top of page

Team Members

Hunter Perske

Hunter Perske

JULIUS CAESAR

Hunter is a graduate of the West Australian Academy of Performing Arts. Since graduating he has combined Acting, Parenting, Train Driving and travel. He has been a guest performer on many TV shows from being abducted by aliens in Blue Healers to being dissolved by intestinal acid juices in a mining ‘planet’ on Farscape. In theatre he has played many and varied roles across many formats, the Shakespeare world has been a major focus for him performing in Taming of the Shrew (Petruchio) and Much Ado About Nothing ( Bennedick) for the Venice Shakespeare Company, Midsummer Nights Dream (Bottom) Macbeth with Arneke Shakespeare in the UK and collaborating with the Melbourne Shakespeare Company in the Tempest, Comedy of Errors, Much Ado About Nothing and Twelfth Night. He was James Joyce in Holy Cow.

Natasha Herbert

Natasha Herbert

MARC ANTONY

Natasha graduated from VCA in 1991 and has since worked extensively in theatre in Australia. She was last seen at fortyfivedownstairs in the Keene/Taylor show Dreamers. Most recently she spent two years as McGonagall & Umbridge in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child (Michael Cassell Group). Highlights of Natasha's career include Cloudstreet & Trustees (Malthouse), The Father (STC/MTC), Away (STC/Malthouse), I Heart John McEnroe & Anti-Hamlet (Theatreworks), and Contest (Darebin Arts). With the Malthouse Theatre, Natasha performed in the Misconception of Oedipus, Happiness, Kitten, Speaking in Tongues, Rapture, Still Angela, Black Sequin Dress, Honour, Love Child, and Wolf. With Melbourne Theatre Company she performed in Neighbourhood Watch, The Dreamlife of Butterflies, God of Carnage, Pillowman, The Balcony, The Three Sisters, Hysteria, I’m not Rappaport and I Hate Hamlet. Interstate, Natasha performed in War Horse (Global Creatures), The Unspoken Word is Joe, The Large Breast or the Upside-down Bell, Inconsolable (Griffin), The Country (Belvoir), Black Sequin Dress (Adelaide Festival) and many other productions across the country. Natasha was awarded 2001 Green Room Award for Best Fringe Actress (Portrait of Dora) and Best Ensemble Green Room Awards for I Heart John McEnroe.

Michelle Perera

Michelle Perera

CALPURNIA / CLITO

Knee deep in the corporate sector by day, and an Actor and Radio Journalist/Broadcaster at all other times, Michelle has a Specialised Degree in English / English Literature and has been involved in theatre for over 30 years, both in Australia and Sri Lanka.
She keeps a loose grip on her sanity by producing and presenting the weekly arts and issues centred radio show, ‘Community’ on 3MDR 97.1fm, and by pursuing her passion for the stage as an Actor and an Arts Advocate.

Her most recent stage credits include Ash Flander’s ‘This is Living’ for Malthouse Theatre (2023), Amy May Nunn’s ‘Lemon Tree on Dreg Street’ for Theatreworks (2023), Thomas Eccleshare’s ‘Heather’ for Melbourne Fringe (2022), Harrison Davies Rivers’ ‘And She Would Stand Like This’ for Antipodes Theatre Company (2022) & William Hinz’s ‘Guerilla Sabbath’ at La Mama Theatre (2021).

Annabelle Tudor

Annabelle Tudor

METELLUS CIMBER / CINNA THE POET / PINDARUS

Having completed her BA (Acting) at Federation University in 2016, Annabelle moved home to Melbourne where she has since enjoyed numerous productions with The Australian Shakespeare Company and Melbourne Shakespeare Company. Annabelle also appeared in the Original Australian cast and tour of Puffs, and you may recognise her voice from the numerous audiobooks she records in her time away from the stage. Recent stage credits include Moon in Artefact Theatre Co’s The Real Inspector Hound and Titania in MSC’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. This is Annabelle’s 8th production with MSC, it being the second in their studio seasons at 45 Downstairs.

Leah Baulch

Leah Baulch

CAIUS LIGARIUS / YOUNG CATO

On stage, Leah's appearances include Pygmalion (Australian Shakespeare Company), We Were There (Tilted Projects), Romeo & Juliet, Much Ado About Nothing (AIP), Cowboy Mouth (Actors Theatre Collective), MP (The Street Theatre), Macbeth, Romeo & Juliet (Flying Bookworm), Too Hot To Handle, Master & Servant, Pearl Verses the World (Jigsaw Theatre Co) The Merchant of Venice, Much Ado About Nothing (Shakespeare by the Sea) and Twelfth Night (CCSC).
Leah spearheaded works under The Actors Theatre Collective and as an independent producer (theatrical and screen). Commencing her acting journey at Actors Centre Australia, she has since trained with Cicely Berry, Larry Moss, Lisa Robertson, and is also a graduate of 16th Street Actors Studios full time program.
She was raised in Canberra, and has Australian/German heritage.

