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ABOUT US

ABOUT US

Periscope Productions is a Naarm/Melbourne based independent theatre company. Founded in 2012 by University of Melbourne students - the company has produced 9 full length works as well as a number of creative developments across Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Adelaide. Specialising in new and contemporary works and supporting new writing - the company also has a strong interest in collaboration, design and site-specific staging. Above all - the audience sits at the centre of all our work. We seek to create a unique and innovative audience experience from the moment we welcome you into the space.

The Company

Benjamin Sheen 

Benjamin is a Melbourne based Film and Theatre Director/Designer - and graduate of the NIDA directing course in 2015. Previous to NIDA, Benjamin spent 4 years studying Media at RMIT. He co-founded Periscope Productions, and directed and designed Chatroom (2012), The Dice House (2013) and Attempts on Her Life (2014). Benjamin also directed and designed independent productions: Sugar Sugar for MKA and The Pillowman for Four Letter Word Theatre. 

 

In 2017, Benjamin directed music video ‘Man You Want Me to Be’ for WHARVES and was assistant producer for ‘This, This is Mine’ for Corinthian Food Store. He will be directing ‘Fraternal’ by Jake Stewart for the NIDA Graduating actors in October.  

In 2016, Benjamin has worked as an Assistant Director on ‘The Olympians’ directed by Jeff Janisheski, and undertaken Directing Secondments at MTC and Opera Australia. 

Currently Benjamin is a performance teacher for the Bachelor’s of Circus Arts degree at NICA in Prahran. And is coordinating the collaboration between NIDA and the Australian Chamber Orchestra.  

 

You can see some of Benjamin’s work on his website: https://benjamin-sheen.com

Fiona Spitzkowsky

Fiona is a writer, editor and theatre-maker, currently completing a Master of Writing for Performance at VCA. As a writer, Fiona has worked extensively with Australian Theatre for Young People (National Studio 2014, Voices Project 2015, Fresh Ink Program 2015), while also penning scripts for Sprung Festival, Disability Media’s sketch show What’s Wrong With U?, and most recently Too Soon, Too Now  for the 2017 Melbourne Fringe.

Fiona has previously worked as a non-fiction editor on the Voiceworks editorial committee, editor of Express Media’s Buzzcuts program, and a reader for the Ritchell Prize and the John Marsden & Hachette Prize for Young Writers. She has worked as a producer for Attic Erratic, creative producer for the Emerging Writers’ Festival and assistant producer for the Festival of Live Art at Arts House; and directed Taming of the Shrew (MUSC, 2015), [Lady] Macbeth (Twelve Angry, 2016). Fiona was a 2016 Wheeler Centre Hot Desk Fellow and has presented critical works at Critical Animals Festival and the Victorian Association for the Teaching of English State Conference. 

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Sian Halloran

Sian is a theatre producer, technician, and enthusiast. Since being Intern to the Artistic Director at Monash Uni Student Theatre in 2016 and completing a Diploma of Live Production and Technical Services in 2017, she’s since produced two shows at Melbourne Fringe Festival: award-nominated Stories from the Choir (Choral Edge, 2018) and antony//cleopatra (Monash Shakespeare Company, 2018). She’s also worked for the Melbourne International Comedy Festival as a technician, designed Gravel (HomeBrand Comedy, 2018) at Theatre Works, stage managed Festen (Play Dead Theatre, 2018) at Ripponlea Estate and stage and production managed Disparate Scenes for Millennial Dreams (Periscope Productions, 2019) at Meat Market Stables. Sian has been singing in choirs for most of her life and now sings in Exaudi, as well as producing Choral Edge.

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Brendan McDougall

Brendan is a Melbourne-based playwright and theatre-maker. He is currently finishing up his Masters in Writing for Perfomance at the VCA. He co-founded Periscope Productions in 2012, and has been involved in all of their shows since, first as a performer, then as a director. He played Estragon in a 2014 in an ensemble-led production of Waiting For Godot in 2014, before returning from overseas to direct Lally Katz’s Apocalypse Bear Trilogy in 2016 and co-direct their 2017 production of Fire Place, a double-bill of Caryl Churchill’s A Number and Harold Pinter’s A Kind of Alaska.

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Katharine Gentry

 Katharine is a Melbourne based actor and teacher. She co-founded Periscope Productions and was Co-director on Chatroom (2012) and The Dice House (2013) and starred in Time and the Room (2016) and Fire Place (2017). Katharine has been a great lover of Shakespeare since she was very young and has starred in a number of roles including Lady Macbeth and Caliban for the Melbourne University Shakespeare Company in 2012 and 2013, and as Verges for the Australian Shakespeare Company in 2016. Katharine is also a graduate of the Teach for Australia program, completing her placement in 2014-2015 at Warracknabeal High School in North Western Victoria. She is currently completing a Masters in Marine Biology with a research focus on cleaner fish in salmon farms. 

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