Melbourne Cast of When Night Comes
Bri Emrich
Bri is a highly versatile, multidisciplinary artist specialising in dance, physical theatre, acrobatics, and aerial arts. She began dancing at the age of four in her hometown, Perth, studying all styles of dance including acrobatics. She went on to study classical ballet and contemporary at WAAPA (The Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts). Bri began her aerial arts training when she was 17 while also training full-time in dance and acrobatics at Lee Academy. Bri has toured globally, performing internationally as an aerialist for Porsche, and as a dancer at many major national corporate events, including those for Westpac, NextGen and CommBank. Recently Bri appeared in the world premiere of L’Hotel, directed by Craig Ilott, at Adelaide Cabaret Festival in 2021, then at the Sydney Opera House in 2022. In 2018 Bri was thrilled to be cast in Broad Encounters’ immersive theatre production A Midnight Visit in the role ‘Madeline Usher’. Bri also played Sandy in the 2023 Melbourne season of Broad Encounter’s Love Lust Lost.
Gabby Carbon
Gabby Carbon is a Maltese-Australian artist with a diverse range of talents. She is an award-winning actor, writer, musician, poet, and makeup artist with a strong passion for interactive and immersive works. Gabby specialises in improvisation, special effects makeup, and clown, working across commercial, theatre, film, cabaret, and cruise ship worlds, being described as “Chaplain-esque” with her command of facial expressions.
Her eclectic projects have been recognised internationally, with performances in the UK, Australia, South-East Asia, and across the South Pacific. She also features in fine art publications across America, Canada, and Europe.
She holds a bachelor of Fine Arts in drama (Distinction) from the Queensland University of Technology and has further studied with La Boite, NIDA, ImproQueensland, Queensland Theatre, Melbourne Actors LAB, Drama Centre London, Locomotive (NZ), and Laugh Masters Academy (Chicago).
Meg Hickey
Meg Hickey is a songstress, musician and dancer who values a whole-hearted expression of authenticity in her performance art, from soft sensual storytelling to grotesque comedic charm. Landing naively on the cabaret stage touring the satirical #firstworldwhitegirls: Botox Party! “a dynamic duo that never missed a beat” Meg continued exploring the cabaret scene bringing her polished musical theatre training to the dynamic art of cabaret and burlesque. She regularly performs as a resident artist at Speakeasy Theatre Melbourne, debuted magic aboard cruise ship Pacific Explorer in The Purple Rabbit (Strut’n’Fret) and delighted in multiple immersive theatre productions by Broad Encounters, being described as “hypnotic to watch”. She looks forward to what When Night Comes will bring to audiences and to her own creative expansion.
Sho Eba
Sho’s professional career has taken them to the most extreme immersive experiences available in Australia. Sho Eba began as the acclaimed gothic poet, Edgar Allan Poe, in Broad Encounters’ Brisbane season of A Midnight Visit in 2021, then flipped from gothic horror to a magical night out in Tokyo as the provocative and naughty ‘hostess with the most-ess’ in Maho Magic Bar, performing at Sydney Festival 2023, Adelaide Fringe 2023 and other Australian cities. Sho has performed for Melbourne audiences in the 2023 season of Love Lust Lost as the charmer and schemer Trink. Sho’s previous works include the feature film The Portable Door 2023, MAZE 2022 at the Brisbane Powerhouse. They’ve trained in Suzuki Actor Training with Zen Zen Zo, and Gareth Harris in traditional acting.
Tomas Correia
Born the ‘flying zucchini’, the oddball Tomas Correia spent over 10 years training circus, and his desire for new and different creative avenues has led him to pursue all things performing. Interactivity and audience performer relationships have always fascinated him, so he has always strived to create and find opportunities to explore this.
Creatives
Kirsten Siddle - Creator, Co-Writer, Co-Director
Kirsten is a creator, creative director, producer, and curator. Her experience and expertise covers both strategic leadership roles and consultancy for the arts sector and government, as well as independent producing. Kirsten’s creative practice places the audience at the heart of every experience and she delights in creating opportunities for audiences to truly immersive themselves, play and be part of the action.
Recent productions include Love Lust Lost, as well as the boutique theatrical-gin experience A Journey Most Unusual in partnership with Hendrick’s Gin. Kirsten created, directed and produced Maho Magic Bar, the innovative Japanese show, bar and pop-up venue and co-created, creative-directed and produced the record-breaking and award-winning immersive theatre experience A Midnight Visit, which went on to break records in 2021-22 as Brisbane’s longest running staged theatre production. Other credits include co-creator and co-director of the Helpmann nominated A State of Grace: The Music of Tim and Jeff Buckley and creative producer on Way to Blue: The Music of Nick Drake.
