LACHLAN PHILPOTT

​Writer 


​Lachlan Philpott is an award-winning Sydney based writer, teacher and dramaturg.

Lachlan’s plays have been performed across Australia and internationally including at: Sydney Theatre Company; Malthouse Theatre; Griffin Theatre; La Comedie Francaise; La Criee, The Traverse Theatre; Edinburgh Festival; The American Conservatory Theatre; Crowded Fire Theater; Kansas State University; The Lark, New York; The Mac, Belfast; The National Theatre of Croatia; Troisieme Bureau, Grenoble; Red Stitch; Merrigong Theatre Company; Sydney’s Mardi Gras Festival; Midsumma Melbourne; Melbourne Festival; Hothouse Theatre; and Australian Theatre for Young People.

His plays include: BISON, BUSTOWN, CAKE DADDY, CATAPULT, COLDER, IN 3D, LAKE DISAPPOINTMENT, LITTLE EMPERORS, LOST BOYS, MICHAEL SWORDFISH, M. ROCK, THE PINAPPLE WAR, PROMISCUOUS/CITIES, SILENT DISCO, THE CHOSEN, TRUCK STOP, WALTER, and THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY.

Lachlan is under commission to adapt his plays M. ROCK, SILENT DISCO and THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY for the screen. Lachlan is also under commission to write several new plays and is developing a new music theatre work, THE RISE AND FALL OF ST GEORGE, with composer Paul Mac which was performed in concert version at Hamer Hall in 2020.

He has won three Australian Writers Guild Awards (AWGIE Awards) for his plays as well as numerous other awards and fellowships including Australian Writers Guild Awards for Best Play for Young Audiences for MICHAEL SWORDFISH and for TRUCK STOP. Lachlan won multiple awards for SILENT DISCO including the Australian Writers Guild Award for Best Stage Play, the Griffin Award for Outstanding New Australian play, and the GAP Competition Aurora Theatre Co. USA. COLDER won the R.E. Ross Trust Award. In 2018, he was nominated for an Australian Writers Guild Award for PROMISCUOUS/CITIES. His latest play, LOST BOYS is nominated for the 2019 AWGIE Awards. Lachlan has received four NSW Premier’s Literary Award nominations, most recently for LOST BOYS.

Lachlan was awarded an Australia Council Cultural Leadership grant to study new play development models in the United States, United Kingdom and Ireland. He was the inaugural Australian Professional Playwright Fulbright Scholar 2014-15; and was awarded an Australia Council Keesing Literature Residency in Paris 2016-17 working with La Comedie Francaise and Maison Antoine Vitez. Lachlan undertook a second residency in Paris in 2018 supported by The Australia Council to continue work with French translator Gisele Joly. 

He has worked extensively as a teacher, mentor and dramaturg at theatre companies, schools and tertiary institutions around the world. He was dramaturg on HOME COUNTRY for Urban theatre Projects and Sydney Festival. Recent teaching residencies include at: American Conservatory Theatre, Lycee Charlemagne, Paris, Edinburgh University and The Victorian College of the Arts.

Lachlan was Artistic Director and CEO of Playwriting Australia and Program Manager of Australian Theatre for Young People’s Emerging Writers’ Program. He has been writer in residence at: Keesing Studio at The International Cite des Arts Paris, The American Conservatory Theatre San Francisco, Griffin Theatre Company, The Playwrights Foundation San Francisco, Newington College Sydney, Red Stitch Melbourne, and was part of The Traverse Fifty at the Traverse, Edinburgh. Lachlan was Chair of the Australian Writer’s Guild Playwrights’ Committee between 2012 and 2015. His work is published by Currency and PlayLab in Australia and Oberon in the United Kingdom.