Brett Sheehy AO is back in South Australia gearing up for Adelaide Festival 2025 as Artistic Director. It’s an appointment he’s had before, and he’s relishing the opportunity to get his hands on the reins once more. Brett has worked in multiple jobs from multiple angles in a stellar career, often drawing on his own own artistic practice of dramaturgy to nurture and develop artists and performances, and now you might find him leading the way as an artistic director, a producer, an educator, and as a creative consultant, with educational institutions such as NIDA, or producing companies such as Michael Cassel Group.
After a brief career in law in Queensland he joined Sydney Theatre Company (STC) where he was variously Artistic Associate, Literary Manager & Deputy General Manager. After leaving STC, Brett artistically and administratively led four major arts organisations -Sydney Festival (Festival Director & CEO 2001 to 2005), Adelaide Festival (Artistic Director & Co-CEO 2006 to 2008), Melbourne Festival (Artistic Director & Co-CEO 2009 to 2012) and Melbourne Theatre Company (Artistic Director & CEO 2013 to 2022).
Brett’s tenures have been renewed and extended multiple times at every organisation he has led. Works programmed and curated by Brett have earned a total of 117 Helpmann Award nominations, winning 24. He is the on-going mentor to multiple arts executives and cultural leaders across Australia, and internationally. He is also an alumnus of the esteemed Cranlana Ethical Leadership Colloquium. In 2012, Brett was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia ‘for distinguished service to the performing and visual arts as a director of national festivals, to international artistic exchange, and through mentoring roles.’
And so, a few weeks out from the next edition of the festival, it was only fitting that Brett Sheehy AO sat down with Irresistible on a Friday morning just before Christmas. We probed deep to find out what his journey to the top has been like, how he feels about the profound responsibility of putting great art out into the world, and, of course, what his gym schedule is like.
You’ve come to lead Adelaide Festival after a two-decade gap. How does it feel to be back?
“Although I was enjoying my semi- retirement in the Blue Mountains, when I got the call to step in, I didn’t hesitate. Incredibly, there are 6 or 7 of the festival team members who were here with me 20 years ago. It’s great to be with old colleagues again and I’m having a lot of fun back in Adelaide.”
Why do you think Adelaide Festival has always, and continues to be, such a successful festival?
“The festival was founded in 1960, and began as a Biennial. Since then, there has been unwavering bipartisan support in all the Coalition and Labour South Australian Governments. Decades ago, South Australia was given the moniker of The Festival State and all governments have understood how important festival culture is to the city.”
Is there an unsung hero or team that really makes it all work?
“The ticketing team are maybe the most unseen in many ways. They deliver often a very complex program. For example, this year we’re doing Complete Works: Table Top Shakespeare. There are multiple performances every day over 8 days. There’s a chessboard complexity to it and it baffles me that the ticketing team can make it work. Production, marketing and programming teams have a lot of contact with the artists and see a lot of shows, but the ticketing team are really beavering away getting the audience in front of the performers. Even now, the festival hasn’t even started, and the ticketing team are are working away from the crack of dawn!”
Do you remember coming to Adelaide Festival for the first time?
“I was a teenager in the 70s. I loved it. I didn’t know anything this wonderful existed on Planet Earth. I didn’t know what was happening in Adelaide. I hadn’t really travelled. It just thrilled me to bits. I would continue to come from Queensland as a teenager and in my 20s every two years, and it was incredibly special, and it was the first event in Australia like it. There became a tradition of people visiting Adelaide from all over for the festival, which just grew and grew.”
And then other cities wanted to do the same?
“With the success of Adelaide, and I can say this with some knowledge having directed Sydney and Melbourne Festivals, the other cities tried to duplicate it. Not only Sydney and Melbourne, but Perth and Brisbane too, and then the Ten Days on the Island Festival in Tasmania. Nowhere has matched the tourism draw of Adelaide though. Last festival in March 2024, 35% of our audience came from interstate and overseas, that’s still much more than other cities.”
It seems to really resonate around Adelaide.
“There’s a lot of traction. The average person in the street knows that it’s on, they know it’s important to their city, even if they don’t come. With that recognition has come really significant financial support. I know that when I was the director of Sydney Festival 2002-2005, I think my government grant was $1.5 million, and in Adelaide at the same time it was about $5 million. It’s continued to grow exponentially and I think our grant is still 2-3 times other cities. With that kind of resourcing comes the luxury of stability and certainty, and that reflects in our wonderful team, the fact that staff stay with us for years, and in the end, the quality of the festival we put on.”
