Be New - New Musicals Showcase

Welcome to the Be New Showcase – where new Australian musicals take their very first breath. Running on 23 August from 11:30am to 2:00pm, this special daytime event celebrates the bold work of our 2025 Writers, whose original musicals are being brought to life on stage by a talented cast of performers. These are stories in development, raw, moving, and unmistakably homegrown, shared in their earliest stages with an audience ready to listen, feel, and imagine what’s possible. Be part of the journey as we champion fresh voices and the future of Australian musical theatre with an opportunity to provide feedback and contribute to shaping their future.

11:30am - Children of the Air
12:15pm - Q&A session

12:30pm - Break

12:45pm - Knowing How to Love
1:30pm - Q&A session

Children of the Air

By Lachlan Obst
Featuring Isabelle Davis (she/her), Imogen Whittaker (she/her), Jackson Cross (he/him), Lily Walker (she/her), Marissa Economo (she/her), and Rama Luksiarto (he/him)

Children of the Air follows two women - Madison, a mother of two in the bush, and Ellen, a career-focused city bureaucrat - caught in a tug-of-war between personal truth and public expectation. Madison’s fight for rural education puts her directly in conflict with Ellen, whose budget cuts threaten the future of thousands of children. But nothing is simple. Their choices are shaped by guilt, memory, ambition—and an understanding that the system never makes space for people like them.

Knowing How to Love

By Amelia Pawsey, Matthew Poggi, and Kirilee Taylor
Featuring Georgia Unsworth (she/her), Sam Dyer (he/him), and Kieran Humphreys (he/him)

Set in the here and now, Knowing How to Love is a contemporary Australian musical that follows Ben and Charlie - two young adults caught in the chaos of connection in the digital age. Between typing bubbles, Tinder swipes, and ghosted messages, they’re searching for something real. This is a story of self-doubt, late-night D&Ms, and the awkward, aching journey toward self-love and emotional intimacy. Funny, fragile and fiercely honest, Knowing How to Love explores whether we’re losing the ability to love - or just learning it all over again.