Stories I Want to Tell You in Person

By LALLY KATZ Director ANNE-LOUISE SARKS

This production of Stories I Want to Tell You in Person opened at Belvoir St Theatre on Saturday 23 March 2013.

Set & Costume Designer RALPH MYERS Lighting Designer DAMIEN COOPER Composer & Sound Designer MAX LYANDVERT Production Manager GLENN DULIHANTY Stage Manager AMY MORCOM

With LALLY KATZ

THANK YOU Mitchell Butel, Robin Monkhouse, Danielle Roffe.

PHOTOGRAPHY Heidrun Löhr DESIGN Alphabet Studio

Belvoir and Malthouse Theatre present

Stories I Want to Tell You in Person

I’ve always believed in magic.

And I’ve always felt like writing is a little bit magic. You’re sort of doing it, but you’re also getting help from some outside source – like the common consciousness or something. Or ghosts. I’m not sure what it is. But I know it’s something. Most people who have been writing for a long time talk about writing coming through them, rather than necessarily from them. Like you’re a channeller sometimes. That’s one kind of writing anyway. I don’t want to make it sound like writers don’t have to work. It takes a lot of work to get into that zone. Usually I have to clean my house about fourteen times for every one page that I write. And you have to live everything you write. Nothing good comes for free.

Despite my belief in magic, I had always avoided seeing fortune tellers. Because I was scared they would influence my future. I wanted to be the writer of my own life. But a couple of years ago I found I was getting stuck typecasting myself. And I began to think I needed a circuit breaker to change my fate.

I’ve never believed in magic.

I was the type of child who wanted to know how the trick worked. And who then wanted to master it myself. I wonder how I ended up here in the theatre?

It is an enormous challenge that Lally has taken on. To play herself. Or rather not to play, but just to be herself, on stage in front of an audience night after night. And for me

the challenge is how to best support that bold idea. How do you direct Lally Katz to be Lally Katz in a show about Lally Katz?

Lally has been brave enough to reveal herself to us. We all try to paint flattering versions of ourselves. Lally doesn’t do that. Actually that’s not true; she does, and then she tells you that she has. In this show she gives all of herself to us. It’s an incredibly brave and generous thing

So when I met Cookie, a New York City psychic, I decided to invest in her. With my money, my writing and my heart. I really hope it pays off. Because she was very expensive.

Thank you to everyone at the wonderful Belvoir and Malthouse, director Anne-Louise Sarks, the designers and the crew for believing that I could perform in something instead of just writing it, like I usually do. And thank you to my family, my agents and my friends for all the support (and also material). Particularly: John Safran, Lois and Dan Katz, Zrinka Lemezina and Mike Katz, Ben Chessell, Martina Murray, Jean Mostyn, Lizzie Cater, Karen Colston, Nina Bonacci, Anna Bosnjak, Matt Lutton, Tom Wright, Rita Kalnejais and Doulla Manoli.

And thank you, dear audience, for coming! Looking forward to seeing you all in the theatre!

Writer & Performer’s Note Lally Katz

Director’s NoteAnne-Louise Sarks

Belvoir and Malthouse Theatre present

Stories I Want to Tell You in Person

to do. And as she does, as amazing and improbable as it sometimes seems, I find we keep stumbling upon moments that are all too familiar. Lally reminds us what it is to be human in all its complexity.

I often see a little bit of myself up there. And I think you might too.

And yet, it is so uniquely Lally Katz.

When I first heard about this show, I thought it was all about Lally and her visits to psychics. I thought that none of it had anything to do with me. I don’t really believe in psychics. I’d never visited one until we started work on this show. (Lally claims in the play that I’m a cynic. It’s true. Incidentally, nothing else Lally says about me is true!) But it turns out this play is about things that matter very much to me. It’s about belief. It’s about being an artist in the world. It’s about doubt and faith. It’s about figuring out how to live. It’s about love. It’s about being a woman. It’s about

complex political questions like: Can I have it all? And it asks all these questions in a very human and personal way.

Lally has this way of making you see our world anew. It’s a gift. She finds the magic in the ordinary and then celebrates it. It’s one of the things that makes her an exceptional artist.

I believe that every show you create teaches you something. This one brought me right back to the theatre. To belief. To why I do what I do and how deeply I cherish it.

I’m incredibly grateful for this journey with Lally. It has been a pleasure to spend time in the world of Katz. I thank her for her trust in me. And for all she teaches me every day about life. And love. And about magic. Which maybe does exist. It certainly does every night here in the theatre with Lally.

Malthouse Theatre Malthouse Theatre presents an adventurous annual program of contemporary theatre, using high-octane performance as its currency. Tackling public subjects and themes that energise our thinking and quicken our emotion, the works are as provocative as they are fun, as visceral as they are affirming, and always a little irreverent.

