Marian McCurdy

Distraction Camp (2009)

Marian McCurdy has worked with Free Theatre Christchurch since 2002 and has managed the company since 2018, running its Education Programme and Te Puna Toi Research Centre. Her first Free Theatre experience was as an audience member to Krapp's Last Tape (1999) featuring Alan Brunton from Red Mole, an experimental theatre company that influenced the founding of Free Theatre in 1979. She is passionate about preserving and making more visible Free Theatre's long history, continuing work on its archive with that in mind. She has been involved in theatre and film projects including: Ubu Nights (2014-present), Ars Acustica (2019), The Black Rider (2017), Frankenstein (2016), The Mauricio Kagel Project (2015), I Sing the Body Electric (2012), The Earthquake in Chile (2010), Faust Chroma (2008), Emmy & Nico (2008), Remake (2009), Fantasia (2005 and 2006), Ella & Susn (2004) and Samson Airline (2002). Marian completed a PhD in Theatre and Film Studies at the University of Canterbury in 2014 and her book Acting and its Refusal: The Devil Makes Believe was published by Intellect in 2017. 

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It shows a very original way of looking at examples of the antitheatrical prejudice as practised by creative artists in various contexts. The study is enhanced by the author’s direct experience of such projects as participant.

A broad range of theories smoothly linked together, unfolding the phenomenon of the refusal to act; an enormous range of examples and detailed case studies that demonstrate different aspects of this phenomenon in terms of historical moment, cultural context and philosophical underpinning.
Márta Minier, Peer Review