Company Members
Canberra Playback Theatre company members are from various backgrounds. Theatre practitioners, musicians and community members. They all share a love of stories, theatre, music, community participation and above all a passion for Playback Theatre.
Robin Davidson
Robin Davidson is an actor, clown, director and writer. He is a graduate of Charles Sturt University in Theatre/Media. He is a founding member of Canberra Playback Theatre and has been a playback theatre trainer in Canberra, Hobart, and Tamworth. He devises theatre with communities, including five years as artistic director of Hidden Corners Theatre, a company for young carers (young people who have a family member with a disability) and four years as director of Imperfectly Sane Productions, the Mental Health Foundation of the ACT’s theatre company. He was co-awarded the 2005 Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance ACT Green Room Award for services to community theatre. He also performs, directs and teaches clown and Commedia dell’Arte, including having performed in Nara Japan and at the Sydney Olympic and Paralympic Games. He is sometimes seen as an unusually large bogong moth.
Alkeiya Brown
Music Movement and Colour, being in their vibrations, and being part of their creation, are Alkeiya’s inspirations. As a moth to a flame, she is drawn, but as a phoenix a-flame she is renewed “We’ve been on a wonderful journey, you and I. What fun we’ve had laughing and singing. holding a rainbow in our hands.” She loves this quote, from someone with dementia, expressing clearly the joys and connections they experience in the creation of music. As a toddler, she remembers standing watching her Dad, at the piano, being just tall enough to wonder at his hands and the black and white keys dancing together. As she grew up, dancing was the highlight of her week, then she discovered theatre and the thrill of combining dance music and drama. Alkeiya has been in playback for Ten Years, primarily as a company musician. She is also a Music Teacher and a Music Therapist.
Tanisha Jowsey
Tanisha Jowsey has been involved in drama and acting since she was a small fry. She discovered the Canberra playback Theatre company and joined as a member in March 2007. During her time in the company Tanisha has been a player in both corporate and public performances and has also directed the company in rehearsals and led introductory workshops from time to time. Prior to joining the company Tanisha was heavily involved in theatre sports with the Scared Scriptless Company in Christchurch as well as theatre script writing, stage acting, and television and film acting in New Zealand. She trained at Rosie Belton's Christchurch Drama School from 1995-1998 and won several awards at national drama competitions, including the YFC Best Monologue in 1998. Tanisha completed university degrees in Greek classical studies as well as anthropology, where she focused and mythology, narrative and discourse; which basically means she likes stories and knows a bit about them. Tanisha now works at the Australian National University, writing up people's stories of illness. In her spare time she's an artist dabbling in all things arty, cooking exotic foods and hanging out with one seriously groovy beagle called Sherlock Cornelius James.