Skip to main content

The Shiralee By D’Arcy Niland
Adapted for the stage by Kate Mulvany
Directed by Jessica Arthur

6 October – 22 November 2025

In the Drama Theatre

Sydney Theatre Company

Theatre

Bathed in the golden light of an outback sunset, audiences will be swept away into a story as beautiful as the landscape in this adaptation of a classic Australian story. 

A love song to the open road

The Australian epic The Shiralee comes to the stage for the first time, adapted by Kate Mulvany, in a ranging and poetic story of life and love on the margins. 

Macauley is a rugged swagman who roams the highways and byways of mid-century Australia, while Macauley’s young daughter Buster lives with her separated mother in a neglectful home in Sydney. When Macauley discovers Buster’s circumstances he takes her on the road with him, despite his hesitations around fatherhood. 

Hot on the heels of the national sensation The Dictionary of Lost Words, director Jessica Arthur returns with a spectacular cast featuring Mulvany herself, Josh McConville, Aaron Pedersen and Ziggy Resnick, in this new play about a father-daughter bond that blooms in a harsh and unforgiving world.

A Sydney Theatre Company production
 

Director Jessica Arthur
Designer Jeremy Allen
Lighting Designer Trent Suidgeest
Composer & Sound Designer Clemence Williams
Dramaturg Kip Williams
Assistant Director Guy Simon
Fight Director Tim Dashwood

With

Stephen Anderson
Paul Capsis
Josh McConville
Lucia Mastrantone
Kate Mulvany
Aaron Pedersen
Ziggy Resnick
Catherine Văn-Davies

Plan your visit

You may also like

The 39 Steps

8 – 30 Aug 2025

The 39 Steps is Hitchcock’s classic spy thriller meets Monty Python madness, now reimagined for a brand-new Australian tour. Directed by Damien Ryan and starring Lisa McCune, Ian Stenlake and The Umbilical Brothers (David Collins and Shane Dundas) it’s a fast, funny, unmissable night of theatre.

  • Theatre
  • Comedy

Good Trouble with Nick Kyrgios: Live

12 Nov 2025

In a first-of-its-kind global tour, Nick Kyrgios brings his chart-topping podcast Good Trouble with Nick Kyrgios LIVE to the stage, presented by Hana Kuma.

  • Talks and Ideas

Reflections on David McDiarmid: Paul Yore and Sally Gray

26 May 2025

Free event, tickets essential. Join curator, historian, and executor of the David McDiarmid estate, Dr. Sally Gray, in conversation with artist Paul Yore, to celebrate the launch of McDiarmid’s Lighting of the Sails commission, Kiss of Light.

  • Talks and Ideas

Checking availability