Writings belong of David Finnigan

bio

I am a pharmacy assistant, playwright, spoken word artist, performer and festival producer based in Sydney, Australia. Since 2001, I have written for, performed and produced theatre throughout Australia and overseas, including working with theatre organisations in Manila and New York.

As a playwright, more than twenty of my full-length and one-act playscripts have been produced for seasons by companies in Australia, the Philippines and the United States. Recognition for my writing includes my appointment as 2006 Writer-in-Residency with Tanghalang Pilipino, the key government-funded theatre company in the Philippines, and nominations for the 2005 Queensland Premier’s Literary Awards and the 2006 Max Afford National Playwright Award.

Since 2006, I have worked with cross-artform ensemble Boho to devise and present interactive performances based on Complex Systems science and Game Theory. Boho productions A Prisoner’s Dilemma (2007-08) and Food for the Great Hungers (2009) have toured to theatres, museums, science conferences and festivals throughout Australia.

I have been a featured performer at poetry slams and spoken-word events in Australia and the United States, and was a finalist in the 2008 Australian National Poetry Slam. Following my tour to New Zealand in 2010, my spoken-word performance Sun Drugs was nominated for Best Solo Show in the New Zealand Fringe Awards. As well as solo spoken-word, I am a vocalist for music ensembles Diplodocus and Finnigan and Brother.

I have also worked extensively in arts administration and festival production. I was Artistic Administrator for the 2008 Canberra International Music Festival, NSW Committee Coordinator for the 2009 National Science Week, and in 2008 I completed an internship at the HERE Arts Center in New York during their Culturemart Festival. I currently co-direct the Crack Theatre Festival, a national forum and festival for alternative theatre-makers taking place annually in Newcastle as a part of This Is Not Art, Australia’s largest media arts festival.

Contact me to view my full professional CV, or read on for a more detailed bio.

2001-4

After graduating from college in the ACT in 2000, myself and three other deviants (Jackal Lloyd, Mick Bailey and Nick Johnson) formed theatre-ensemble Bohemian Productions. Our mission statement:
1. make plays
2. don’t go broke

From 2001-4, Bohemian presented eight productions in theatres throughout Canberra, with the core ensemble taking turns writing, directing, designing, performing and producing. Our first production in April 2001 was a double-bill of Harold Pinter’s The Dumb Waiter and Quiet Time, an original script by Jackal and myself. Later in 2001, I wrote and directed my first full-length play for Bohemian: The Mischief Sense, a comedy about a swarm of supernaturally enhanced thieves.

In 2002, Bohemian produced a double-bill of Pinter’s police-state drama One for the Road with Stu Roberts’ Victorian-era graverobbing tale Bonesyard (January); Steven Mallatrat’s gothic horror-story The Woman in Black (April) and Shakespeare’s grotesque pop-classic Titus Andronicus (September), all of which I performed in. In November, Bohemian’s sister company Opiate produced a one-act play by me, Nick McCorriston and Muttley entitled Chosei: Eternal Life.

In 2003, I wrote and directed science-fiction road-trip play w3 w3lcome the future, produced by Bohemian in January as part of a double-bill with George Huitker’s Spitting Image. I performed as part of Bohemian’s The Empire Builders, by French Absurdist Boris Vian, and as “I” in sister company BKu’s production of Withnail and I.

Also in 2003, I first met and worked with Canberran playwright Hadley when I performed his monologue The Man from Zod. As well as being a major influence on my writing, Hadley has subsequently become a significant collaborator and a kind of warped inspiration. Our first joint project was to curate and coordinate a mass of short skits entitled (This Is) A Paid Presentation for the National Multicultural Fringe Festival in February 2004.

At the beginning of 2004, I undertook a mentorship program through Canberra Youth Theatre with playwright Paschal Berry to write and workshop my script Vampire Play, which Nick Johnson directed and Bohemian produced for a successful two-week season. Vampire Play is set in the vampire-infested train tunnels and sewer systems under Canberra, and traces the brief history of four vampires amid the turbulence of undead gang warfare. Vampire Play went on to be nominated for the 2005 Queensland Premier’s Literary Award, with the judges commenting; ‘Pop-cult influenced and market savvy, this play gives us an original vision and voice, appealing to fresh audiences. A writer to watch.‘

In April and November I performed in the Canberra and Sydney seasons of Shadowhouse PITS‘ 2004 Theatre of Cruelty production Acting Artaud.

2005-6

In 2005, I co-wrote and performed in Raoul Craemer’s Vidooshaka: the Indian Clown at the Multicultural Fringe Festival. My one-act play Hate Restaurants was directed by Estelle Muspratt for Canberra Youth Theatre’s Whining and Dying, I contributed two pieces to BKu’s duologue festival: Weasel and Brown on the beach and Playable Demo, written with Jack Lloyd, and I performed in Buzzing Productions’ contact improvisation production in November.

