13.07.23
Dear Grif-friend,
I feel very honoured to be writing today’s newsletter after experiencing our opening night of Suzie Miller’s Jailbaby last night. If you haven’t already been a part of our first five audiences, we can’t wait for each and every one of you to see this powerful new work. We think this work is shaping up to be another home run!
As a new writing theatre, there is a different type of thrill when it comes to opening a show at Griffin. Our Jailbaby team has worked for many months around the clock and across many time zones to get this work up—after years of it living rent-free in Suzie’s brain since her time at Shopfront Youth Legal Centre. If you haven’t got your tickets yet, we have just announced an extended season so you can nab the final tickets to any of the performances 14–19 August—you don’t want to miss this.
As Griffin’s Head of Development, I wanted to take a moment to gush and thank some of this show’s supporters. This work would simply not exist without the Australian Writers’ Guild, who commissioned this work in 2020, and a circle of supporters we so fondly call our Production Partners. Each year we create a donor syndicate of true believers who rally behind the riskiest, most impactful and most potentially divisive work we program in that season, and I wanted to take the opportunity to thank them for supporting this important new work. We are buoyed by their support, confidence and generosity, thank you again to AWG and our Production Partners for letting us take big swings! (Final baseball reference, I promise!)
Speaking of support, THANK YOU to everyone who donated to our end of financial year campaign. With everything going on in the world, we are chuffed to have your support—in every sense of the word. We are so grateful for the amazing community of loyal donors, subscribers, audience members, Grif-friends and advocates that support us from a like on Instagram to telling a friend to see our shows; from those who have the means to donate financially to those amazing individuals who give us their expertise and time by volunteering for Griffin. And thank YOU for subscribing to our eNewsletter and taking the time to read this rambly update!
Last time you heard from me, I had just started at Griffin and after a big (almost full) year at the company—so it feels fitting to be celebrating “Another Op’nin, Another Show” (last time it was Whitefella Yella Tree). We are just over a week from announcing our Griffin Award 2023 winner, check out our shortlisted playwrights (generously supported by the Copyright Agency’s Cultural Fund, thank you!). Congrats to each of them (and to the whopping 144 entrants who submitted this year), we look forward to announcing the winner on Sunday 23 July.
Now a look to the future, I am here to set you some homework… If you haven’t watched the 1995 erotic drama thriller and cult classic (read, critically-panned) Showgirls starring Elizabeth Berkley as she shook off the shackles of Saved by the Bell, you have until September to watch it before Nakkiah Lui’s sparkly, smart-arsed spoof Blaque Showgirls takes the SBW Stables Theatre. So hunt through that $5 bin at Kmart/Big W/JB HiFi or stream it for free on Beamafilm. You too will be… so excited, so excited, so scared.
That’s all from me, see you at the Stables.
Affectionately,
Jake
Jake Shavikin
Head of Development
