My Brilliant Career, adapted as a musical from the novel by Miles Franklin. Melbourne Theatre Company at Canberra Theatre Centre, 7 – 15 March, 2026
Reviewed by Frank McKone
Opening Night March 8
CREATIVES
Director Anne-Louise Sarks
Musical Director / Additional Music Arrangements Victoria Falconer
Choreographer Amy Campbell
Set & Costume Designer Marg Horwell
Lighting Designer Matt Scott
Orchestrator / Vocal Arranger James Simpson
Sound Designer Joy Weng
Associate Director Miranda Middleton
Associate Set & Costume Designer Savanna Wegman
Assistant Musical Director Drew Livingston
CAST (alphabetical order – Collective Ensemble)
Cameron Bajraktarevic-Hayward; Melanie Bird; Lincoln Elliott
Victoria Falconer; Kala Gare; Jack Green; Raj Labade; Drew Livingston
Meg McKibbin; Ana Mitsikas; Christina O’Neill; Jarrad Payne
Key acting roles:
Kala Gare as the protagonist Sybylla Melvyn. The ensemble includes Raj Labade (Harry/Peter), Drew Livingston (Father/Uncle Jay-Jay/M’Swat), Ana Mitsikas (Grannie/Rose Jane), and Christina O'Neill (Mother/Aunt Helen/Mrs M'Swat)
The very best theatre happens when the source material is emotionally honest and the writers, directors, designers, choreographers, musicians and actors create an original way to present on stage a work both thoroughly entertaining and true to its source.
This adaptation of Miles Franklin’s My Brilliant Career as music theatre by Melbourne Theatre Company is a wonderful example. It takes Franklin’s understanding of herself as a woman growing up in 1899, making it available for our young generation in the 21st Century through music, song and dance as the story which Sybylla Melvyn tells us is “about – me!”
In this way, Sybylla – in effect the young Miles Franklin – takes us into her confidence. As her mother shows her, to see herself in a mirror is to see her external attributes; but it does not reveal her real self.
Entirely appropriately for our modern concerns about, for example, the destructive effects – especially in girls and young women – of the misuse of imagery on internet social platforms, Sybylla’s search for how to find and, for herself, how to become “someone like me” – very often generating shout out loud comedy – creates for us empathetic depth. We feel for Sybylla, for Miles, for ourselves as we react to and reflect on their experiences, and so by a kind of osmosis understanding grows.
While writing the original My Brilliant Career, Miles Franklin was what we know nowadays as a young adult, just turning 21 as her first novel was published. Opening night at the musical was full of cheers and whistles, and sighs – not only from the young, though I admit as an octogenarian I only clapped in admiration – standing with everyone for the final ovation.
To achieve such great theatre, all the performers work as an extraordinary ensemble company, playing out all the characters over time as musicians, dancers, singers, mimes and actors with such precision, in itself a powerful reason to not miss My Brilliant Career – the Musical.
Though, as Sybylla insists, her story will not be a romance, and has no plot, I think it is fair to say that the performances by Kala Gare and Raj Labade as Sybylla and Harry are especially memorable.
It’s exciting to watch; ironic humour abounds; thoughtful on social issues; and emotionally honest.
A brilliant career for Melbourne Theatre Company; a brilliant theatre experience here in Canberra.
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| Kala Gare as Sybylla My Brilliant Career - Melbourne Theatre Company 2026 |
