Drama Time is an exciting and rewarding drama program especially created for primary school aged children.
The goal of the Drama Time program is to develop self-cofidence, communication skills and of course creativity.
This is achieved through a stimulating and rewarding drama program designed to encourage active participation, self-expression and build character.
Lara is a passionate and experienced educator and has a wealth of experience as a teacher, performer and producer.
Lara has a Masters in Primary Education and has over ten years teaching experience in a variety of positions. These include the roles of Primary School Teacher, Literacy Co-ordinator and three months teaching English to various under- resourced and needy communities in El Salvador, Central America.
Lara has a Licentiate Degree in Speech and Drama with the Trinity School of London and has forever been passionate about teaching drama to children. As a performer Lara has had a vey successful performance career, most notably playing the ongoing role of Serena Bishop for three years in the long running series Neighbours. Lara also performed in various plays and television commercials and toured England, playing the lead role of Beauty, in the 'Beauty and the Beast' pantomime.
In 2010, Lara created "Applause for a Cause Inc" - a charitable company which produced educational plays for not-for-profit organisations. She produced and performed in its first production “I Can Cry” which had a sold out season and raised over a hundred thousand dollars for a variety of chairites.
Lara is passionate about teaching drama both for the art of drama, as well as for the enhancement of life skills.
Lara is extremely excited to join Drama Time as a director and manager and looks forward to bringing confidence, imagination, communication and the development of social skills to children of all ages.
Growing up in an artistic family, performing has always been a huge part of Hilary’s life. From a young age Hilary began lessons in drama, dance, singing, piano and saxophone. This inspired her to study fulltime musical theatre at the Australian Dance Performance Institute in Brisbane for 2013.
Continuing her study through to 2016, Hilary graduated from the Queensland Conservatorium with a Bachelor of Musical Theatre. Throughout her study she played roles such as ‘Beverly’ in Abigail’s Party, ‘Maureen’ in RENT, ‘Linda-Lou’ in The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas and ‘Dabby Bryant’ in Our Country’s Good. After graduating, Hilary joined the cast of Love Train as a lead vocalist which performed at the Adelaide Fringe Festival for 2018.
Hilary is very excited to be taking on this new role with Drama Time, and wants her skills and passion for the arts to influence and inspire kids to be creative, brave and bold!
Romi is a Melbourne based contemporary director and theatremaker. She is passionate about creating work that starts meaningful conversation and examines the transmission of storytelling. Romi's practice stems from physical theatre and she is an inclusive practitioner. Using live theatre and performance, Romi aims to provoke, question and explore life as we know it.
After finishing a Bachelor of Performing Arts with Honours at Monash University and a Masters of Directing for Performance at the Victorian College of the Arts - University of Melbourne. Romi concentrates on developing new contemporary performances, facilitating children's theatre and performance and integrating access into her process and performances. Romi was an Artistic Associate at Theatre Works for 2018. Romi brings her experience with working with young people in theatre to Drama Time. Her interest lies within supporting young people in self-development, social skills, performance and creative thinking and looks forward to integrating these into her workshops for 2019!
Daniella holds a Bachelor of Early Childhood Studies and a Masters of Education (Special Education, Inclusion and Early Intervention). She has over 20 years experience working with children across a variety of early childhood settings. These include working in child care, preschools, holiday programs and as well as working with children with special needs in a Specialist School, running a special needs playgroup as well as in early childhood intervention services.
Daniella began performing in the arts when she was 3 years old. Since then she has trained in voice and dance (jazz, broadway jazz, funk, salsa and Zumba). Her theatre credits include Seussical, Fame, Little Shop of Horrors, Joseph and his Technicolour Dreamcoat, Mame and Patty Simcox in Grease.
Daniella is passionate about using music, movement and drama in her work with young children as a tool to encourage their engagement, social interaction, imagination and extension of their overall skills!! As a mother of 2 beautiful children Daniella has developed an even greater appreciation of the value of the arts in encouraging children's development and communication!
Originally from the Northern Rivers of NSW, Isaac has been working as an Actor for the last three years since graduating from the QLD Conservatioum in 2016.
He has worked in productions such as The Australian Premier of “Memphis” (StageArt), QPAC’s production of RENT, and spent this year touring with Brainstorm Productions. The fun-dimentals of Drama are really important to Isaac, that's why he's so proud to be apart of the Drama Time team, sharing and learning with next generation.
Cais knew from a very early age that she wanted to be a performer. After graduating from the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) where she received a Bachelor of Arts in Music Theatre, she began her career writing and performing her own cabaret show in venues around Australia.
In 2005 Cais released her debut album and began performing on cruise ships around the world, wowing audience’s with her enchanting mezzo-soprano voice, her natural warmth on stage and down to earth Aussie sense of humour.
Cais enjoyed her experience performing on cruise ships so much that she started working with the onboard entertainment team and ended up running the entire entertainment program as Cruise Director for Celebrity Cruises.
Cais loves sharing her passion for performing with children of all ages. She also teaches singing and piano for beginners, and is thrilled to now be apart of the Drama Time team. Her teaching style is always fun, supportive and encouraging to build confidence and to ensure that all students develop their own love of performing.
Ashlea Sander has experience in film, television and stage. After being awarded Immanuel College's 'Full School Colours' for Dramatic Arts she went on to further her training with Actors Ink in South Australia. From there she moved to Melbourne to study with the NIDA open program.
Ashlea was awarded a Scholarship at the Stella Adler Academy of Acting Los Angeles, and moved over to study full time at the beginning of 2017. Upon arriving back home she went straight into further full time study with the Actors Performance Studio in Melbourne where she trained in Stanislavski technique, voice, movement, and improvisation and graduated at the end of 2018.
Ashlea believes in the power of creativity for children and thinks drama classes at any age is extremely beneficial in all aspects of life and personal development not to mention a whole lot of fun.
Whether acting, dancing, singing, playing saxophone or piano, choreographing, composing or devising, Hannah is always keen to create, perform and share her passion for performing arts. Having completed a Diploma of Music (Contemporary Performance) in Sydney, she moved to Brisbane to study a Bachelor of Musical Theatre at the Queensland Conservatorium of Music, graduating in 2017. University credits include Nickie Pignatelli in Sweet Charity, Graziella in West Side Story, Watkin Tench in Our Country’s Good, Bridesmaid in I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change and Bobby in The Life. Hannah has also appeared in The Boy from Oz: The Arena Musical (2006), ABC’s Sing! CDs (2004- 2007), Featured dancer in Opera Queensland’s Kiss Me Kate (2016), Judy Turner in Mad About Theatre’s production of A Chorus Line (2018), Big Blue Sky: A Peter Garrett Story (2018), Odet in Post: A New Musical (2019) and most recently in educational performances of Much Ado About Nothing for Victorian High Schools with Eagle’s Nest Theatre.
Now a Melbourne local, she prides herself as an enthusiastic, hardworking, highly skilled, versatile performer.! Hannah loves spreading the joy of performing arts with children; as an enthusiastic, passionate teacher, performer and party entertainer! She strongly believes in the immense benefits of performing arts education for youth and adolescence, and has plenty of experience teaching all styles of performing arts; drama, singing, dance, and even saxophone, piano and musicianship! She is absolutely thrilled to be joining the Drama Time team and can’t wait to begin exploring the power of theatre and storytelling with all of her future students!
