Though she’s held her role as Artistic Director for just 100 days (as of 26 October, 2022), Courtney Stewart has been involved with some amazing productions at Brisbane’s La Boite Theatre, further expediting the company’s mission to deliver diverse and rich programming.
At this point in her tenure, Courtney can say she’s achieved some of the things she had envisioned coming into the role. “The biggest priority for me was to meet as many artists and people making theatre and telling stories in Brisbane as I could,” she says.
“Brisbane prides itself on local stories and providing opportunities for local talent, which is really important because I think historically, a lot of people have felt like they’ve needed to move elsewhere to have a career in the arts.
“In Brisbane, because I think everyone is fiercely protective of the industry here, it means the flow of people with different ideas is a different thing. I think that has its benefits, but it also has its challenges.”
Having spent time early on in her career in Sydney, more of a “transient city” as Courtney calls it, where the flow of ideas and diversity of people is different, in a roundabout way she was able to bring ideas to her role that would penetrate the Brisbane bubble. “Because I’m from here and have worked here, I feel I’m uniquely positioned to figure out what those conversations might mean in a Brisbane context and to Brisbane artists.
“I’ve wanted to meet as many people as I could to chat to them about the challenges they’ve been facing [as artists], what their relationship has been with La Boite, what they want it to be in the future. To really figure out what the community want La Boite to be.
“To me, La Boite and the company really is at its best when it’s an extension of the community and it needs to take into consideration artists’ needs, what they’re hungry for. I think we’re uniquely placed as a company to be nimble and agile to be able to respond to that.
“I want to provide the access that I wish that I had had when I was on the other side of the [audition] table.”
Image © John McRae
Courtney’s mission to create opportunity and showcase diversity will continue into 2023 when she will direct a Sydney Theatre Company co-production of ‘The Poison Of Polygamy’ at La Boite. Not only does the play hold significance for Courtney because it’s an Asian-Australian production led by Asian-Australian actors, but because Courtney’s professional stage debut was a production of ‘Single Asian Female’ at La Boite.
Commissioning multiethnic works and giving a spotlight to multicultural casts in Brisbane is something La Boite intends to steamroll well into the new year. “La Boite’s vision is to be the most diverse theatre company in the country,” she says, “so the word ‘diversity’ in that context means all facets.
“People from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, First Nations artists, it also means artists who have different abilities, who identify differently in terms of their gender or sexuality, everyone who feels like they haven’t had a platform or haven’t felt like they’ve been part of the majority, La Boite is about giving opportunities and nurturing and accelerating the careers of those artists as a priority.
“It’s also about differences in ideas and experiences and diverse forms. I think while we’re still very much a text-based theatre company, the forms with which we explore, present and communicate stories I think are diverse and will continue to be so well into the future.”
