Study Guide

Rella

Meet the Creatives

Sasha Zahra

Co-Creator, Director

Sasha has worked in the performing arts industry for over 25 years as a producer, maker and director. Positions include Artistic Director of D’Faces of Youth Arts, Kurrruru Youth Performing Arts, Associate Artistic Director of the Come Out Festival, Creative Producer of Adelaide Fringe (2009 – 2014), co-program director for the Royal Croquet Club (2015 – 2018), co-director of Stirling Fringe (2017- 2019) and Producer for Briefs Factory and Hot Brown Honey (2014 – 2015).

Sasha has worked extensively with Vanuatu’s Wan Smolbag Theatre and was Executive Producer of the Opening and Closing Ceremonies for the mini–Pacific Games (2017). In 2021 she was appointed as Associate Director of Windmill Theatre Company.

Tracey Rigney

Co-Creator, Writer

Tracey is a playwright and screenwriter who draws inspiration from her  Wotjobaluk and Ngarrindjeri culture.  She has worked with Ilbijerri Theatre Company, Black Hole Theatre and Windmill Theatre Company.

Tracey has worked broadly across the Australian screen industry as a writer and director. Her credits include: Endangered, Abalone, Man Real and Elders. She directed Steven Oliver’s web series A Chance Affair and has written for TV on The Warriors. Her works have screened nationally and internationally.

One of her career highlights is working with her co-collaborator Desiree Cross and Koorie students from Dimboola Primary School on Teacher’s Pet. This film won Best Primary School Production and was an ATOM award finalist. She is currently working back in the theatre space on some exciting projects.

Fez Faanana

Co-Creator, Choreographer, Performer

Fez is well known for creating accessible, ground-breaking, physically dynamic and contemporary performance that infuses his Pacific bloodline, political bite, gender juggling, visual spectacle and tongue-in-cheek.

Fez has worked broadly as an educator, choreographer, creative director, performer, and mischief maker as the Co-founder and Creative Director of Briefs Factory International, an all-male circus, burlesque performance company that has toured the globe.

He has also independently produced and programmed work for Brisbane Festival, Adelaide Fringe Festival as well as the Brisbane Powerhouse.

Thomas Fonua

Co-Creator, Choreographer, Performer

Thomas Fonua an artist of Pacific decent with an established career as a dancer, choreographer and emerging leader. Thomas has worked for companies such as Black Grace (NZ), Australian Dance Theatre, Red Sky Performance (Canada), Briefs Factory and has been touring internationally from the age of 16.

Thomas’ alterego Kween Kong, is the Reigning Dragnation Australia Winner. With a strong focus to inspire, challenge and nurture our community with his loved based leadership style.

Thomas is the recipient of The NZ Prime Minster’s Award for Arts and Creativity (2015), Out For Australia’s Emerging Leader (2019) and has recently been nominated for the Dora Award For Outstanding Choreography in Canada.

Carla Lippis

Performer, Co-Composer

Carla Lippis has recently returned home to Adelaide after 4 years in London’s West End, where she worked as the principal singer at the historic Cafe de Paris, and as the host of notorious nightclub The Box.

Her international touring has included concerts with Calexico, Kiss, Mötley Crüe and Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, and she has performed with La Soiree, Club Cumming and Johnny Woo’s All-Star Brexit Cabaret among others.

Her Adelaide Cabaret Festival appearances include The 27 ClubSouthern Belles, and her own Cast A Dark Shadow.

Elaine Crombie

Performer

Elaine Crombie is a Helpmann Award-winning actor, singer, writer and musician working broadly across theatre, television and film.

She has performed with Belvoir, Sydney Theatre Company, Queensland Theatre, Malthouse Theatre, State Theatre Company South Australia and Bangarra among many others. Elaine’s screen credits include Top End WeddingRosehaven, Top of the Lake and Black Comedy.

