Melbourne Theatre Company

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The Melbourne Theatre Company, which is the oldest professional theatre in Australia, known popularly as MTC, is based in the Ferrars Street complex in Southbank, Victoria, which serves as its administrative, costuming and rehearsal base. However, until its new Southbank theatre (currently under construction) opens, it performs mostly in the Playhouse and Fairfax Studio of the Victorian Arts Centre. It has also recently produced shows in the Merlyn and Beckett Theatres at the CUB Malthouse and in Space 28 of the Victorian College of the Arts. Despite being recognised as Victoria's State Theatre, it is a Department of the University of Melbourne. Currently, it offers a subscription season of ten to twelve plays each year, as well as running education and affiliate writers programs.

The Melbourne Theatre Company was founded in 1953 by John Sumner as the Union Theatre Repertory Company, based at the Union Theatre of the University of Melbourne's Student Union building. Sumner's original idea was to present a season of plays over those months when the Union Theatre was not being used by student drama societies. It was Australia's first professional repertory theatre, presenting a new play every two weeks during the season. Later, that became three weekly repertory. The first play, Jean Anouilh's Colombe, opened on 31 August 1953, starring Zoe Caldwell (who was later to have considerable success on Broadway), George Fairfax, and Alex Scott.

Over the years, MTC has championed Australian writing, introducing the works of writers such as Alan Seymour, Vance Palmer, Patrick White, Alan Hopgood, Alexander Buzo, David Williamson, John Romeril, Jim McNeil, Alma De Groen, John Powers, Ron Elisha, Janis Bolodis, Hannie Rayson, Louis Nowra, Michael Gurr, Jack Davis, Michael Gow and Joanna Murray Smith ( to mention only a few)to mainstream Melbourne Audiences. The first Australian play produced by the companyThe Summer of the Seventeenth Doll by Ray Lawler in 1955 was quickly recognised as an Australian classic.

Lawler had by that time succeeded Sumner as Director of the company, taking it through the 1955 and 1956 seasons. When Lawler left to perform The Doll in London, he handed the directorship to Wal Cherry, who oversaw the company from 1956 until 1959. Cherry's experimental and daring approach to theatre did much to broaden the tastes of Melbourne theatre-goers, though the Company suffered at the box-office. In 1959, John Sumner returned and subsequently steered the company through twenty-eight years of growth and prosperity, watchin it become, by the time he retired in 1987, the largest theatre company in Australia. Since then the company has had two artistic directors: Roger Hodgman (1987-99), who steered MTC through the finacially troblesome period of the late eighties and nineties, and Simon Phillips,who has been Artistic Director from 2000 to the present. It has a current subscriber base of 18000 people and plays to a quarter of a million people annually.

The Melbourne Theatre Company has performed in many venues in its history, including the Russell Street theatre, the Athenaeum Theatre, St Martins Theatre and, since 1984, the Victorian Arts Centre. In 2005 it was annouced that the company would have its own theatre on Southbank Boulivade in Southbank. Construction has begun on the 500-seat theatre which will probably welcome its first audiences in 2008.

Melbourne Theatre Company offers costume hire to actors and students. For students it offers work experience and tours, as well as support for Drama and Theatre Studies classes during VCE and summer schools for interested students. Tickets are usually offered as a discount for secondary and tertiary students.

Annual sponsors of the Melbourne Theatre Company include Hanging Rock Winery, The Deck Restaurant, QuayWest, Paul Mitchell, Epicure, Playbill, Crown Lager and Boomerang Paper. Philantrophic sponsors include Harold Mitchell Foundation, Robert Salzer Foundation, and the Sydney Myer Fund, this last is specifically used for scholarships. The print media sponsor of the Melbourne Theatre Company is The Age.

The Melbourne Theatre Company does its best to be accessible to those with special needs. The seats are available for wheelchair users at the Playhouse and the Fairfax Theatre. People with hearing impairments may use a headset which can be acquired from the theatre, and if they use a hearing aid, they can put their aid into the induction loop. Auslan is also used with interpreters at various performances. For those with vision impairments, there are audio describers from a sound booth at the back of the theatre, and also tactile tours on Saturday matinee an hour before the audio described performance.

[edit] Reference

  • Geoffrey Hutton (1975). "It won't last a week!' : the first twenty years of the Melbourne Theatre Company. Melbourne : Macmillan. ISBN 0-333-17506-9.

[edit] External links

Theatre in Melbourne
Major Venues Athenaeum | Capitol Theatre | Comedy Theatre | Forum Theatre | Her Majesty's | La Mama | Malthouse Theatre | National Theatre | Palais Theatre | Princess Theatre | Regent Theatre | State Theatre
Major Companies Melbourne Theatre Company | Playbox Theatre Company | Red Stitch Actors Theatre | Theatreworks
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