Is there something about the design of the city itself lends itself to a festival?
“Adelaide is a perfect festival city because of the scale. It’s contained. It’s not too big, so a festival can’t get lost in this town. Being able to walk from venue to venue and cover the whole city on foot is what makes it work. Three of the most perfect festival cities in the world are Edinburgh, Avignon and Adelaide, and they have that similar size and accessibility. I would hate to see Adelaide get too big and start down a path of growth for growth’s sake. Adelaide is magical just as it is.”
What else do you love about Adelaide?
“What didn’t exist here when I was here 20 years ago, is the astonishing cafe and restaurant culture. I could go to a different cafe every day in the city and the quality across the board would be phenomenal. Everyone talks about the cafe culture in Melbourne, but here they are knocking it out of the park. If they can keep this depth of quality, I’m thinking about retiring here. I could easily spend extended periods of time here forever- I love it.”
How did you end up getting Festival Director jobs?
“I’ve been incredibly lucky. I was doing my Law Articles as a young man on the Gold Coast, and not loving it. My partner had moved to Sydney so I followed him. I got a job at the Sydney Theatre Company as an usher. Then a job came up as a gofer- I was getting the directors their coffee and their photocopying. The Artistic Director then was Richard Wherrett AM, who was a fantastic mentor and gave me so many opportunities. I went from assistant to literary manager to deputy general manager of Sydney Theatre Company. Then Anthony Steel AM poached me for Sydney Festival and I ended up as deputy director to Leo Schofield AM, who also mentored me and was a big influence on my life. I followed him as Director of Sydney Festival. Then I was at Adelaide and Melbourne Festivals, followed by a decade as Artistic Director of Melbourne Theatre Company.”
How broad was your experience coming up?
“I was able to straddle artistic and administrative and production type roles. I could be in the literary department of Sydney Theatre Company working on dramaturgy and productions, but I also became deputy general manager so I understood budgets and contracts and how the whole machine works. That has allowed me to move with a lot of ease between organisations without having to be exclusively focussed on one thing and to have a broader understanding of what needs to be done. When I was in my early 20s at the STC we worked all day and saw all the shows, we all stuffed envelopes, we all did everything. I think now maybe people don’t muck in together in the same way. I’m not saying younger generations now aren’t prepared to do that, I don’t think they’re given the same opportunities. Employers are much shyer about asking and allowing people to get a really broad experience.”
What advice would you give to a future director of Adelaide Festival?
“Enjoy your time here. Become part of the city. Meet people, everyone here is so welcoming to the Adelaide Festival Director even if they have nothing to do with the arts. The city buys a lot of tickets, the philanthropists give a lot to the festival. You can have so much fun here.”
Do you have any horror stories from over the years?
“I had an eager publicist recently who counted all the productions I have presented – it was 850. This is my 11th festival as a director, and you tend to do 60-80 events per festival. Plus, I had 15 shows a year at Melbourne Theatre Company. So, with those kinds of numbers, there have been a lot of, shall we say, interesting turns of events. I know I’ve seen performances that were an absolute knock-out overseas, and I’ve brought them across to Australia, and I’ve maybe put them in a very bourgeois pristine setting, and it has just bombed. Sometimes the work sings because of the particular social or political, or even physical context. Some European or Central and South American festivals, for example, can create an incredible earthiness to the way a work is presented which you can’t bring with you. Those kinds of experiences taught me to not be swept up in the atmosphere of the moment, the environment, the geography, and to try to be laser focussed on what will work on the other side of the world.”
How about handling difficult personalities?
“Difficult performers tend to be still on their way up. I once had an artist with a rider that stipulated, they be picked up from the airport in a white Mercedes- Benz. That year, the festival I was delivering had a sponsorship with BMW. We sent out the biggest best white limousine we had, but it was a BMW. The artist came through the gate and out of the airport, looked at the car, and walked straight back in, saying they weren’t going to move until their rider was acknowledged. I took a while to find a suitable white Mercedes but we did. I’ll admit I wasn’t thrilled about it.
Artists at the top tend to be fantastic, and the only grief they give me is if what is happening to their art is unravelling it in some way, or it’s not perfect enough. And I love perfectionists and most people at the top are exactly that.”
Do you think that’s not a co-incidence? That some people get to the very top because they also just have some normal people skills?
