The Trustees of the Australian Children’s Theatre Foundation (ACTF) and Regional Arts Victoria (RAV) have announced the 2023 Joan and Betty Rayner ACTF Commission has been awarded to regional theatre company, Lab Kelpie, one of Australia’s leading independent theatre touring companies.
Lab Kelpie’s critically acclaimed production of Elegy about the plight of LGBTQ+ refugees was a key event in the 2016 Midsumma Festival. The company also produced Katy Warner’s A Prudent Man, which was nominated for Best Performance and subsequently won the WA Tour Ready Award and the Bank Australia Audience Choice Award from over 430 shows at the 2016 Melbourne Fringe Festival. Lab Kelpie was also nominated for a 2016 Green Room Award for Best New Writing, enjoyed a soldout run at Fringe World Perth and has been programmed at the Darwin, Brisbane and Hawke’s Bay (New Zealand) Festivals. Previous works have also toured to regional Victoria and interstate, including to Queensland and Western Australia.
