The Backyard Bard

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The Backyard Bard

Type	Christian Theatre Company
Founded	2003
Headquarters	Melbourne, Australia
Key people	Simon Camilleri, director
Website	http://www.thebackyardbard.com

The Backyard Bard is a Christian theatre company based in Melbourne, Australia. It specialises in Biblical Storytelling but also in Shakespeare. It was created in 2003 by Simon Camilleri.

1 History
- 1.1 Origin
- 1.2 Early Years
2 Major Productions
3 See also
4 External links

[edit] History

[edit] Origin

In 2002, Simon Camilleri directed Mark through La Trobe Student Theatre. It was a Biblical Storytelling production of the Gospel of Mark with twelve storytellers. In 2003, he directed a production of Shakespeare's Othello in the Melbourne Fringe Festival. Othello was the first production under the name The Backyard Bard, which was so named because the desire to make Shakespeare ("The Bard") accessible.

[edit] Early Years

Ensemble Storytelling in Daniel - Dream Interpreter

After the success of Mark, many of the storytellers continued to do small-scale Biblical Storytelling performances. In order to encourage others to learn Biblical Storytelling, Camilleri organised a 6 week course to teach the skills and philosophy behind it. To advertise the course he directed his second Biblical Storytelling production in 2004, Storytelling Judges, which was a selection of stories from the Book of Judges. This was followed by Daniel - Dream Interpreter in 2005 taken from the first seven chapters of the Book of Daniel. This production pioneered the approach of Ensemble Storytelling. In 2006, the production of Esther was entered into the Melbourne Fringe Festival.