“Why did you start Sun and Wine Arts Company?”

I started Sun and Wine for what I think is ultimately because I wanted to produce shows that I wanted to see. Whether it is for a show that I haven’t seen done, or to see someone in a particular role, or to see someone’s take on a show: I wanted to facilitate and produce work that I believe are interesting, insightful, or, if nothing else, good to watch.

 

“What kind of shows do you put on?”

A constant for Sun and Wine productions is for showing the world as it is. And it’s not all tragedy! There is joy and humour and absolute absurdity littered throughout human existence. But there is also terrible, unfortunate truth, and we produce these shows not to inspire sadness but to inspire unity, or at least for you to think and consider for a moment.

 

“Why is it called ‘Sun and Wine’? What is the significance?”

When I studied at uni there was a cork board labelled “Books you must read before you graduate”. Of course, I didn’t get through all of them (I’m still working on it) but one of the ones I did read was The Birth of Tragedy from the Spirit of Music, by Friedrich Nitzsche. I found it amusing that Nietzsche wrote a prologue of sorts, An Attempt at Self-Criticism, over a decade after The Birth of Tragedy was published and describes it as “poorly written, ponderous, embarrassing, with fantastic and confused imagery” and so on. However, despite this, I found meaning: Nitzsche’s text laid the seeds which then were cultivated into the foundational roots of this company’s ethos.

Nitzsche spoke of the Apollonian and the Dionysian, named after Apollo and Dionysus: two patron gods of the arts. Their domains oppose each other; however, it is the belief that both these domains overlapping and converging that creates good theatre.

Logic and irrationality; prudence and passion; reason and emotion.