Meg Wilson

Designer

Meg Wilson is an Adelaide-based interdisciplinary artist and designer whose practice has spanned installation, performance and set, lighting, curation and costume design. Meg has worked with State Theatre Company South Australia, Theatre Republic, FELT Space, Ace Open, Vitalstatistix, Foul Play, Patch Theatre Company, The Rabble and Restless Dance Theatre among many others.

Meg’s durational performance work SQUASH has toured nationally and was awarded the 2019 Green Room Award for Contemporary and Experimental Performance (Innovation in Durational Performance.

Duncan Campbell

Co-Composer, Sound Designer

Duncan has been an active creative in Adelaide for the past 15 years working in the music and film industries.

From early days writing and performing in concept rock band Mr Wednesday to more recent endeavours working in foley and sound effects/design for film and television. In 2019 Duncan received an Australian Screen Sound Guild award for Best Sound Editing on the SciFi Netflix film I Am Mother. He is also currently writing and performing with Adelaide singer songwriter Carla Lippis.

Most recent film credits include The FurnaceMortal KombatMr CormanKate and Westworld.

Chris Petridis

Lighting and AV Designer

Chris is a lighting and video designer from Adelaide, working across theatre, dance, and other live events in Australia and internationally.

Chris has worked with renowned arts organisations including State Theatre Company of South Australia, Theatre Republic, Is This Yours, Australian Dance Theatre, Brink Productions, Restless Dance Theatre, Slingsby Theatre Company, Force Majure, Windmill Theatre Company and Vitalstatistix.

Chris recently worked on the inaugural Illuminate Adelaide Festival’s Light Cycles in the Adelaide Botanic Gardens crafted by the world-leading studio, Moment Factory.

Other recent credits include Carla Lippis’ Mondo Psycho for WOMAD 2022, Theatre Republic’s How Not To Make It In America and Windmill Theatre Company’s Creation Creation.

Liam Somerville

AV Content Designer

Liam Somerville is a video artist and cinematographer living and working on Kaurna Land. He is the co-founder of CAPITAL WASTE PICTURES, a production company creating installations and films that focus on the interaction between distortions of reality and the moving image. Liam has worked broadly across film and television, completing residencies in Adelaide and Denver. He was the co-director of VIDEO NASTY: The Making of Ribspreader and has had works screened at Adelaide Film Festival, RCC, Womadelaide, Adelaide Festival Centre, Otterbox Digital Dome at Fort Collins Museum of Discovery and Gates Planetarium at Denver Museum of Science & Nature among many others.

Greg Stewart

AV Content Designer

As a motion graphics designer, Greg has been working in the industry for over a decade with clients from all over the world. Developing social media content for a broad range of leading brands from network TV to big sporting events he has a passion for helping brands and clients get their message out to the world.

Go behind the scenes

Hear from the director

Sasha Zahra introduces the team behind Rella and lets us know about all of the marvellous mischief she and her awesome collaborators are making in the show.

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Meet the writer

Tracey Rigney talks about her inspiration for Rella, the process of smashing the glass slipper and how she has gone about reframing the moral compass of the classic fairytale.

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Meet our sisters

Thomas Fonua and Fez Faanana take a break from the rehearsal room to tell us about taking on the biggest challenge of their career: being ugly. Which is impossible for two people as objectively beautiful as them, obviously.

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Key Themes & Ideas

Family
The strong ties of family are at the core of Rella, from the moment Rella is taken in by Marlene and raised as her own, to Afa and Sika fighting to free Rella from the confines of Prince Charming Record Company. The family bond between these characters ultimately proves greater than the sum of its parts and provides a place where each characters feels they can be their true self. Australian First Nations and Samoan cultural connections to family are also evident throughout the play, as it subtly explores abandonment, forced separation and transformation, the indestructible connection of spirit and enduring presence of the past.

Identity
Each character experiences a transformation of identity throughout the play. With a new identity imposed on her by Prince Charming Record Company, Rella must choose between living with an artificial or authentic version of herself. Having lost Rella, Afa and Sika must also find their own voices and identity as they transform into their own ‘Samoan Goddesses’. Marlene’s identity has been shaped by significant personal and cultural loss throughout her life. Consequently, she must face her grief to find a way forward for herself and her daughters.

