Tangent Talk: The Glass Menagerie

Get the story behind the story with our Tangent Talk event at the State Library of South Australia.

One of Tennessee Williams’ most powerful plays and an American classic, The Glass Menagerie is a compelling journey into the heart of memory, illusion and a family fighting for their lives. In a small apartment in 1930s St Louis, Amanda Wingfield and her two children, Tom and Laura, spin singular and separate dreams. Under the direction of Artistic Associate Shannon Rush and starring Kathryn (Kitty) Adams, Laurence Boxhall, Jono Darby and Ksenja Logos.

Before you see the show, join us for a drink and discussion about the themes of the show in “Directing the past into the present: how does a classic play stay relevant today”. We’re joined by an insightful panel including, our host for the evening news media icon Jane Doyle OAM, Manager of the Flinders University Drama Centre Dr Christopher Hurrell, theatre and music reviewer Murray Bramwell, emerging playwright Anthony Nocera and Associate Director at ActNow Theatre Nescha Jelk.

Date: Monday, 20 October 2025

Time: 5.30pm for a 6.00pm start. Concluding at 7.00pm.

Location: Hetzel Lecture Theatre
Institute Building, State Library of South Australia
North Terrace, Adelaide 5000.

Tickets: $10 including a wine from SC Pannell

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Please contact marketing@statetheatrecompany.com.au if you have any questions.

Jane Doyle OAM
Jane Doyle became Adelaide’s most experienced and respected television news presenter across more than three decades and has more than 40 years’ experience as a print, radio and television journalist.
Jane’s media career started when she left the Queensland Education Department teaching special education to take up a newspaper cadetship in far North Queensland in 1980.
She then worked for The Recorder newspaper in Port Pirie and ABC Radio station 5CK as a casual announcer until 1983 when the couple moved to Adelaide.
She joined ABC Radio Adelaide in 1986 and was chief morning newsreader for ABC Radio and took on the additional role of relief news presenter for ABC TV; in 1988 Jane was appointed weeknight newsreader for ABC TV in SA before joining Seven News and established herself as the pre-eminent newsreader in South Australia for a remarkable 33 years before retiring in December 2022.
From 2005 until 2012 Jane worked as part of Adelaide’s number one breakfast radio team on 1395 5AA.
In 2009 Jane was named Australia’s Best AM Newsreader at the Australian Commercial Radio Awards in Sydney.
Jane’s love of the arts has seen her as Chair of Carclew; she is an Ambassador for Impact 100 SA, an advocate for the Adelaide Cabaret Festival and a member of several philanthropic arts groups, including the Adelaide Festival’s Chairman’s Circle, and sits on the Board of State Opera SA.
On Australia Day 2022 Jane was awarded an OAM for her service to the broadcast media, particularly to television, and to the community.

Dr Christopher Hurrell
Manager of the Flinders University Drama Centre, Dr Christopher Hurrell is a stage director and dramaturg who has worked nationally and internationally over a 20-year career in the areas of new writing, Shakespeare and musical theatre.
Christopher has collaborated with leading Australian playwrights as director, dramaturg and in his former role as Literary Manager of Sydney’s Griffin Theatre company, on the creation of numerous award-winning new works of Australian theatre. His collaborators include writers such as Debra Oswald (creator of Offspring), Stephen Sewell, Justin Fleming, Glace Chase and Caleb Lewis.
His PhD at Goldsmiths, University of London investigated archival records of the acting of Shakespeare at the Royal Shakespeare Company, The National Theatre and Shakespeare’s Globe, and his original practice-based research developed new techniques for actors working on late Shakespeare.
While in London, Christopher continued to champion Australian theatre on the world stage. With Wayne Harrison AM, he brought Alan Seymour’s classic Australian play The One Day of the Year back to the London stage for the centenary of the Gallipoli campaign in 2015.
In 2017, he directed the West End premiere presentation of Adelaide singer-songwriter Amity Dry’s The (M)other Life at the historic Wyndham’s Theatre.
He recently directed the world premiere of Glace Chase’s play Gull – or – the Most Lamentable Comedie Called Love, for the 2025 Adelaide Fringe.

Nescha Jelk
Nescha Jelk is a theatre director based on Kaurna land, with 15 years of experience directing independent and mainstage productions that have been presented locally and around the country. She is the current Associate Director at ActNow Theatre.

For the State Theatre Company of South Australia, Nescha has directed Euphoria (co-pro with Country Arts SA), Single Asian Female, Jasper Jones, Terrestrial, Switzerland, Straight White Men (co-pro with La Boite), Gorgon, Volpone, Krapp’s Last Tape in the ‘Beckett Triptych’ (2015 Adelaide Festival, 2016 MOFO), Othello, Jesikah and Random.

Other directing credits include How to Kill Your Husband (State Opera South Australia), Meet Me At Dawn (Gavin Roach Productions), Yerma (Foul Play), Sepia (RiAus/Emily Steel), Hamlet (Actors Folio), Alice and Peter Grow Up (Milk Theatre Collective), As One (Tiny Bricks) and Deluge (Tiny Bricks with Brink, 2016 Adelaide Festival).

Nescha was a co-founder RUMPUS, an artist-run curated independent theatre venue, which ran from 2019-2022. She was one-half of independent theatre company Tiny Bricks, with playwright Phillip Kavanagh. Nescha was an Artistic Associate of Floods of Fire for the Adelaide Festival, a large scale participatory event focused on climate change in the 2024 Adelaide Festival.

Anthony Nocera
Anthony is an award-losing writer based in Adelaide.
His play, Log Boy, was shortlisted for the Jill Blewett Playwright’s Award and longlisted for the Theatre503 International Playwrighting Award. It will have its world premiere as part of State Theatre Company South Australia’s SPARK program next year, and will feature in Great Australian Bites for the Company in December.
His writing has appeared in The Guardian, The Age, Splinter Journal, Krass Journal, The Saturday Paper and The Suburban Review. His essays have been included in collections published by Black Ink and Wakefield Press. He is currently under commission with Brink Productions SA and Theatre Republic, and is developing a full-length non-fiction work for Pink Shorts Press.

Murray Bramwell
Murray has been a theatre and music reviewer in Adelaide since 1985.
He contributed regularly to The Adelaide Review from 1985 until 2010 and for The Australian since the 1990s. He has also written for publications such as The National Times, CentreStage, Vogue, Theatre Australia, The Advertiser, The Australian Financial Review, Limelight and more recently, InDaily.
He taught part-time in English (and later in Drama) at Flinders University, Adelaide University, and Sturt College of Advanced Education from 1972 to 1988 and was appointed to a full-time Lectureship in Drama at Flinders in 1989. He was promoted to Associate Professor in 2006 and retired in 2011.