In September I produced and coordinated the Australian National University Theatre Society’s large-scale production One Night Only: Dallas Rockwell’s Confessional Tour. One Night Only consisted of three short plays set during a pop concert: Max Barker and my improvisational Savage Dancefloor (set on the dancefloor), Hadley’s Flush (in the toilets) and Stu Roberts’ Loose… Ships (backstage).

I wrote and directed four episodes of the serial drama The Adventures of Boy President, which took place as part of the Multicultural Fringe Festival. I was commissioned to co-write (with Hadley and Tess Elvin) Canberra Youth Theatre’s large-scale performance event Arcane Secrets, based on the origins of the city of Canberra, and I wrote and directed a short piece entitled Before the elephants reach the beach for BKu’s annual duologue festival.

I won the first ACT Poetry Slam in June 2006 with my poem Platypus Fever, and was banned from performing at the Street Theatre’s A Bunch of Fives monologue series after reading a piece of erotic fiction from the internet. When A Bunch of Fives was subsequently shut down, the ban was lifted and I performed my mash-up All the pieces that weren’t up to standard at the final Bunch of Fives event.

In August 2006, I travelled to the Philippines to take up a Writer’s Residency with Tanghalang Pilipino at the Cultural Center of the Philippines in Manila. Working with Tanghalang’s professional directors and actors, I wrote and workshopped two new scripts which were presented for short seasons in Manila: Sagrado sa Loob (Sacred Inside), co-written with Rogelio Braga and directed by Tess Jamias, and To heat you up and cool you down, directed by Issa Lopez. To heat you up and cool you down has subsequently been produced in Canberra by Belconnen Theatre (2007), in Melbourne by Heidelberg Theatre Company (2008) and was remounted in Manila in 2009 by the Sipat Lawin Ensemble.

From March-December, I worked as Programme Administrator for Hidden Corners Young Carers Theatre, providing respite and arts activities for young people caring for a family member with an illness or disability. I was responsible for coordinating and managing Hidden Corners’ two-week tour of ten young carer performers to the Northern Territory to devise and perform a new performance with CarersNT.

I received funding in 2006 to write and workshop new script Oceans all boiled into sky. Working with five actors, dramaturg Paschal Berry and director barb barnett, Oceans was presented for a reading in May 2006. The script was subsequently nominated for the Max Afford National Playwrights Award and featured in the inaugural Interplay Online Festival in 2007.

2007-8

Over January - December 2007, I devised, curated and managed Belconnen Theatre’s Wave Edge Theory (W.E.T.) Season of ten productions by young and emerging Canberra ensembles. Working with Cultural Development Officer Jan Wawrzynczak, the W.E.T. Season brokered partnerships with colleges, media outlets and arts organisations to support the artists involved. We subsequently applied for and received $40,000 funding through the Foundation for Young Australians Launchpad program to plan and implement a follow-up to the W.E.T. Season: the 2008 Hunting Season. I was responsible for the Research and Planning stage of the Hunting Season before handing on the project in March 2008.

In late 2006, core Bohemian members Jackal Lloyd, Mick Bailey, David Shaw and myself consolidated Bohemian into four-man ensemble Boho and began development of a new show based on the science of Game Theory. Working with Dr David Newth (CSIRO) and Patrick Helean (National Science and Technology Centre), Boho produced A Prisoner’s Dilemma, a cross-artform performance combining live trombone / electronica, Absurdist theatre and interactive game-modules in which the audience used custom-built devices to control the performers and direct the outcome of the performance.

Following its premier at the 2007 National Multicultural Fringe Festival in the ACT, Boho toured A Prisoner’s Dilemma to the Adelaide Fringe Festival (SA), CSIRO’s Friday Lecture series (ACT) and the Asia-Pacific Complex Systems Conference (QLD). In 2008, Boho received funding to tour A Prisoner’s Dilemma to high schools and colleges in the ACT, followed by a sell-out season at Canberra’s Street Theatre and a tour to Queensland as part of the curated Brisbane Festival Under The Radar Fringe.

Over 2007-8 I was a featured poet at the Bam Bam Slam in New York, the National Multicultural Fringe Festival, the ACT Poetry Slam and the National Young Writers Festival in Newcastle. Over August - October, I performed as vocalist and VJ with Fight Fire With Knives, a music ensemble incorporating theatre, lo-fi projections and live cooking.

I travelled to New York from January - February 2008 to work as part of the HERE Arts Center’s production crew for the Culturemart Festival, and at Three-Legged Dog for their 2008 season.

I worked as Artistic Administrator on the May 2008 Canberra International Music Festival, helping co-ordinate, promote and stage-manage more than 70 concerts of classical, contemporary, jazz and electronic music in venues around the ACT.