Dreams/reality
The road to dreams becoming reality is never easy and is often paved with crossroads and detours that provide invaluable life lessons. On the path to transforming their hopes into reality, Rella, Afa and Sika discover that dreams are worth fighting for and what they were searching for was in front of them the whole time.

Beauty
Beauty is at the centre of the classic Cinderella story and most traditional fairytales. Through the journey of Afa and Sika (and their smearing as ‘ugly’ by the team at the ‘Is This Talent’? TV talent contest), Rella asks audiences to look at popular or mainstream beauty standards and how they interact with non-western cultures and conceptions of gender.

Camp Windmill

When we created Rella, we found ourselves with a work that used the language of camp to explore beauty, fame and gender in a thrilling and fun way. Camp Windmill takes this a step further, giving our wonderful young audience with the language to better understand the art of artifice by introducing them to some of Australia’s finest purveyors of camp.

Developed in collaboration with experience design firm Sandpit and hosted by drag artists Thomas Fonua and Fez Faanana, Camp Windmill features interviews with Paul Capsis, Chiara Gabrielli, Christine Johnston, Joel Bray, Stephen Nicolazzo, Glace Chase, Jonathon Oxlade and Windmill’s very own Rosemary Myers.

Explore Camp Windmill

Tracey Rigney talks all things Rella

Q1. What cultural influences have inspired you as a contemporary artist?

The cultural influences that inspire me as a contemporary artist are quite broad. I’d like to think I’m inspired by my Wotjobaluk and Ngarrindjeri roots, but that’s only the beginning. I am heavily influenced by my upbringing in the 1980s and 1990s, as well as influenced by my family, friends and the environments I live in or visit. Be it country and/or city. What draws me to the city is watching people go about their lives. But I am bias when it comes to the natural environment – it truly is awe inspiring. I like to keep up to date with things going on in terms of popular culture and find social media a fascinating beast of a thing. Music is a massive part of my life and really helps me create. I actually write my scripts as I listen to music. And in addition to this I am a deeply spiritual person and find that this plays a huge role in my life personally and professionally.

Q2. How are these influences evident in ‘Rella’?

I think these influences are evident in Rella in a lot of ways. I get to funnel my First Nations perspective and voice through the character of Marlene. I get to tap into my idea of spirituality as I delve into the beauty of Samoan culture and spirituality. I also draw from life the notion of what family is in today’s society – quite a departure of what that notion was during my formative years. In Rella I think the thing that excites me also is the fact that it is a musical. Music is so inspiring for me and I am just so grateful that I can now say I’ve written for a musical. Especially since we as a team all agreed to incorporate music from the 1980s and 1990s. I feel Rella really is a love letter to the music and fashion of those decades. And I must admit – I always love me some drag queen action too! I really do feel privileged to help tell this unique story.

Q3. What impact do you want your work to have on your audience considering these cultural influences?

I hope the audiences find inspiration in my work just like I find inspiration from things that influence me in life. I hope they allow themselves to go on the journey with the characters. Venture into this Rella world and really enjoy their time there, learn something new there or see themselves reflected there.  Art and storytelling have a vital role to play in our lives and can impact change for the greater good, be it through transformation, healing and empathy. And if the audiences watch this show and wonder to themselves if this creative life is something they might like to do – then I hope they have the courage to just do it. Because from my perspective – a creative life is a viable career option and it’s such a fulfilling existence.



Year 7 - 8: Drama



Year 9 - 10: Drama



Year 11 -12: Drama



Year 7 - 8: English



Year 9 - 10: English

Ackonwledgments

Produced by Windmill Theatre Company. Developed and compiled by Melissa Newton-Turner and Zac Von Hoff with contributions by Tracey Rigney.

The activities and resources contained in this document are designed for educators as the starting point for developing more comprehensive lessons for this work.

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This resource is proudly supported by the South Australian Department for Education and the Lang Foundation.

  •  Lang Foundation