Malthouse Theatre Executive Team

Artistic Director & CEO Marion PottsExecutive Producer Jo PorterFinance Manager Mario AgostinoniProduction Manager David MillerMarketing & Communications Manager Lisa Scicluna

malthousetheatre.com.au

Stories I Want to Tell You in Person will be playing at Malthouse Theatre, Melbourne, 9–25 August 2013.

Stories I Want to Tell You in Person is supported by The Hive – a collective of like-minded, committed philanthropists supporting Belvoir’s creativity. The Hive members are committed philanthropists, whose annual donation helps actors, writers, directors and other creatives strike out on new adventures in content and form.

This initiative is a collaboration between Belvoir and Playwriting Australia (PWA) and directs funding towards one production of a new Australian play each season for our Downstairs Theatre. It also supports one PWA Resident Playwright and seed commission each year.

Thank you to our current Hive donors…

Joanna Davidson & Julian Leeser Julie & Jamie Garis Ruth Higgins & Liliana Munoz Emma Hogan & Kim Hogan Fiona Holyoake & Gerard Outram Bruce Meagher & Greg Waters Andrew & Louise Sharpe Peter Wilson & James Emmett

Want to get involved?

For our Hive donors, this is what’s on offer…

- A number of networking opportunities hosted by Belvoir, including an end-of-year event with the sponsored playwright-in-residence

- Two tickets to one Upstairs and one Downstairs preview per season

- Industry rates for all regular-priced Belvoir shows

- Acknowledgement in our Upstairs production programs during the financial year in which a donation is made

- Invitations to Playwriting Australia’s exclusive supporter events throughout the year, to discover the country’s red-hot new plays as they take shape.

For more info about The Hive contact Belvoir’s Development Manager Retha Howard on 02 8396 6224 or email retha@belvoir.com.au

We’d love to have you on board!

The Hive

ANNE-LOUISE SARKS Director

Anne-Louise is Artistic Director of The Hayloft Project. She works professionally

as an actor, director and dramaturg. For Belvoir Anne-Louise directed and co-wrote Medea, was assistant director on The Wild Duck and dramaturg on Thyestes. Her most recent work Medea won five 2012 Sydney Theatre Awards including Best Direction, Best Mainstage Production and Best New Australian Work. In 2011 Anne-Louise was an associate artist at Belvoir and was director-in-residence at Malthouse Theatre. Her other theatre credits include The Seed (Melbourne Theatre Company); The Nest and Yuri Wells (The Hayloft Project). Her acting credits include The Suicide (B Sharp/The Hayloft Project); 3XSisters, The Only Child (The Hayloft Project, Best Independent Production, Sydney Theatre Awards); Return to Earth (Melbourne Theatre Company); The Spook (Malthouse Theatre); and Starchaser (Arena Theatre Company). Under the direction of Anne-Louise, The Hayloft Project will join four other independent theatre companies in presenting new work later this year as part of NEON, a new independent festival established by Melbourne Theatre Company.

LALLY KATZ Writer/Performer

Lally performed in Frankenstein at Sydney Theatre Company and regularly appears on

stage and in the media as a speaker and commentator. Lally’s play Neighbourhood Watch was part of Belvoir’s 2011 Season. Her plays The Black Swan of Trespass and The Eisteddfod (Stuck Pigs Squealing Theatre) were part of Belvoir’s B Sharp seasons in 2005 and 2007, and have both toured to New York. Her other theatre credits include Smashed (Griffin Independent); Return to Earth (Melbourne Theatre Company); Goodbye Vaudeville Charlie Mudd, A Golem Story, Criminology (co-written with Tom Wright) (Malthouse Theatre); The Apocalypse Bear Trilogy (Melbourne International Arts Festival); The Mysteries: Genesis, Frankenstein, Waikiki Palace, Hip Hip Hooray (STC); When The Hunter Returns (The Gaiety School of Acting, Ireland); and Goodbye New York, Goodbye Heart (The Production Company). For TV, Lally has written episodes of the upcoming series Wentworth, The Elephant Princess and Spirited. She has won two Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards, a New York International Fringe Festival Award and several Green Room Awards. Lally has also been awarded a Churchill Fellowship and received a British Council Realise Your Dreams grant. She was recently a recipient of a playwriting grant from The Australian Writers’ Foundation.

Biographies

DAMIEN COOPER Lighting Designer

Damien works internationally across theatre, opera and dance. His designs

for Belvoir include Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Peter Pan, Private Lives, Conversation Piece, Strange Interlude, Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, Neighbourhood Watch, The Seagull, Gethsemane, Keating!, Toy Symphony, Peribanez, Stuff Happens, The Chairs, The Spook, In Our Name and Exit the King (including the Broadway production with Geoffrey Rush and Susan Sarandon). His other theatre credits include Under Milkwood, The Lost Echo, The Women of Troy, Tot Mom, Riflemind (Sydney Theatre Company); and Macbeth (Bell Shakespeare). Damien’s opera designs include Aida, Cosi, Peter Grimes (Opera Australia); A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Chicago Lyric Opera/Houston Grand Opera/Canadian Opera Company); and Chorus! (Houston Grand Opera). His designs for dance include The Narrative of Nothing, Romeo and Juliet, Swan Lake (Australian Ballet); Mortal Engine (Chunky Move); and Of Earth and Sky (Bangarra). Damien has won three Sydney Theatre Awards and a Green Room Award.