Over 2007-8 I collaborated with a range of musicians in both live and studio settings, and in early 2008 I assembled an album of these collaborations entitled Dinosaur Concept Album. In mid-2008, guitarist Chris Finnigan, producer Paul Heslin and myself formed music ensemble Diplodocus. Diplodocus recorded two EPs in 2008: You are KGB, aren’t you? and First Handshake in Space, both available for free download. Working as a guitar / vocals duo entitled Finnigan and Brother, Chris and I regularly record and performed at the National Multicultural Festival in February 2009.

In November 2008 I was a finalist in the Australian National Poetry Slam, and was one of eighteen poets Australia-wide to compete in the National Poetry Slam Finals at the Sydney Opera House, as well as performing on ABC TV and Radio National’s Book Show.

I participated as a writer in PlayWriting Australia’s 2008 40-Hour Play Generator, producing after a home-brand breakfast cereal play, which was subsequently shortlisted for the Short + Sweet short play awards. My short script Robot Salesman Training Play was produced in Canberra as a part of BKu’s 2008 duologue festival, and sections from my prose piece On The Night Sea were performed by Jay Christian and others in an underpass in Portland, Oregon. In July 2009, my script Hate Restaurants was produced in Manila as part of the Virgin Labfest of new Filipino playwriting, and in October it was produced by the National University Theatre Society for a double-bill with two Hadley shorts.

lantern-bearer Rahul Craemer, machine-shaman Chrism Lloyd and whingy little shit Lloyd Allison-Young in Oceans. photo by ‘pling.

In November 2008, director barb barnett and Serious Theatre presented a sell-out season of my road trip coming-of-age play Oceans all boiled into sky, as part of the Street Theatre’s Made in Canberra season. barnett transformed Oceans‘ sci-fi journey into the steam-wasteland of post-apocalyptic Canberra into a 1950’s-style radio play, complete with live music, FX and video projections. The production was a popular and critical success, and the script was subsequently selected for inclusion in the 2009 World Interplay Festival in Cairns.

2009

In January 2009, Boho was funded through the Australia Council Inter-Arts Board to undertake a residency at the Manning Clark House Scholarly and Cultural Centre, based in the former residence of prominent historian Professor Manning Clark, to develop a new work entitled Food for the Great Hungers. Working with dramaturg Chris Ryan and scientific historian Dr Doug Cocks, Boho’s Hungers was a site-specific performance based on Complex Systems science and Manning Clark’s History of Australia. The performance consisted of a series of modules focusing on different aspects of Australian history, taking place in different spaces throughout Manning Clark House. In each module, the audience made a decision and followed a different path. These decisions were combined to construct a counterfactual history of Australia, unique to each audience.

Myself and Jackal Lloyd in Food for the Great Hungers, Jan 2009.

Boho has subsequently presented short installation performances at the Manning Clark House Weekend of Ideas, the opening of the Belconnen Arts Centre, and a performance on a travelling bus for the Belconnen In2Change project. Boho are presently undertaking a residency at the Belconnen Arts Centre across 2009-10.

In March 2009 I moved to Sydney and began work as Marketing and Media Coordinator for Accessible Arts, and as Committee Coordinator for the NSW National Science Week Committee. I was subsequently appointed Assistant Editor of Science Week’s 10 Days of Science blog.

I have performed feature spoken-word sets throughout 2009 at the Katoomba Winter Magic Festival (NSW), the Youth Earth Symposium (QLD), Performance Space’s Nighttime (NSW), Bad Slam No Biscuit (ACT) and the Traverse Slam (ACT).

I founded (with Gillian Schwab) the Crack Theatre Festival. Crack is a national forum and festival for alternative theatre-makers, taking place in Newcastle as a part of This Is Not Art, Australia’s largest media arts festival. Originating in 2007-8 as a performance stream within the National Young Writers Festival, in 2009 Crack took place for the first time as an independent theatre festival under the TINA umbrella. From October 1-4, Crack featured 14 performances, 17 panels and workshops, and over 50 artists from around Australia. Gillian and myself will direct the festival again in 2010, after which it will be passed on to a new director/s.

naked pillowfight at Crack Theatre Festival. image by Holly Orkin, from her site.

2010

In March 2010, I toured my new solo show Sun Drugs to New Zealand. Directed by Naomi Milthorpe, Sun Drugs is a grimy teen romance set in the flash-flooded streets of Manila, compacting the sweeping romance of The English Patient and the sassy dialogue of Mean Girls into 25 minutes (including DIY-vibrator making workshop) and microwaving them. After headlining the Poetry Live readings in Auckland, I presented a season at the BATS Theatre in Wellington as part of the New Zealand Fringe Festival, and received a nomination for Best Solo Show in the 2010 Fringe Awards.