Tim Winton writes for the stage

Directed by Black Swan Artistic Director Kate Cherry and featuring John Howard, Alison Whyte, Stuart Halusz, Geoff Kelso and Claire Lovering, Rising Water runs until 10 September at the Arts Centre, Playhouse.

On his shambles of a yacht in the marina, Baxter watches his wreck of a life fall with the tide. It’s Australia Day and his plan had been to get so thoroughly shickered that he’d be past caring by the time the fireworks start. And, he’s some way down the road to that ambition, when an English backpacker called Dee turns up, swearing a blue streak and threatening to rock his boat.

In creating this tough yet affectionate portrait of life on an ebbing tide, award-winning writer Tim Winton brings to the stage all the humanity, larrikin humour and unsentimental pathos for which his novels are so well-loved.

“Those who saw the brilliant adaptation of Cloudstreet a decade or so ago know that Tim Winton’s wry, compassionate stories have the dramatic elements embedded in them to make thrilling theatre,” says MTC Artistic Director Simon Phillips.

“Rising Water, Winton’s first work written directly for the stage, is a tale of a man cut adrift. With its profound existential themes made conversational and crustily wise-cracking in his familiar lithe Australian voice, Winton reaffirms his position as our chief chronicler of fringe-dwellers and outsiders – our Camus in t-shirt and thongs.”

Winton draws his inspiration from his birthplace of Perth and the richness of the Western Australian landscape and coastal region. Declared a Living Treasure by the National Trust and awarded the Centenary Medal for service to literature and the community, Winton has won or has been nominated for every major literary award.

Winton won the Miles Franklin Award a record four times and his novels The Riders and Dirt Music were both shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize for Fiction. Cloudstreet is arguably his best known work. He is also consistently voted Australia’s most beloved novelist. Winton’s most recent book Breath was published in 2008

Booking details: The MTC Theatre Box Office 03 8688 0800 or mtc.com.au, the Arts Centre 1300 182 183 or theartscentre.com.au