GLENN DULIHANTY Production Manager

For Belvoir Glenn’s credits include Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, And They Called Him

Mr Glamour, The Wild Duck (including tours to Melbourne and Norway), Ruben Guthrie and The Man from Mukinupin. He was Belvoir’s production deputy from 2008 to 2011. Glenn’s other credits include Mister Bailey’s Minder national tour, The Marvellous Boy and Strangers in Between (Griffin Theatre Company). He has recently been arts production manager for the national Harvest music festival, as well as working on other events such as Playground Weekender and Splendour in the Grass.

MAX LYANDVERT Composer & Sound Designer

Max is an award-winning composer, sound designer and

director. His composition/sound design credits include The Business, The Ham Funeral, UBU, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Belvoir); The War of the Roses, Gross und Klein, True West, Life is a Dream, Oresteia, The Three Sisters, The Art of War, The Lost Echo, Festen, Julius Caesar, among many others (Sydney Theatre Company); The Ham Funeral/Journal of a Plague Year, Eldorado (Malthouse Theatre); Same, same But Different, Never Did Me Any Harm and The Age I’m In (Force Majeure), as well as numerous shows for other companies.

RALPH MYERS Set & Costume Designer

Ralph is Belvoir’s Artistic Director. For Belvoir he has directed

Peter Pan, directed and designed Private Lives, and designed Death of a Salesman, Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, The Seagull, The Wild Duck, Measure for Measure, Toy Symphony, Parramatta Girls, Ray’s Tempest, The Spook, The Fever, Conversations with the Dead and The Cosmonaut’s Last Message to the Woman He Once Loved in the Former Soviet Union. Ralph’s other design credits include The City, A Streetcar Named Desire, Blackbird, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, A Kind of Alaska/Reunion, The Lost Echo, Mother Courage and Her Children, Boy Gets Girl, This Little Piggy, Far Away, Morph, Endgame, The 7 Stages of Grieving and Frankenstein, which he also directed (Sydney Theatre Company); Enlightenment, Cruel and Tender, Dinner, Frozen (Melbourne Theatre Company); Othello (Bell Shakespeare); Wonderlands (Griffin Theatre Company/Hothouse Theatre Company); Borderlines, Sweet Phoebe (Griffin Theatre Company); Eora Crossing (Legs on the Wall/Sydney Festival); Caligula (English National Opera); The Marriage of Figaro, Peter Grimes, Così fan tutte (Opera Australia); La Bohème (New Zealand Opera); and Two Faced Bastard (Chunky Move).

Max’s work as director includes My Head Was a Sledgehammer (B Sharp); Now That Communism Is Dead My Life Feels Empty (B Sharp/Melbourne Festival of the Arts); Manna (Sydney Theatre Company); I’ve Got the Shakes (Darlinghurst Theatre); and his own work, Close Your Little Eyes (Sydney Festival). Max has won two Helpmann Awards and has received Sydney Theatre Award and Green Room Award nominations.

AMY MORCOM Stage Manager

Amy has worked with Belvoir as assistant stage manager on Peter Pan, The Wild

Duck (including Melbourne and Norway tours), That Face and Page 8. Amy was the producer and production manager on Woyzeck for B Sharp and Arts Radar in 2010 and supported its tour to Brisbane Festival’s UNDER THE RADAR in 2011. Her other credits include assistant producer on Hollywood Ending (Arts Radar/Theatre503/Griffin Independent); stage manager for Joan Rivers and Sleaze Ball (New Mardi Gras); The Nutcracker (Free Association); production manager for Velvet Shackles and Sprung Festival (CYCLE Productions); and event management for NYE on the Cahill Expressway, the Australian Event Awards, and the Helpmann Awards (The Epic Team). Amy also has experience in devised theatre, community theatre and theatre for young people (Makhampom Living Theatre, Thailand/CYCLE Productions/Catapult Festival).

Belvoir Sponsors

Andrew Cameron Family Foundation

Besen Family Foundation

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Copyright Agency Cultural Fund

Gandevia Foundation

Goldman Sachs

The Greatorex Foundation

Johns N H Trust managed by Perpetual

Linnell / Hughes Trust managed by Perpetual

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Teen Spirit Charitable Foundation

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For more information on partnership opportunities please contact our Development Manager Retha Howard on 02 8396 6224 or email retha@belvoir.com.au

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A playwright. A psychic. A commission. A curse.