January 2020 - Tom Sweeney

Our first guest speaker for 2020 was Tom Sweeney who is the President of the Willoughby Theatre Company. Tom and his wife have been members of the WTC for over 50 years and during that time Tom has directed over 40 musicals for that company and directed plays and musicals for other companies in Sydney.

Tom presented a very entertaining behind the scenes description of how musicals are actually chosen, cast, rehearsed and staged  It is now a big business, not just a hobby.

The Theatre Company is currently rehearsing for Priscilla Queen of the Desert which will be staged in May this year.

February 2020 - Jennifer Farrer

Jennifer Farrer, an enthusiastic gardener, was  the speaker at our February meeting.  At a young age she acquired an appreciation of plants growing in the wild in Australia and as well had a love for Australian history. Bringing these two interests together Jennifer was able to form the base for her talk  on plants used by the First Settlers. These early settlers in Australia lived in a time of drought and an unreliable food supply line so they had to experiment with local plants for food, drink and. Medicine.  In her presentation Jennifer described some of these plants and their uses. Especially interesting were the ones we can  find in our local environment.