Chris Bendall
Director, Playwright and Creative Producer

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Chris is an award-winning Australian arts leader, artistic director, programmer, playwright & dramaturg. He is currently Artistic Director of the iconic Bondi Pavilion, curating a diverse program of year-round arts and culture cross-artform events. He was Director & CEO of Critical Stages Touring from 2014-2022, curating annual programs of outstanding professional theatre and live performance for regional and metropolitan audiences across Australia and New Zealand (2014- present). Previous roles include Guest Curator of the 2013 National Play Festival for Playwriting Australia; Artistic Director & CEO of Deckchair Theatre (2008-2012) in Fremantle WA; Artistic Director of Theatre @ Risk in Melbourne (2001-2007); &  Resident Director at Melbourne Theatre Company (2002-2006).
 
Chris won the PAC (Performing Arts Connections) Australia Touring Legend Award for 2019 for his work with Critical Stages Touring. He won the Sydney Theatre Award for Best Production for Young People for Critical Stages Touring / ATYP/ The Good Room's I've Been Meaning to Ask You in 2021. He won WA Equity Award for Best Director in both 2009 and 2011, and was nominated for a Green Room Award for Outstanding Direction in 2001.  He has been awarded the Queen's Trust Australia and Foundation for Young Australians Centenary Grant (2001) and the George Fairfax Memorial Award for Theatre (2003). Chris was a member of PAC Australia & Regional Arts Australia’s Touring Advisory Group and on the nominating panels of the Helpmann Awards for Regional Touring (Deputy Chair) and for Theatre from 2013 to 2021. He is currently on the Sydney Theatre Awards Children's Theatre and Theatre for Young People panels. 

Highlights as a director include: Black Sun / Blood Moon (writer and director, premiere Wagga Wagga Civic Theatre May 2022, Australian national tour 2023); Thomas Murray and the Upside Down River by Reg Cribb (Griffin Theatre world premiere Jan 2016, NORPA, Lismore April 2016, Critical Stages national tour Feb-April 2018); Stones in his Pockets  (Critical Stages NSW tours 2015 & 2016, national tour 2017). For Deckchair Theatre productions include: world premiere of The Magic Hour  by Vanessa Bates (Nominated for Drover Award for Tour of the Year for 2014, National Tour with Performing Lines, including seasons at Queensland Theatre Company and Darwin Festival); Taking Liberty (WA Equity Award nominations Best Production & Best Director 2012); The Modern International Dead by Damien Millar (WA Equity Award Winners Best Director and Best Production 2011); world premiere of Grace adapted  from the novel by Robert Drewe (Perth International Arts Festival 2010); Checklist for an Armed Robber by Vanessa Bates (WA Equity Award Winner Best Director 2009).
 

Chris was awarded the Goethe Institut / Playwriting Australia Dramaturgy Fellowship & and Ian Potter Foundation Cultural Trust Award  in 2008, which enabled him to travel to Germany and work as Guest Dramaturg on Hiob directed by Johan Simons at the Munchner Kammerspiele.

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