David Burton is a writer based in Brisbane, Queensland. He is the author of over thirty professionally produced plays, two acclaimed books, and has contributed to some of Australia’s most innovative theatrical and community arts projects. David’s career spans award-winning theatrical works (including April’s Fool, published by Playlab Press), large-scale community commissions for Queensland Music Festival (The Power Within; The Mount Isa Blast), and significant literary accolades, including winning the 2014 Text Prize for How to Be Happy. His recent achievements include being shortlisted for the 2024 Queensland Premier’s Drama Award and continuing collaborations with major education and theatre organisations such as The Grin and Tonic Theatre Troupe. David holds a doctorate in community-engaged theatre and regularly works across writing, consulting, and content creation for arts organisations. He also maintains a popular weekly blog with hundreds of loyal readers.
When a young father is suddenly left alone with his two daughters for a week, he is not only forced to deal with pooey nappies, hungry children and complicated sleep routines. His conspiracy-theorist brother-in-law is about to have a nervous breakdown. He accidentally enrages online trolls when he suggests Bluey’s dad isn’t a great role model. And… oh God… is the dog choking on something? A funny, brutally honest look at the day-to-day grind of modern parenting, the good dad is about fatherhood, fury and freedom. For our hero, the question ultimately becomes if he can juggle the expectations placed upon him or will he become a real-life Princess Elsa and just… let it go?
Michael Sams is an award-winning playwright and actor originally from Brisbane but currently residing in Townsville. He has performed in over sixty productions including for Queensland Theatre, Matrix/QPAT, 4MBS, TheatreiNQ and Grey Rose. His short plays have been performed overseas (Dubai & New York) and around Australia, with several adapted into podcasts and radio plays. He’s a published playwright (Australian Plays Transform & Amazon) with several of his full-length works supported with Regional Arts Development Fund (RADF) grants. In 2022, Michael participated in Playlab’s Incubator program. Previous positions held include RADF committee member for Townsville City Council and Regional Literary Manager for Short + Sweet International. Michael holds a Bachelor of Arts (Drama) from Q.U.T. and a Masters of Creative Writing from Macquarie University.
Logan, Queensland. Three days before Christmas, 1992.
Sam turns sixteen today—but instead of spending it with mates on the basketball court, he’s trapped in the chaos of a family birthday party he never wanted. In a house overflowing with clashing personalities and emotional landmines, Sam is stuck playing peacekeeper, referee, and emotional sponge.
There are his feuding sisters—one neurodivergent, the other defiant; two aunts—one hypersexual, the other silently suffering under coercive control; a pill-addicted mother searching obsessively for missing chocolate and scapegoats; a sugar-bribing grandmother; and a great-grandmother who just wants help cleaning her toenails. Amid teasing, tantrums, and broken birthday presents, Sam’s milestone is swallowed whole by his family’s dysfunction.
As tensions boil over into a literal food fight, Sam quietly chooses rebellion—not with shouting, but with a single act of disobedience that marks his first step toward independence.
Lisa Smith is a theatre maker, director, actor and writer who has worked over the last 22 years in London, Melbourne, Townsville and on the Gold Coast; where she founded White Rabbit Theatre in 2012. Lisa is passionate about collaboration and creating new work for theatre; thus far with WRT she has developed new works including ‘The Grand’ by Victoria Carless (Director/Producer), which was subsequently published by PlayLab Australia, ‘Slide Night’ by Victoria Carless (Director/Actor) presented as part of Bleach* Festival, ‘Pocketful of Pebbles by Victoria Carless, Lisa Smith and Tammy Weller (Director/Co-writer) presented at HOTA Home of the Arts, and ‘Love Means Nothing in Tennis’ Various Playwrights (Director of Collection/Writer ‘More of a Jan’) presented at Dust Temple.
Lisa was selected as part of the GENERATE program to create a new immersive puppetry work ‘Agnes & Earl’ for the 2018 Commonwealth Games cultural program, Festival 2018, and directed ‘The Woman in Black’ by Stephen Mallattrat at HOTA Home of the Arts for their Youth Theatre initiative. She was an Artist in Residence at Bleach* Festival in 2022 where she created a solo theatre work exploring her experience of grief and loss called ‘A Heart Stops Beating’. Lisa was director of ‘Ready or Not’ by Ainslee Palmer, that premiered at HOTA in 2024 and toured regional QLD later that year as part of JUTE Theatre’s DARTS Initiative. Lisa was selected as an Art Keeper a HOTA Home of the Arts in their 2024 cohort; an award-winning initiative that offers an embedded employment residency to selected artists: there she developed a new work for theatre, ‘Awake’, with collaborator Vicky Falconer (Co-Artistic Director Hayes Theatre Sydney, Musical Director ‘Once’ Darlinghurst Theatre International Tour, Fringe Wives) with support from program provocateur, Wesley Enoch. Lisa is also the playwright and director of the new WRT work for young audiences, FISH! that was commissioned by HOTA Home of the Arts.
Swallows Falling explores the experiences of a family after the shock death of their father and husband. Sitting in the liminal space between death and grief, this play considers the different ways people experience shock and loss, before the true grieving process begins. As this family reflects on their memories of their own experiences across just a few hours, we see their sense of time warp, stretch and compress, and their stories interweave, sometimes corroborating and sometimes conflicting, as we travel along with them through the brutality and absurdity of sudden and profound loss.
