Neil Armfield awarded Honorary doctorate
20 April 2006
One of Australia’s foremost theatre directors, Neil Armfield will be conferred an honorary degree of Doctor of Literature at the University of Sydney on Friday 21th April 2006.
The long time Artistic Director of Company B which is currently performing at The Seymour Centre, Neil Armfield graduated in Arts from the University of Sydney with Honours in English in 1977.
He began directing plays for Sydney University Dramatic Society at university, and after graduation he was appointed artistic co-director of the Nimrod Theatre Company before working with the Lighthouse Company in Adelaide.
Since 1984, Neil Armfield has been most strongly associated with the work of Sydney’s Belvoir Street Theatre, and he has been Belvoir's artistic director since 1994.
Apart from his long association with Company B, Neil Armfield has directed productions for every state theatre company in Australia. His international work includes productions for the Royal Opera Covent Garden, the Lyric Opera Chicago, the Zurich Opera, the Canadian Opera, the Welsh National Opera, the English National Opera, and the Bregenz Festival in Austria.
He has also directed television and film productions.
Neil Armfield has won four Green Room Awards for best director, four Sydney Critics' Circle Awards for best director, and the Helpmann Award for Best Director twice.
He was nominated for the honorary degree of Doctor of Literature by Professor Penny Gay, Chairperson of the Department of English and Professor Elizabeth Webby of the Department of Australian Studies at the University of Sydney, “in recognition of his long and distinguished contribution to the Humanities, especially through his work as a director of plays, opera and films both within Australia and overseas”.
In his essay on Armfield published in Fifty Key Directors, Dr Ian Maxwell, Chair of the Department of Performance Studies at the University of Sydney described Neil Armfield’s 1998 production of Cloudstreet:
“Armfield’s absolute regard for, and privileging of, the actor; his commitment to developing new writing through ensemble work conducted in collaboration with playwrights; his visual and spatial flair; his concern with the development of an expressive, poetic Australian stage language; a desire to people the Australian stage with indigenous actors and characters; his passion for a good story, well told, and a recurring thematic concern with familial belonging”.
