Sydney Theatre Company

Sydney Theatre Company, as the premier theatre company in Australia, has been a major force in Australian drama since its establishment in 1978. The Company presents an annual twelve-play program at its home base The Wharf, on Sydney's harbour at Walsh Bay, the nearby Sydney Theatre, which STC also manages, and as the resident theatre company of the Sydney Opera House. Current Artistic Directors, Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton joined the Company at the beginning of 2008. 

Sydney Theatre Company offers Sydney audiences an eclectic program of Australian plays, lively interpretations of the classic repertoire and the best of new international writing. It seeks to produce theatre of the highest standard that consistently illuminates, entertains and challenges. It is committed to the engagement between the imagination of its artists and its audiences and the development of the theatrical art-form. As the state theatre company of NSW, it also produces a significant education program for schools, STC Ed, and in its studio space produces work devised by, and for, developing artists, originating in 1988 with Baz Lurhmann's Six Years Old and, in its current identity, as Next Stage. The Company reaches beyond its home state, touring productions throughout Australia and internationally. It plays annually to audiences in excess of 300,000.

Sydney Theatre Company actively fosters relationships and collaborations with international artists and companies. Renowned directors Michael Blakemore, Max Stafford-Clark, Howard Davies, Declan Donnellan, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Liv Ullmann and Steven Soderbergh have worked with STC in recent years, and in 2010 Tamás Ascher will direct Uncle Vanya for the Company. STC has presented productions by Complicite, Cheek by Jowl, Out-of-Joint and the National Theatre of Great Britain, and in 2010 will collaborate with acclaimed UK physical theatre company Frantic Assembly, present Steppenwolf Theatre Company’s production of August: Osage County and co-present Long Day’s Journey Into Night with Artists Repertory Theatre, Portland. In 2001 STC performed at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York with its production of The White Devil, returned in 2006 with its production of Hedda Gabler and once again in 2009 with its production of A Streetcar Named Desire which also toured to the Kennedy Center in Washington. Other STC productions to tour internationally in the last few years include The Cherry Pickers (UK 2002), Riflemind (UK 2008) and Blackbird (NZ, Germany 2008). 

STC has launched and fostered the theatre careers of many of Australia's internationally renowned artists including Mel Gibson, Judy Davis, Hugo Weaving, Miranda Otto, Geoffrey Rush, Toni Collette, Rose Byrne and Cate Blanchett.

In 2006 STC launched its first acting ensemble, The Actors Company, which, over three years, performed an extraordinary range of repertoire including award-winning productions of The Season at Sarsaparilla, The Lost Echoand The War of the Roses. STC’s new permanent ensemble of theatre-makers, The Residents, commenced work at the Company's home base, The Wharf, in June 2009.  The Residents are nine actors employed full time by Sydney Theatre Company with a particular focus on the development of theatre while working across all aspects of the Company's program including Main Stage, Next Stage and STC Ed.