Event and Ticketing Details
Dates & Times
Thursday 14 May
8:00 PM - 9:00 PM
Satirist, comic essayist, novelist, playwright, reporter, columnist, translator, screenwriter, philosopher: all describe Michael Frayn.
He is the author of Noises Off, Copenhagen and Democracy; critically-acclaimed and best-selling novels such as Headlong, Spies and The Tin Men; and has written extensively for the Guardian and the Observer. His exceptionally broad body of work showcases his warm intellect, savvy comic sensibility and deep humanity.
If you were to suspect that he’s some kind of living legend, you might just be onto something.
Celebrating fifty years since his first novel was published (The Tin Men), and in Melbourne with his wife — noted literary journalist and biographer Claire Tomalin — Michael Frayn comes to the Wheeler Centre to talk about getting started.
How do you first begin to write? What happens if you then, years later, take off in a different direction entirely? Can you ride two horses at the same time? With Chris Mead.
Featuring
Michael Frayn
Michael Frayn was born in London in 1933 and began his career as a journalist at the Guardian and the Observer. His novels include Towards the End of the Morning, Headlong, Spies and his latest, Skios. His 17 plays range from Noises Off, recently chosen as one of the UK's three favourite plays, to Copenhagen, which won the 1998 Evening Standard Award for Best Play of the Year and the 2000 Tony Award for Best Play. His most recent publication is Matchbox Theatre, a collection of 30 dialogues and monologues.
Chris Mead
Chris is literary director of the Melbourne Theatre Company.
His previous positions have included: inaugural artistic director, PlayWriting Australia; literary manager, and Wharf 2LOUD Producer, Sydney Theatre Company; and literary manager, Company B Belvoir St Theatre.
He has also been curator of the Australian National Playwrights’ Conference; and festival director of the International Festival for Young Playwrights.
Recent directing credits include Richard Frankliand's Walking into the Bigness (co-director with Wayne Blair, Malthouse Theatre 2014), which won Best Performance for VCE Theatre Studies and was nominated for three Green Room Awards, Ian Wilding’s Rare Earth (NIDA 2011) and Quack (Griffin 2010), and Damien Millar’s The Modern International Dead (Griffin 2008), which won Best New Play at the Sydney Theatre Critics’ Awards and the WA Premier’s Literary Award, as well as being shortlisted for the NSW, Queensland and Victorian Premier’s Literary Award.
Chris has a PhD from Sydney University, was awarded an inaugural Dramaturgy Fellowship by the Australia Council for the Arts in 2004. He was selected to attend New Visions New Voices at Washington DC’s Kennedy Center in 2008.
His monograph on institutional racism and outreach strategies was published by Currency House in June, 2008. He has recently written introductions to Currency Press volumes by Lachlan Philpott and Lally Katz. In 2009 Chris was named as one of Sydney’s 100 creative catalysts; he sat on the steering committee for the 2011 Australian Theatre Forum, and on the board of Arena Theatre Company (2008-13) and the artistic directorate of Hothouse Theatre (2011-14). He is currently on the Board of Theatre Network Victoria.