book in her Breadwinner series, which introduced readers to Parvana, a young Afghan girl, and her struggles to overcome her place in society.

This year, Deb is taking us back to Afghanistan where an adult Parvana and her family must escape once more.

We've all those moments at the dinner table: the brilliant idea that's going to take the market by storm.

Most of us leave the idea there. After all, starting a business is a lot of work and usually involves a fair amount of risk.

But for those who want to take that good idea and make it a reality, where do you even begin?

Richard Turner has founded businesses across four different industries, most recently ZEN Energy, and was, for a time, the entrepreneur in residence for the University of South Australia.

In the Drawing Room, Richard shares his experience in business and the lessons he's included in his new book, The Essential Entrepreneur.