Kirsten has produced across far ranging genres, including as Executive Producer for The Royal Ballet’s (UK) Australian tour and Ballet Preljocaj’s Snow White. She has held executive curatorial roles at Queensland Performing Arts Centre, Melbourne Recital Centre, including 9 years shaping the Centre’s Artistic Direction as Head of Programming, and the Barbican (London) and was founder and Director of Melbourne’s SummerSalt Outdoor Arts Festival. Her background is as a musician and she completed a Bachelor of Music (Honours) from The University of Queensland. Kirsten is the proud recipient of Australian Business Arts Fountation’s Magaret Lawrence Bequest Scholarship in arts leadership and the inaugural Chief Executive Women Leadership Program Scholarship.
Scott Maidment - Co-Director
Scott is a powerhouse creator and stage director having created and directed a multitude of theatre productions, landmark events and festival precincts for major organisations across the globe. Scott’s creative practice draws from both traditional and contemporary forms and is typically defined by a heady mix of music, cabaret, circus, stunt and thrilling spectacle. His productions have been presented by Sydney, Melbourne, Darwin and Brisbane Festivals, Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Melbourne International Comedy Festival, Kermezzo(o) Brussels, and Adelaide Festival Fringe.
Creation and directing credits include the international smash hit shows: Blanc de Blanc and Blanc de Blanc Encore, both explosions of cabaret, circus, dance and comedy that set sales records in their Sydney premieres and have played to sold out houses across Australia, London, Las Vegas and many locations around the world since. Additional creations by Scott include Limbo and Limbo Unhinged, Life - The Show, The Purple Rabbit, Fun House, Love Riot and Madonna’s Rebel Heart tour.
Scott is the Creative Director of the award-winning producing company Strut & Fret and is Founder and Creative Director of Adelaide’s The Garden of Unearthly Delights, a curated festival precinct that delights 100,000s of people each year. Scott is also the Creative Director of New Zealand’s famed Bread & Circus - World Buskers Festival and previously collaborated with Broad Encounters as Stage Director for the acclaimed production Love Lust Lost (Brisbane 2022 and Melbourne 2023).
Mike Finch - Co-Director
Graduate of the Theatre/Media course in Bathurst, co-founder of Circus Monoxide, and Artistic Director & co-CEO of Australia’s Circus Oz from 1997 until 2015, Mike Finch is a creative itinerant and enthusiast.
Notable projects include 18 years of directing Circus Oz in sell-out national, and international tours, with highlights including four seven-week seasons on 42nd Street New York, seasons on all the continents (except Antarctica). Shows included ‘Barely Contained’, ‘Laughing at Gravity’, ‘Steampowered’ and ‘But Wait There’s More!’.
Since Circus Oz, among other things, Mike has directed 12 hours of non-stop circus performance for White Night Melbourne, two commissioned works for the Sydney Opera House, ‘Skate’; a major skateboarding collaboration between Barangaroo and BIGhART, and two shows for the Australian National Institute of Circus Arts. He also has a solo visual art practise in ink drawing.
Mike’s first engagement with Broad Encounters’ was as Head of Build for the Melbourne season of Love Lust Lost (2023), where he shaped and realised the visual design over more than 2000 square metres.
Mike is an atheist who believes humans are, on the whole, and if given the chance, inherently good.
Helen Cassidy - Co-writer
Helen is a theatre maker and performer with nearly 25 years experience nationally and internationally across a range of genres. Helen frequently collaborates with independent and commercial companies around Australia. Under her company Pretend Productions she created critically acclaimed productions including: Erotic Intelligence for Dummies, Statuesque, Glitter and Dust and most recently the short film Goldfish.
In 2018 she moved to Las Vegas to be part of the creative ensemble for Spiegelworld’s new comedy Opium at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas. She is also a member of the Matilda award-winning ensemble and creative team of Dirty Fame Flash Candles Club.
As a stage actor career highlights include: Family Values, As You Like It, Boston Marriage, Orphans, The Glass Menagerie, Long Days Journey into Night, Scapin, Mrs Warren’s Profession, A Christmas Carol and Absurd Person Singular for Queensland Theatre. Alongside work with Shake and Stir, Strut n Fret, La Boîte, Bell Shakespeare and MTC. Helen played London and the UK with Unlimited Theatre in The Moon The Moon and he solo comedy work has featured on the variety stages of London, New York and Sydney. Her Film and Television appearances include Thirteen Lives, Sisters of War, Wanted, Australia Day, The Contents and Through My Eyes. Helen is a proud recipient of the Lord Mayors Performing Arts Fellowship and four Matilda Awards.