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The Balm of the Sea: Sarah Philips Brings Coastal Reverie to West End in Traces
Nicholas Blake—9 October 2026·2 min read
Brisbane's inner-city voice since 2014
Brisbane's inner-city voice since 2014
Eight plays billed as All Feeling. Full Volume., from David Wenham in An Iliad to a Miss Fisher world premiere, with Counting and Cracking making its Queensland debut at Brisbane Powerhouse.
Queensland Theatre has unveiled its 2027 season, eight plays billed as "All Feeling. Full Volume.", and the biggest name on the list is not strictly a Queensland Theatre production at all. Counting and Cracking, the Sri Lankan-Australian family epic hailed by more than 100 theatre professionals as the best Australian play of the 21st century, makes its Queensland debut at Brisbane Powerhouse in May, presented in association with the company.
It is the second season programmed by Artistic Director Daniel Evans, who directs three of the eight himself. Season ticket packages of five, six and eight plays are on sale now, and three-play packages and single tickets open on Thursday 15 October.
The year opens with David Wenham in An Iliad, a solo retelling of Homer's Trojan War with a musician as his only companion, in a Sydney Theatre Company production directed by Damien Ryan. Wenham is also narrating Queensland Ballet's new The Little Prince in the July school holidays, as we reported in our look at that company's 2027 season.
Romeo & Juliet is reimagined through a First Nations lens by Isaac Drandić, who adapts it and co-directs with Kamarra Bell-Wykes, with a score sung in the Turrbal language. Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries: Death by Deckchair is a world premiere written by Deb Cox, co-creator of the television series, which puts Phryne Fisher aboard a 1929 South Seas cruise, and Evans directs it. He also directs Stereophonic, David Adjmi's play about a band recording an album in 1976, with original songs by Will Butler, formerly of Arcade Fire, and Sweeney Todd, with Rockhampton's Andy Conaghan in the title role and Naomi Price as Mrs Lovett.
The Queensland-made end of the season is just as busy. My Roman Empire, by Alberto Di Troia, won the 2026 Queensland Premier's Drama Award, and Little Women is adapted by Kathryn Marquet and Maxine Mellor and directed by Bridget Boyle, with an all-Queensland cast led by Courtney Cavallaro as Jo.
The Belvoir St Theatre and Kurinji production of Counting and Cracking. Photo: Pia Johnson.
Ten years in the making and the winner of 14 major awards, Counting and Cracking is by S. Shakthidharan with Eamon Flack, who also directs. It opens on the banks of Sydney's Georges River, where Radha and her son Siddhartha release the ashes of Radha's mother, their last connection to Sri Lanka. Then a phone call from Colombo brings the past spinning back to life.
The story runs across four generations and five decades, from 1956 to 2004, in five languages and with more than 50 characters. It arrives after seasons at Sydney Festival, Adelaide Festival, the Birmingham Commonwealth Games and Edinburgh International Festival, and it has won seven Helpmann Awards, including Best Play.
For Brisbane Powerhouse CEO and Artistic Director Louise Bezzina, bringing it north is a long-held ambition. "When I saw Counting and Cracking at the Adelaide Festival in 2019, I sat in that theatre in floods of tears, followed by moments of joy – sometimes within the same breath," she says. Flack attended high school in Brisbane and studied at the University of Queensland, so the Queensland debut is a homecoming of sorts for him too.
Counting and Cracking. Photo: Geraint Lewis.
Queensland Theatre's listing describes it as the production's final Australian outing before it transfers to London and New York.
The rest of Queensland Theatre's 2027 season is at queenslandtheatre.com.au.
Photography: Brett Boardman, Pia Johnson and Geraint Lewis.
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