Sebastian Li

Sebastian Li

LUCIUS / VOLUMNIUS

Sebastian Li is a Chinese-Indonesian/Australian theatre and film actor. He is a graduate from The Victorian College of the Arts with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Acting. There, he was awarded the Grace Marion Wilson Trust Scholarship for Excellence in Acting. Sebastian starred as Chen in SBS mini-series New Gold Mountain and his other television credits include The Family Law (SBS) and Nowhere Boys: Season 4 (ABC). Sebastian has performed the role of Prince Chululongkorn in Opera Australia’s The King and I (QPAC) and has performed with Melbourne Shakespeare Company on their productions of The Comedy of Errors as Angelo, A Midsummer Night’s Dream as Puck and The Merry Wives of Windsor as Slender. Sebastian performed in Melbourne Theatre Company’s (MTC) 2023 season of Cybec Electric, playing the role of Art in HELL FIRE, mortal boys. He performed at the 2022 Edinburgh Fringe Festival in the original work How to be a Person When the World is Ending, followed by a subsequent season at Theatre Works for the Melbourne Fringe Festival. Most recently, Sebastian appeared as Alex in Climbers by Elly D’Arcy at Fortyfive Downstairs.

Matthew Connell

Matthew Connell

MARCUS BRUTUS

Matthew is an acting graduate of the Victorian College of the Arts. A 2013 Heath Ledger Scholarship finalist, his television credits include The Blake Mysteries, Preacher, Ms Fisher’s Modern Murder Mysteries, Neighbours, Celebration Nation & Sherazade: The Untold Stories as well as Australian feature films The Boy Castaways (Arena Media, Soft Tread, Mene Mene) and Ecco Homo (Ghost Pictures). Matthew’s theatre credits include Hello Goodbye & Happy Birthday (Malthouse/ Melbourne Festival), Hamlet (Australian Shakespeare Company), Romeo and Juliet and King Lear (Melbourne Shakespeare Company), Travesties (Bloomsday In Melbourne), Cock (15 Minutes From Anywhere), The Darkening Sky and LOW (Victorian Theatre Company), and Variations Or Exit Music (Justin Nott Company). Most recently he featured in Code Of Conduct (Rory Godbold & Mark Wilson). As Artistic Director of Victorian Theatre Company, Matthew has programmed six productions to date.

Terry Yeboah

Terry Yeboah

OCTAVIUS CAESAR / POPILIUS LENA

Graduating with a Bachelor of Dramatic Arts from the VCA, Terry has worked for the Red Stitch Actors Theatre, Melbourne Theatre Company, Black Swan Theatre (Perth), Malthouse Theatre, Queensland Theatre Company, Capital Theatre, Princess Theatre and La Mama. Terry performed and toured a one man play titled Boxman, written for him by the well-known writer Daniel Keen. Since finishing up his years tour with Disney’s Lion King, Terry co-directed AMKA performed at the Fairfax Studio, Art Centre Melbourne, to sell-out crowds, being awarded the highest selling gross sales since the opening of the studio. Terry has been a guest Alumni speaker for the Graduating students of VCA, NIDA and WAPA. And just finished a 6 months tour with Hit productions “the Saphires”. He just finished producing a movie titled “RESIDENCE” which comes out at the end of the year.

Mark Yeates

Mark Yeates

CASCA / MESSALA

Mark is a graduate of the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in the UK, graduating with the acclaimed Peter Ackerman award for outstanding comedy performance. Mark is the founder of Artefact Theatre Co. - A Melbourne based independent theatre company that has been producing shows since 2016. Mark also graduated from the 16th Street Actors Studio full time program in 2012 and has studied with other institutions such as VCA, MTC and NIDA as a part of their intensive training programs.
Theatre credits include: Last Time (Hensby & Beckett), The War of the Worlds (Layered Reality), A Little Rain in Monaco (Sober Riot Theatre), Troilus & Cressida, Julius Caesar, The Seagull, Constellations (all with BOVTS Studios), Much Ado About Nothing (Artefact Theatre Co.), Mr Burns: A Post-electric Play (Lightning Jar Theatre), The Importance of Being Earnest (Artefact Theatre Co.), Festen (Play Dead Theatre), The Pillowman (Patalog Collective), Mojo (Patalog Collective), Romeo and Juliet (China Tour - Australian International Opera Company), Much Ado About Nothing (China Tour - AIOC), Seminar: A Comedy (Artefact Theatre Co.), You Got Older (Red Stitch Actors Theatre), Proof (Artefact Theatre Co.)

Anthea Davis

Anthea Davis

FLAVIUS / TREBONIUS / LUCILIUS

Anthea Davis is also a graduate of V.C.A Diploma of Dramatic Art 1991, And Masters In Writing for Performance 2013 Anthea recently performed in: Neil Coles,“Shawry” at Chapel of Chapel, Richard Murphet’s “The Darkening Sky" and “Melbourne Shakespeare Company, “King Lear” as Gloucester. She performed Virginia Woolf in “A Room of Ones Own” and “I Shot Mussolini” both produced by La Mama. Anthea wrote and performed, “The Imaginarium” an immersive audio tour for the Coburg Carnival Festival and appeared in the hit web series, “Little Acorns”. Anthea has toured extensively throughout Australia with “Arena Theatre Company ,“ “Mud and Blood “and Mick Thomas’s Australian Musical “The Tank”.

