The Tamarama Rock Surfers are an independent theatre

Theatre

Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...

 company who operate out of the Old Fitzroy Hotel in Woolloomooloo, New South Wales

Woolloomooloo, New South Wales

Woolloomooloo is a harbourside, inner-city eastern suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Woolloomooloo is located 1.5 kilometres east of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the City of Sydney. The suburb is located in a low-lying, former...

, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

, and beyond. Formed by a collection of local actor/surfers in 1998, they felt at the time there was lack of a platform for new voices in the industry. The story behind the name is that some of the founding members were regular board riders in Tamarama, a notoriously dangerous surfing spot known for its hazardous rocks. The name was to become a metaphor for the edgy and risky plays these performers were to produce.
As of 2008, over 133 shows, including 53 new Australian pieces, that have been seen by over 88,000 audience members

Not confined to the space, the TRS have also performed in the Studio venue of the Sydney Opera House

Sydney Opera House

The Sydney Opera House is a multi-venue performing arts centre in the Australian city of Sydney. It was conceived and largely built by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, finally opening in 1973 after a long gestation starting with his competition-winning design in 1957...

Programmed a year in advance, the subscription submission cut off is October, after which a selected panel of industry experts select the chosen pieces, their decision based on a number of variables.

Many talented Australian actors, both veterans and newcomers, perform in plays at the Old Fitzroy Theatre such as Bojana Novakovic

Bojana Novakovic

Bojana Novakovic is a Serbian Australian actress who works in Australia and the United States.-Early and personal life:Novakovic was born in 1981 in Serbia. She moved to Australia in 1988, at the age of seven. Novakovic was initially interested in becoming a social worker or doctor, but after a...

, Beejan Olfat, Jeremy Cumpston

Jeremy Cumpston

Jeremy Cumpston is an Australian actor most known for his work as Connor Costello on All Saints, an Australian hospital drama....

, Simon Burke

Simon Burke

Simon Burke is an Australian actor. Burke began his acting career as a 13 year-old in the Australian film, The Devil's Playground for which he was awarded Best Actor at the 1976 Australian Film Institute Awards....

, Pippa Grandison

Pippa Grandison

Pippa Jody Grandison is an Australian musical theatre performer. She currently lives in Sydney, with husband Steve Le Marquand and daughter Charlie.-Career:...

, Toby Schmitz, Victoria Hill

Victoria Hill

Victoria Hill is an Australian actress, writer and producer. She is the daughter of the Chancellor of the University of Adelaide Robert Hill and the Australian president of UNICEF, Diana Hill...

, Damon Herriman

Damon Herriman

Damon Herriman is an Australian actor who is best known for his role in drama series Love My Way.Damon Herriman was born in Adelaide, South Australia. He began acting in local television commercials at the age of eight, but it was not until he was cast as Frank Errol in The Sullivans two years...

, Carole Skinner

Carole Skinner

Carole Skinner is an Australian actress who works mainly in the theatre and is well known to armchair viewers for her roles in many long running soap operas.Skinner played top dog Nola McKenzie in Prisoner...

, Leah Vandenberg

Leah Vandenberg

Leah Vandenberg is an Australian actress, who is best known for her role as Anne Cassidy in the comedy series Stupid, Stupid Man. Leah has appeared in many Australian television series and movies.-Filmography:-External links:...

, Danny Adcock

Danny Adcock

Danny Adcock is an Australian actor, best known for his work in television and theatre.His television acting roles include Matlock Police as the killer of Michael Pate's character, Division 4, Homicide, Patrol Boat, Sons and Daughters as Joe Parker, Prisoner as male warder Geoff Carlson, A Country...

.

In addition, many notable directors have recognised the space as one of Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

's finest intimate venues, among them David Field

David Field

David Dudley Field II was an American lawyer and law reformer who made major contributions to the development of American civil procedure...

, Simon Lyndon

Simon Lyndon

Simon Lyndon Simon Lyndon Simon Lyndon (born February 1971, in London is an Australian actor who grew up in Fremantle, Western Australia. He is a WAAPA graduate. He played Jimmy Loughlin in Chopper with Eric Bana, for which he won an AFI award for Best Supporting Actor and a Film Critics Circle...

, Jason Clarke

Jason Clarke

Jason Clarke is a writer and web developer living in Orono, Maine.His first book, Michael Moore Is a Big Fat Stupid White Man, co-written with David T. Hardy, was released in June 2004 and spent six weeks on The New York Times Bestseller list for Hardcover Nonfiction...

, Brendan Cowell

Brendan Cowell

Brendan Cowell is an Australian actor, screenwriter and director. Cowell was born in Sydney. He stumbled upon acting by accident while waiting for his sister to come out of a rehearsal; he was then cast in a commercial at age 8...

, Van Badham

Van Badham

Van Badham is an Australian writer. A playwright and novelist, she writes dramas and comedies.-Early life:Van Badham was born Vanessa Badham in Sydney in 1978 . Her mother and father worked in the New South Wales gaming and track industry, with her father eventually working for the registered club...

, Jeremy Sims

Jeremy Sims

-Personal life:He was educated at Wesley College, Perth, 1977–83. Sims was married to film director Samantha Lang. They have two daughters, Frederique and Evelyn Rose.-Career:...

.

2002 saw the introduction of the innovative 'late shows'. Running on Sunday nights after the scheduled performance, the space was opened up to a variety of performances such as cabaret, multi-media, music and dance.

2006 - A particular highlight of the season was Sue Smith's Thrall, directed by current CEO Leland Kean, starring Peta Sergeant

Peta Sergeant

Peta Sergeant is an Australian actress best known for her lead role in the Australian television series Satisfaction.Peta graduated from NIDA in 2000....

, John McNeill, Tamara Cook and Bryce Youngman. "Sue Smith's beautiful, evocative and erotic play understands the necessary seduction of narrative set-up but, even better, knows how to develop bigger and universal ideas inside the reductive machinery of plot. It's a grounded work in which the thematic ideas transcend the narrative"

2008 was a mixed year for the Company with the success of Toby Schmitz's Cu*t Pi, and the sudden tragic loss of company member Mark Priestley

Mark Priestley

Mark Priestley was an Australian actor. Born in Perth, Western Australia, he graduated from the National Institute of Dramatic Art with a degree in Performing Arts in 1999. His first big TV break was when he appeared in The Farm in 2000 and met director Kate Woods...

The 2009 season opened with the Philip Ridley

Philip Ridley

Philip Ridley is a British artist working with various media.- Biography :Ridley was born in Bethnal Green, in the East End of London, where he still lives and works. He studied painting at St. Martin’s School of Art and his work has been exhibited throughout Europe and Japan...

 play Vincent River

Vincent River

Vincent River was the fourth stage play by Philip Ridley. It premiered at the Hampstead Theatre in London in 2000.It enjoyed a revival in October 2007 at Trafalgar Studios in London. The production starred British actress Lynda Bellingham and British actor Mark Field...

, starring Beejan Olfat and Elaine Hudson to encouraging reviews, "In a period of heatwaves in Sydney (turning the Fitz into an oven) and the distractions of the Sydney Festival, these two have risen above all to grip audiences by the throat and not let go for a minute"
TRS continually collaborate with other independent production companies both nationally and internationally.
The current Artistic Director and CEO of the TRS is Leland Kean

External links

• Tamarama Rock Surfers - Old Fitzroy Theatre, organization homepage