Photographer: Alex Vaughan

Kate Gaul is a theatre and opera director, creative producer, festival director, writer and occasional designer based in Sydney, Australia. A graduate of NIDA (Directing, 1996), she undertook a residency with SITI Company in New York and was Associate Director at Ensemble Theatre.

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Kate has established a distinctive directing practice across theatre, opera, physical theatre, devised work and new writing. Her work is characterised by a strong visual and physical language, a deep engagement with text, and a particular interest in work that asks audiences to see familiar stories differently. She is the Artistic Director of Siren Theatre Co, where she develops and directs ambitious, text-driven work that brings artists and audiences together for bold and imaginative theatrical experiences.

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Alongside her directing practice, Kate has worked extensively as a creative producer and festival director. She has directed World Interplay, Playlist, Invisible Circus, Cabaret and Short Play Festivals, as well as the Sydney Mardi Gras Parade, and has produced and developed work across Australia and internationally.

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Opera credits include: Rigoletto and a new production of The Magic Flute for Opera Australia (2024); It's Still Her Voice, an opera/drama mash-up based on Janet/Poulenc's La Voix Humaine (Flying Nun); Castor + Pollux (Pinchgut); Eight Songs for a Mad King (Verbruggen Ensemble); The Cunning Little Vixen (Sydney Chamber Opera); Hansel and Gretel (Pacific Opera); and Il Matrimonio Segreto, English Eccentrics, Les Mamelles de Tirésias, Cendrillon and A Midsummer Night's Dream (Sydney Conservatorium). For WAPPA she directed Dialogues of the Carmelites and Die Fledermaus. For Opera Australia, Kate was Revival Director for Rigoletto and Attila, and directed the schools' production By the Light of the Moon and the Oz Opera production of Carmen. She was Assistant Director on Adriana Lecouvreur, Lohengrin and Aida.

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Recent Theatre directing credits include: the Australian premiere of Eugene O'Brien's Heaven and Charlie Josephine's Cowbois; the premiere of Noëlle Janaczewska's The Past is a Wild Party; CAMP, which played a sold-out season during Sydney WorldPride; and an acclaimed interpretation of H.M.S. Pinafore, which toured extensively and played Sydney Festival. She directed Janaczewska's The End of Winter on national tour and at the Singapore Festival in 2025.

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Her original play EDEN premiered at Adelaide Fringe in 2026 before a subsequent Sydney season. Her adaptation of Kate Gordon's Girl Running Boy Falling — shortlisted for the Stoddart Playwright Award and longlisted for the Monte Miller Award — is scheduled for full production in 2027.

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Kate's work moves between directing, writing and producing, with a particular interest in new Australian work, emerging artists and the relationship between text, performance, design and audience.