Michael Sakinofsky

Michael Sakinofsky

ARTEMIDORUS / THE SERVANT

Michael (They/Them) is a non-binary MENA performer who has performed leading roles throughout their schooling in both plays and musicals. They have been working the last year in the independent theatre scene in films as well as being a part of workshops for new, up and coming works with some of Australia’s leading creatives. They played a leading role in the sold out season of “Teeth and Tonic” as a headliner for the Melbourne Fringe Festival. They have also performed as a lead in HomeGrown Aus. They are a graduate of Showfit under Matthew Frank and Kath Tonkin, and have recently graduated from Howard Fines Acting studio.

Mark Wilson

Mark Wilson

CAIUS CASSIUS

Mark Wilson works as a director, devisor, dramaturg, performer and writer. As a maker/performer he has collaborated with Brian Lipson on The History of the Damnable Life and Deserved Death of Doctor John Faustus (Fringe, ACM); Alice Will Caroline on Doors Shut (Fringe/Temperance Hall); and Triage Live Art Collective. Before the pandemic, he created and performed three radical Shakespeare adaptations: Unsex Me, Richard II and Anti-Hamlet. Directing credits include Declan Furber Gillick’s Jacky (MTC) and Bighouse Dreaming (Fringe, Brisbane/Darwin Festivals), Rory Godbold’s Code of Conduct, Emma Hall’s World Problems (Amsterdam) and Michael Gow’s Sweet Phoebe (Red Stitch). He was dramaturg on Emily Godard’s This is Eden directed by Susie Dee. His first feature as writer-director, The End of A Childhood, based on the work of Henry Handel Richardson, is currently in postproduction. He trained at Monash, VCA, Ecole Philippe Gaulier and is an International Fellow of Shakespeare’s Globe in London. He teaches regularly at VCA. His shows have won awards at Melbourne Fringe and at the Greenroom Awards.

Aisha Aidara

Aisha Aidara

PORTIA

Aisha Aidara is a Naarm-based performer. She received a Diploma of Musical Theatre in 2018 from the National Institute of Dramatic Arts (NIDA) and continued her studies at the Victorian college of the Arts (VCA) from 2019-2020, before commencing her professional theatre debut as Rose Granger-Weasley in Michael Cassel Group’s Melbourne production of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.

Jacqueline Whiting

Jacqueline Whiting

DECIUS BRUTUS / TITINIUS

Jacqueline’s recent work includes Strawberry in Brittany and the Mannequins, Adriana in A Comedy of Errors (Melbourne Shakespeare Company), Olivia in 12th Night (Melbourne Shakespeare Company), Nora in Love’s Bitter Mystery (Bloomsday in Melbourne) and her self-written cabaret Book-crastinators Anonymous (the hearsay theatre group). Pre-covid, Ms Whiting spent two years in Canada refining her skills and training to an international standard. When not performing, Jacqueline works on her own writing projects including action films, tv comedies and an epic fantasy novel.

Malith

Malith

MURELLUS / CINNA / DARDANIUS

Malith is a first-generation Australian-born actor of Sinhalese descent. He has worked extensively in the performing arts industry, both on stage and for the screen – as well as being an experienced improviser and comedian. Most recently, Malith has begun his foray into creating his own work, through independent theatre productions including Fifi’s Fifth! and Sri Lankan Fireteam: The Power of Song as part of Melbourne Fringe Festival and Melbourne International Comedy Festival respectively.

As an actor, some of Malith’s credits include Jacques in As You Like It, nomnomnom (Melbourne Fringe), Jack Irish (ABC TV), Why Are You Like This (ABC TV), Slant (Exile Entertainment) and Summer Love (Gristmill).

Tony Reck

Tony Reck

SOOTHSAYER / LEPIDUS / STRATO

Tony Reck has written, directed, produced and critiqued theatre in Melbourne for twenty-five years. He played a Monster, a Pimp, a Magician, and a deranged Priest in productions of plays written by Bond, Fornes, Kopit and Stein; while in 2015 he played Petey in Harold Pinter's The Birthday Party - which he also directed. Between 2002 - 2014 he reviewed contemporary performance for Sydney arts magazine Real Time and wrote, directed and produced his own work. His plays include The Great Divide: The Tar Machine: The Antechamber: Dirty Pictures, and a fifth play, Broken River (2019). Tony also writes fiction and seeks inspiration in landscapes. But only as images that might reveal elaborate meaning behind appearances. He has completed two novels: True Crime and Of the Road, and is planning a third. His forthcoming, sixth play is titled Blue Carla.

bottom of page