Adriano Cappelletta
Adriano is an actor, writer and theatre-maker based in Sydney and Perth. As a graduate of NIDA and Ecole Philippe Gaulier in Paris, he has presented work throughout Australia, Europe and New York.
In Our Blood, a four-part musical drama series inspired by Australia’s radical response to AIDS in the early 1980s, and written by Adriano with Jane Allen and Jonathan Gavin, has just been produced by Hoodlum Entertainment and will air on ABCTV later this year.
Adriano is also known for his sketch comedy writing and in 2015 he created the comedy web series Ultimate Fanj, which premiered on ABC Iview as part of The Fresh Blood new comedy initiative. His sketch comedy #NewParents received over 100k views on Facebook in 4 days and appeared on Channel 7’s Sunrise and The Daily Edition.
Adriano’s other work spans the full spectrum of theatre: cabaret, physical theatre, musicals, character comedy, stand-up, puppetry, improvisation, bouffon and clowning. Adriano creates work that is playful and satirical, touching on the pleasure and absurdity of life and communicating the magic and imagination of theatre.
In 2016, with fellow writers Holly Austin and Jo Turner, Adriano created Ruby’s Wish which premiered at Belvoir as part of their 2016 Season. As a collective they were awarded The 2016 Philip Parsons Playwriting Fellowship to create a new work, Paradise for production in 2019.
In 2016 his solo cabaret This Boy’s in Love was awarded First Runner Up Best Cabaret at Perth Fringe World, and in 2017 was awarded The Highly Commended Weekly Award at The Adelaide Fringe.
Individually and with Holly Austin he has created the hit comedy shows Cubbyhouse (The Public Theatre: New York, The Old Fitzroy, The Blue Room Theatre, Underbelly Arts Festival), Connie Chang’s Cabaret Roadshow (Sydney Opera House, Melbourne Comedy Festival, The Vanguard, The Great Escape Festival, Sydney Comedy Festival) and Shane and Eddie: Picking Up the Pieces (Edinburgh Fringe Festival)