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MELODRAMA with John Bolton - 5 day workshop

Name: MELODRAMA with John Bolton - 5 day workshop
Start: 2026-12-07T09:30:00+10:00
End: 2026-12-07T09:30:00+10:00
Location: Burringbar Hall

About

Melodrama:

1. A sensational dramatic piece with exaggerated characters and exciting events intended to appeal to the emotions.

2. A play interspersed with songs and music accompanying the action.

In this workshop we will explore Melodrama and the melodrama of our lives. Where do they intersect, and what is the conversation between them? We will explore how one illuminates the other.

How can we take joy in playing the drunken parent, the poor but honest goodie, the rich and narcissistic baddie? We will discover how melodrama rises in the body, how it saturates us slowly, and how it overtakes us in an instant, giving rise to song. We will experience the heightened melodramatic states as star-crossed lovers, the body that holds the child to be abandoned, and the pure impulse that gives meaning to it all. We will question the distinction between concrete and abstract. We will dissolve the border between real events and the dream world.

About John

John Bolton trained at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London and Ecole Jacques Lecoq, Paris. He was Director of Theatre at the Theatre Workshop, Edinburgh and co-founded Artworks, a company specializing in large scale shows and celebrations in Britain and Europe. He was invited to join Welfare State International as a puppeteer, maker and actor for their “Tempest’ as part of the Toronto International Festival and has toured his solo show ‘Jumping Mouse’ throughout the USA, U.K. and Australasia, subsequently invited to the Dublin and New Zealand International Festivals. His directing and co-creation credits include ‘Odyssey’ with Andreas Litras, which was invited to many festivals including the Barbican International Theatre Event in London; and ‘I Don’t Wanna Play House’ with Tammy Anderson, for which she was twice nominated for Best Actress in the Green Room Awards and was invited to the Dublin and the Hong Kong Festivals. In 1991 John founded the John Bolton Theatre School and later became Head of Acting at the Victorian College of the Arts.

John is a Fellow of the Australia Council, he was awarded the 2005 Victorian College of the Arts Teaching Excellence Award, the 2002 Kenneth Myer Medallion for Outstanding Services to Theatre in Victoria and two Green Room Awards for best production and outstanding direction of ‘My Brother the Fish’.

He has directed plays at The Malthouse, Theatreworks, the Festival of Dreaming in Sydney, The Melbourne, Adelaide and New Zealand International Festivals, Melbourne and Adelaide Fringe Festivals, Belvoir Street Theatre, and for some of Australasia’s premier theatre companies, including Stalker, Kage, and Taki Rua, The National Maori Theatre of New Zealand. He was director of movement for the M.T.C. on ‘The Thirty Nine Steps’, ‘The Gift’ and movement director for the S.T.C. on ‘Long Day’s Journey into Night’. He has run professional classes and workshops for many companies including 11th Hour, Melbourne Workers Theatre, M.T.C. S.T.C. and Back To Back Theatre Company. He directed Inotrope Productions with The St.Kilda Drop-In Centre over a six year period form 2008-2014 creating shows for Theatre Works. He ran workshops and directed shows in Mae La refugee camp, Thailand between 2008- 2014.