“I think there’s a lot to that. There are exceptions, people who are extraordinary artists who are tricky, but they are rare. Most at the top are just great to work with. But also, because to a degree, they tend to be secure in their craft, or in their artistic pursuit, and with that comes a willingness to be more open, to encourage younger people, to be more understanding. Live performance is collaborative. You need other elements to make it work. You need an audience. A writer or a painter doesn’t need any contact with the outside world at all. Live performers are often great at having connections with people, on-stage and back-stage.”
How do you feel diversity and sustainability is going at Adelaide Festival, and more generally across arts organisations in Australia?
“We’re getting much better across the board. Even in 2008 in Adelaide, sustainability was incredibly important. We were certainly the first carbon neutral festival in Australia. We may have even been the first in the world. But that was all thanks to the South Australian government. We have a permanent Sustainability Director on staff, and they go through every production and really dig into any issues.
We’re making fantastic progress regarding diversity with what’s on our stages. Backstage, however, it still breaks my heart to see the lack of diversity in the administration teams, in the back of house production teams. It’s not a new issue. It goes back decades; I was looking at this in the 80s and 90s. At Melbourne Theatre Company I looked at diversity issues from the time I started there in 2013 until when I left in 2022. While we were cracking diversity on stage and to some extent in our audiences, if you went through the list of 110 full timers, the lack of diversity was unconscionable. First Nations representation is zero in many administration teams in arts organisations. We have so far to go. All of our training organisations are trying their hardest to change it. My answer to everything is education. First Nations kids need to be educated as children that this is a viable profession. Not just performance. The back of house jobs, that’s where we have to work really hard.”
What in this year’s program are you excited about?
“What I love to be able to do in Adelaide is produce work at scale across so many art forms. In terms of contemporary opera and epic international opera, for example, there is only one entity in this nation that has the will or the resources to present productions of our magnitude and that is Adelaide Festival. It’s none of the other state operas or even Opera Australia, and no other festival. Opera Australia tend to put on works which they restage themselves, but to actually bring in a production and show Australians what is happening on the other side of the world, to show it as it is seen by audiences in other countries; we’re the only ones that can do it.
Our opera for this year is Innocence. It is a work that has been developed in Europe and it has been at Covent Garden, and the moment we finish in Adelaide, we pack it up, and it goes straight to the Metropolitan Opera in New York. That’s the kind of credentials this work has. We have the same singers, soloists, production, everything. In the whole of the Asia Pacific region opera lovers know that the only place they can see this production is by flying to Adelaide next March. We have sold tickets for this performance in New Zealand, Tokyo, Singapore, in KL and Manila.
The big triptych Club Amour is really special. It’s a triple bill with one work by Pina Bausch, and 2 works by Boris Charmatz, who succeeded Pina Bausch as the director of Tanztheater Wuppertal. It’s an amazing examination of love between men and women across three different kinds of worlds.
Stephen Rea in Krapp’s Last Tape is a brilliant chance to see the pre-eminent Irish actor of our times. People may remember his first Oscar nomination in The Crying Game. It’s one of the best Beckett plays as well so it will be a knockout.
Cat Power is doing a show of Bob Dylan songs which I’m really looking forward to. So many of the shows are exclusive to Adelaide as well which makes everything extra special.”
How do you keep going through a whole festival?
“I have a hyperactivity problem. I’ve been in 5th gear since I was six years old. I would get maximum six hours sleep a night on any night. During the festival it’s probably four, but big deal. I never crash and burn, I think the day I do will be the day I die. Until then I’m loving it. I’ll always have a drink at the end of the festival days – there are so many people to catch up with. I do go to the gym religiously, normally 4-5 times. Come festival time I’ll get there twice a week. The festival burns off some of my excess energy.”
What will you remember about this edition of Adelaide Festival in 10 years time?
“These seven months of working with a fantastic team. Being in this city with this group of people. We only have 32 full- timers who work together with only one goal; to put great art in front of people. There’s a kind of selflessness in that; they get very little credit and all they’re doing is trying to enrich other people’s lives. Without wanting to get too spiritual, there’s something like a calling for people who work hard to present other people’s art, above performing themselves. It’s an environment I just couldn’t be happier in.”
Adelaide Festival
28th February – 16th March 2025
17 DAYS
65 EVENTS
11 WORLD PREMIERES
9 AUSTRALIAN PREMIERES
65 EVENTS
11 WORLD PREMIERES
9 AUSTRALIAN PREMIERES
15 AUSTRALIAN EXCLUSIVES
