Annie’s life as actor, improviser, director, dramaturg and eclectic playwright spans decades and continents. Acting roles range widely, from her first ever gig on a BBC microphone in London, to her most recent appearance (2013) as CEO Dawn Snow in Hannie Rayson’s Competitive Tenderness. In Singapore and in Australia in earlier years she performed roles ranging from Coward and Ayckbourn to Pinter and Shakespeare. In Japan (1997-2001) she acted with Tokyo International Players, then formed her own Company, Loose Sock Theatre. In the US (2001-2006), for Michigan Classical Repertory Company she played Tiresias in Antigone, Paulina in The Winter’s Tale and Mme Pernelle in Tartuffe, plus Arkadina in a University of Michigan adaptation of The Seagull which toured to Moscow’s 2005 International Chekhov Festival. On the Central Coast since 2007, she has performed in a variety of roles, playing the Queen in (and co-directing) Ophelia Thinks Harder for International Women’s Day, Moon in The Real Inspector Hound, Mrs Alving in Ghosts for Newcastle Theatre Company and also for NTC the Older Elizabeth in When the Rain Stops Falling. She has also performed in Council-sponsored productions at the Gosford Regional Gallery.
Annie has won playwriting prizes and had several plays produced. Full length plays include The Soul Salon, produced in Sydney in 1996 (Chris Drummond directing) and later toured to Italy’s Theatropolis Festival; Dark Tide, performed in Japan, RAMAT, set in Japan and professionally workshopped in the US, and a new adaptation of Antigone, premiered by Michigan Classical Repertory Theatre and in Australia by Uniting Productions on the Central Coast. Just completed is Elizabeth and Grace (about the historic meeting between Elizabeth 1 of England and the Irish Queen Grace O’Malley), which is currently touring artistic directors. Her portfolio of short plays for stage and radio includes a comedy derived from Greek mythology, Naming the City, a satirical radio play Wild Horses, and The Good Work, based on the conviction of two women soldiers stationed at Abu Ghraib.
Annie has created companies in Sydney (Bare Boards) and Japan (Loose Sock). From 1992-7 she was Literary Manager for Sydney’s Griffin Theatre Co. She has taught theatre and literature, adjudicated acting and playwriting festivals, worked in tv and in multicultural theatre. She is a play reader/assessor for several companies and a free-lance dramaturg.
Directing credits range through Shakespeare, Stoppard, Ibsen and Brecht to musicals including Oliver! and the US premiere of the Detroit blues musical We Are Not Good Girls. For Michigan Classical Repertory Theatre she directed Antigone, The Way of the World, and the Polish Classic comedy Mrs Dulska’s Morality. In 2008 she directed the new Nicholas Parsons musical A Nasty Piece of Work for Sydney’s New Theatre; three winners for various Short+Sweet festivals followed. In 2014 she joined Woy Woy Little Theatre as Vice-President (Artistic) and was Convenor of their 2014 inaugural FLASH Festival.
A Theatre MA (UNSW), Annie is a workshop junkie, with extensive professional training in different acting forms, methods and modes; in stage and filmscript writing; in directing. Included are various NIDA Summer Schools, voicework with Bill Pepper at the Drama Action Centre. Most recent are acting masterclasses with Kate Gaul and a Voiceover Masterclass with Avigail Herman.