Lady 

Windermere's 

Fan

by Oscar Wilde

A comedy about a good woman in four acts


Act 1 -- Lord and Lady Windermere's residence, London

Act 2 -- Lady Windermere's birthday party, later that evening

15-minute intermission

Why not enjoy a glass of local wine? available for sale at the bar 

Act 3 -- Lord Darlington's rooms, even later that night

Act 4 -- Lord and Lady Windermere's residence, the following morning



TIME --- The Present

meet the team

Directed by -  Jonty Reason

Assisted by - Donna Johnstone

Costume coordinator -  Annie Laurenson and her team of elves

Prop makers  -  Donna Johnstone & Neil Banett

Set & Lighting design by the wonderful backstage team

Front of House; Donna , Karen and Kathy

Charlotte Sinnamon

Lady WIndermere

Charlotte Sinnamon has been heavily involved in performing arts since age four. As an Actor, Dancer, Director, Producer, and Educator she has taken part in over forty productions across eleven companies. No stranger to the stage, Charlotte has also won awards in the US for her work on screen.

Recently returning to the stage after a six-year hiatus as Brooke Ashton in Windmill Theatre Company’s NOISES OFF, she is feeling grateful to again be taking the stage with MPTC as Lady Windermere.

Charlotte spent her break earning a Bachelor of Communication Media with a Minor in Cinema Studies from RMIT University, while also building two of her own business’s.

With a keen interest in the developmental benefits of Drama in children, Charlotte is currently the Owner and Principal of O’Grady Drama, Mornington Peninsula.

Matthew Richard Walsh

Lord Windermere

Matthew is an Actor, Director, Producer as well as the Artistic Director and founder of Cracked Actors Theatre (CAT), a company/venue dedicated to providing employment opportunities for up and coming as well as established Artists. The company has developed, produced and/or presented ten new Australian plays over the past three years. He has worked as a roadie, a singer, in children’s theatre, short films, co-ops, TVCs and independent theatre. Most recently he performed multiple characters in ‘Essendon Champions – From Thurgood to Hird’ at Chapel off Chapel. Other AFL inspired roles include ‘Ben Cousins’ in ‘Ben Cousins – A Rock Opera’ through 2009 & 2010 and a heartbroken Hawthorn supporter in Milton’s ‘Maya Drive’ at La Mama. Lately, Matthew played roles in Milton’s ‘Chronic, ‘The Shadows the Hues’ and The Privatisation of Ward 9B at La Mama, ‘’Forget Me Not'  at Theatre 451, ‘Geli - Hitler’s Niece’ for Globe Players, rAPT's 'The Darkside of Midnight'  and numerous play readings. Matthew directed a Cracked Actors production of ‘The Actor Crack’d’ at La Mama in 2018 for Melbourne Fringe. Directing credits include 'Rain Falling On the Abattoir' by Phil Herd,  ‘The Wild Nights of Youth’ by Bill Marshall and 'Cleo's Stratos' by Peter Heavenheld at the CAT.

Zac Rose

Lord Darlington

Zac Rose is a NAARM-based singer, actor, writer, composer, and voiceover artist of first nation’s descent. Recently, Zac starred in Shakespeare Aliens at the 2023 Adelaide Fringe Festival and Shakespeare Ghostbusters at the 2024 Melbourne International Comedy Festival. In his spare time, he writes his science fiction novel and folds origami paper cranes. You can currently watch his first foray into Television presenting: Creatives On The Couch Australia on CTV+ and C31. 

Gemma Murphy

Mrs Erlynne

Gemma Louise Murphy is an Australian Actress and all-around creative. Gemma started off her career in the arts as a dancer before transitioning into acting. Gemma trains at Howard Fine Acting Studio, and with voice teacher Sass Pinci. Her credits span across Film, TV, and Theatre, having a guest role in Neighbours, playing Elaine in Arsenic and Old Lace and starring in numerous short films. In her spare time, she loves to write, see theatre in Melbourne, and spend time with family and friends, and her dog, Willow.

Annie Laureston

Duchess of Berwick

As a child, Annie enjoyed dressing up in her mother's cast off finery and stumbling about in her steel-heeled stilettos. These games could so easily have led to other interesting, if borderline illegal, hobbies, but fortunately Annie's main love was words. And what is theatre, at its very heart, if its not dressing up and saying a lot of words! She loves comedy because delayed gratification doesn't make any sense at all, and with comedy - you know immediately if it's working. She's been in lots of stuff with companies at Mordialloc, Beaumaris, Clayton, Waverley, Frankston, & 1812, but this is her first Wilde. Sooo....YAY! She finds the Duchess of Berwick delicious. If she's doing it right, you probably will, too

Teghan Webster

Lady Plymdale and Lady Agatha

An old high school portable classroom with broken AC is where Teghan was first introduced to Lady Windermere’s Fan. She was handed a role to read out in literature class, her first performance, and not only did Wilde’s writing ignite the entire class, she enjoyed it so much it spurred Teghan on to pursue Community Theatre. Several plays with FTG and 1812 followed with merriment and forgotten cues. Now exactly 10 years later, in a full circle moment, she’s delighted to be performing in the play that started it all for her.

Eddi Asher

Rosalie Parker

Eddi is an Australia/UK based actress and will be playing the part of Rosalie, and wants you to know she is *very* excited to top up your glasses and whatever else it is she's expected to do for this evening's party.

Her theatre career has taken her to stages across the world, from Ballarat festivals to Shakespeare’s Globe in London, from Glasgow basements to the hallowed halls of hundreds of UK primary schools, where she spent last year channelling her inner princess and Victorian orphan in pantomimes of Snow White and Oliver Twist.

When she’s not our Rosalie and madly rushing around the Windermere residence, you’ll find Eddi hosting trivia at a South Melbourne brewery and rooftop bar, cross-stitching in her downtime, and playing Dungeons and Dragons online at 6.00 AM most weeks with her equally nerdy international friends.

Paul Tucker

Augustus Lorton

G'Day my name's Paul Tucker

I am looking forward to playing the role of Lord Augustus Lorton

My background is mainly in comedy, but I have been in quite a few movies and music clips.

I am usually cast as a gangster ,villain or curmudgeon!

I remember being in a Tones & I music clip Eyes Don't Lie.

The producer asked me if i could play a down and out drunk in a strip club watching a pole dancer

I said mate that's a wednesday for me:)

but this is my first foray into theatre. 

Being cast as a hard drinking, gambling, womanising bumbling cad!

Is hopefully in my wheelhouse. Let's find out together!

Looking forward to seeing you there! Cheers

Neil Barnett

Dumby and Hopper

Neil has been acting for many years.  Indeed he can boast that he has worked with Dave Allen, John Mills, Michael Moore and, long ago, with Richard Burton and Marilyn Monroe.  And he may have known a few  more people whose parents thought it would be fun to use famous names….Oh yes, his daughter went to school with Margaret Thatcher’s child.

His directorial highs include directing Timothy West and Prunella Scales (to their seats in the NIDA theatre) and directing Guy Pearce (to pick up a paper in the schoolyard).

He also designs sets for many companies. A set doodle, done before being sent to hospital, was once  nominated for the Lyrebird’s Best Set Design. (Due to an error in the programme, thanks Damien).

Vincent Dang

Cecil Graham

Meet Vincent, a 25-year-old newcomer to the acting scene. He signed up for this production to give acting a try and satisfy his curiosity for new experiences. Joining the cast in hopes of learning on the fly, Vincent is keen on picking up new skills. In his free time, he dives into various hobbies that spark his creativity. He’s here to explore and enjoy the ride.

Lynette Mitchell

Lady Jedburgh

                                         . 

I have a hearing impairment,  I currently live in a Community Village in Glenroy, which I had moved from Hastings in Victoria last July 2023 and I still do have family living on the Mornington Peninsula area.  I am represented by Howell Management I am Married with 3 grown up adult and now have 4 grandchildren. I do have a hearing aid, but there are times I do struggle hearing conversation, speech and words to music. Sometimes I need to use a walking stick and not as mobile as I used to be.  Have always loved to act and sing ever since I was little.  I was in the school choir in primary/high school and participated in mock plays  In 2015 was my first experience in film as extra crowd for a film ‘Spirits of the Game’ held at the Knox Basketball Stadium (Regarding 1956 Games of Final Basketball players France verses England). In 2017 I applied for a casting role in a musical theatre ‘Magdalene:  The Wanton Saints’ director by (COG cast as a chorus and extra. That same year, I joined a Theatre Workshop run by A-Muse Theatre Group Inc., and in December, I performed in their comedy musical ‘Mind Your Manners’ as Miss Cockney, the School Principal. I had been with the Pelican Theatre Company – On Air and as Agnes and also at the Rosebud Theatre in Jack and the Beanstalk as one of the villagers.


Ella Campbell

stage manager

Ella Campbell is a Naarm/Melbourne based Stage Manager & Set Designer living, working & creating on Bunurong land. While currently undertaking a Bachelor of Performing Arts at COLLARTS, majoring in Stage Management, she is learning & applying her skills directly within Melbourne’s independent Theatre scene. Ella’s current credits include Stage Managing ‘Salarywoman’ 2022 Melbourne Fringe Festival, ‘The Angel With Blue Eyes’ 2023 Midsumma Festival & La Mama, ‘ADA’ 2023 La Mama, ‘Minus One Sister’ 2023 VCA, Melbourne Fringe Festival & Theatreworks, ‘Flit’ 2023 Melbourne Fringe Festival & Theatreworks, ‘To Die Will Be An Awfully Big Adventure’ 2024 Midsumma Festival & Theatreworks. Ella was proud to also design the set and costume for ‘Flit’ in 2023 & ‘You’re Being Dramatic’ at Theatreworks. Ella is very excited to be working with MPTC for their production of ‘Lady Windermere’s Fan’ as well as the upcoming production as well as La Mama’s upcoming season of ‘Zorba’s Last Dance’

Jonty Reason

director

Oscar Wilde’s four comedies of manners—Lady Windermere’s Fan, An Ideal Husband, A Woman of No Importance, and The Importance of Being Earnest—were written over a three-year period of intense creativity and new-found celebrity for the Irish writer who made a career skewering English social mores in novels, dramas, fairytales, and criticism.

Lady Windermere’s Fan is without doubt Wilde's most personal play. Echoes of Wilde’s biography run through all four of his comedies, but none more strongly than in this play, which was his first commercial hit. 

Like Lord Windermere, Wilde was repeatedly blackmailed for his perceived sexual indiscretions; like Lady Windermere pursued by Lord Darlington, Wilde was asked to leave his wife and children by a passionate aristocratic admirer, Lord Alfred Douglas; Wilde’s clandestine homosexuality made him perpetually on the brink of falling into the “pit and precipice” of being a societal outcast like Mrs. Erlynne.

In this play, Wilde thrillingly wrestles with comedic and dramatic conventions. As in all classic comedies, marital order is threatened and restored, yet happiness and understanding remains elusive. Secrets remain tantalizingly unrevealed. Most radically, “bad” women are not only un-repentant, but heroic, by the final curtain.

I was first introduced to theatre in the round at The Stephen Joseph theatre way back last century. I was immediately smitten and have wanted to do every show that way ever since. 

As an actor, it leaves you nowhere to hide- we've all turned upstage to cover some mishap at some point in our careers. And for you, the audience, it offers an insight and a connection that 'conventional' proscenium arch productions simply cannot achieve.

When Donna and I started MPtc, at the Christmas dinner table last year, we  quickly decided that our USP would be CLASSICAL THEATRE WITH A MODERN MINIMALIST TWIST and playing in the round suits that just fine, and we hope you come to love it as much we do.

Working on this wild and woolly early Wilde play with this wonderfully dedicated company who bring so much of themselves to their work has felt more like encouraging an exciting new voice than revering a long-dead theatrical legend. With this extraordinary group of creatives, I hope that Wilde’s mirror to his own society’s hypocrisy is equally reflective of our own.

COMING

NEXT

>>>>

coming in 2025

Twelfth Night

William Shakespeare

The Seagull

by Anton Chekhov

Oedipus the King

by Sophocles

She Stoops to Conquer

by Oliver Goldsmith

Music played in today's performance

Kirk Osamayo - Meditation On Love

Telepathic Teddy Bear - This Is Love

Chopin's Ballade no1 in G minor op 23

Greig's Piano Concerto in A Minor op 16

Emotional Piano and Violin by Universfield

Beat Mekanik - Dance the Night Away

Dirk Dehler - Impulsion

Triple5 Here - Vim and Vinagarette Remastered

We Is Shore Dedicated - No Hay Puente Instrumental


under Creative Commons licence  by attribution/PD 

Thanks to FREE MUSIC ARCHIVE

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A Special Thanks to all the wonderful humans who have supported us with this crazy adventure, who have helped by putting up posters, handing out fliers and spreading the word by re-sharing our many social posts and telling firends about us -- Thank You!