Harbour Theatre

I am very grateful to Jo Sterkenburg for this

History of Harbour Theatre

... which was written as an article in the Fremantle Herald (2 November 2019: 9, 38) in response to something the mayor wrote. Joanne Sterkenburg is a former president of Harbour Theatre.

As a long time member of Harbour Theatre, an actor, director, and a participant in the myriad of other jobs that go on behind the scenes, I nearly choked on my morning cup of tea when I read the “Getting Creative” story in last week’s Herald. [Mayor Brad Pettitt, “Getting creative,” Herald, 19 October 2019]

Let me enlighten your readers (and maybe some city councillors) about the ongoing saga we at Harbour Theatre have endured since 1963. We have been promised repeatedly over the past 56 years that we would have a permanent home of our own in Fremantle, as Fremantle Council wanted to support the arts. We are now in Mosman Park at the Camelot Theatre, still waiting for this so-called Fremantle home.

We exist solely on the funds we garner from our paying audiences; no subsidies, with no grants or assistance apart from the odd Lotterywest application to help with lighting/communications/air conditioning etc.

Evan Davies Library building - the Theatre was on the upper floor

In December 1963, Harbour Theatre was formed by eight enthusiastic amateurs in the theatrette on the upper floor of the [[../buildings/evandavies.html|Evans Davies Civic Library]] in [[../streets/southtce.html|South Terrace]] that was made available by council and became Harbour’s first home - with a peppercorn rent.

Conditions were very primitive at the beginning, but enthusiasm overcame all difficulties and the group flourished and expanded rapidly.

In 1975 the library was relocated next to the Town Hall, and the Evan Davies Building was scheduled for demolition to make way for a car park. Due mainly to the efforts of the members of Harbour Theatre, The [[../society/index.html|Fremantle Society]], and a grant from the Heritage Commission, the building was saved and in 1977 was partially restored. At the same time the theatre underwent a major restructuring, now occupying the entire upper floor and resulting in the stage and seating being completely rearranged, allowing for larger audiences and better facilities for actors.

Yet another set build with volunteers from the team

All the work to the theatre was due to the group’s own physical labour, with funds raised by themselves and their supporters - no grants or funding from anyone.

Unfortunately, in March 1995 we were forced to find another venue in which to perform, as Bankwest funded KULCHA to move into our old home and completely changed it. This space has now been empty for a few years since Kulcha left, though I believe it is about to be used again by a brewing company.

Thus Harbour Theatre departed from the Evans Davies Building - our home for 31 years. As a temporary measure and under difficult circumstances, Harbour Theatre performed at the Tivoli Theatre, Applecross, while searching for a location back in Fremantle. During this time, our scenery, props and costumes were stored in a rented industrial unit in Myaree, which doubled as our club base and rehearsal rooms. We moved out, dismantling the entire theatre, seating, dressing rooms etc using our volunteer theatre members and their long suffering families.

backstage

After exhausting every avenue with Fremantle City Council for help in relocating back into Fremantle, a lease was finally arranged privately with the Fremantle Education Centre (FEC) at the [[../schools/princessmay.html|Princess May]] Building, and Harbour Theatre was able to return to Fremantle at the end of 1996.The next few weeks were very hectic as the empty hall space in the Princess May Building had to be completely converted into a theatre, including the stage, proscenium arch, seating, lighting and associated wiring, in time for our last play of 1996. All done by the by now exhausted group of volunteers, but Harbour Theatre won the inaugural Sheila Buchanan Memorial Adjudicators Encouragement Award at the annual Independent Theatre Association (ITA) Finley Awards in 1998. Harbour’s then President, Jo Sterkenburg, said: "It was a real shot in the arm. It was nice to be recognised for overcoming adversity.”

Harbour Theatre continued to perform in the Princess May Building, putting on four to five full length plays and a season of one-act plays every year. In December 2008, Harbour Theatre, in conjunction with many other community theatres in WA, were successful in receiving a grant from the Ignite Funding for WA Community Theatre by the Department of Culture and Arts. The grant was used to install an intra-theatre wireless communications system and to upgrade and replace our ageing lights (most from when the theatre started over 40 years ago) and resurface the similarly aged scenery flats.

One of the many demolish and build-agains - note the age of the volunteers!

And then, yet again, due to circumstances beyond our control, in December 2009 we were forced out of the Princess May Building, our home for 13 years, when the FEC received a federal government grant to re-roof the building and convert the theatre space into offices. Despite intense lobbying by the Harbour Theatre membership and the general public to the state government and local councillors, we were forced to move. Harbour proposed to council to use the long disused Port Cineaste Building on Adelaide Street as a temporary venue, until a more secure home could be found. So once again, we dismantled our beautiful theatre, the only purpose built theatre in Fremantle at the time, and moved lock, stock and barrel across the [[../parks/princessmay.html|Princess May Park]] to the [[../cinemas/port.html|Port Cineaste]] Building. The major task of converting a cavernous cinema into an intimate performing arts space, including building a stage and erecting lighting, was an enormous job undertaken by a small, but hardworking and dedicated group of members and involved many, many hours of volunteer labour.

But it wasn’t to last. In 2014, just after our 50th Anniversary celebrations had come to a close, the Port Cineaste Building was sold and we were told we had to move out by the end of March. A condition of the sale was for the demolition of the Port Cineaste and associated buildings, with construction to start within 18 months - which has yet to occur. After much searching, discussions & negotiations, Harbour Theatre moved just seven minutes north of Fremantle into the lovely Art Deco Mosman Park Memorial Hall, also known as Camelot Theatre. Our dedicated team once again kicked in with the massive undertaking of moving the theatre less than five years after our last move.

So for more than 50 years Harbour Theatre has entertained tens of thousands of people. The variety of plays we have offered the public range from drama to comedy, whodunit to tragedy and murder to farce. Over the years Harbour has produced hundreds of full length plays, countless one-act plays and many Christmas Revues to literally thousands of people since we performed our first play in 1964 and they have earned us many awards in several of the theatre festivals held in and around Perth, and helped local charitable organisations to raise thousands of dollars for their causes. As a self-funded, not-for-profit theatre managed solely by volunteers, all proceeds raised by our productions are channeled back into the club so we can continue offering quality community theatre to the residents of Fremantle and the surrounding suburbs.

We are so tired of Fremantle council saying they will assist us and yet whenever we have found a suitable venue we are told it is earmarked for something/someone else. [[../buildings/victoriahall.html|Victoria Hall]] was suggested but the rent was so astronomical it was impossible. We looked into every empty/ disused building in and around Fremantle with no satisfactory results. We asked about the [[../port/index.html|Port]] and the empty sheds there – seeing as we are called Harbour Theatre in honour of our port city we thought that would be ideal – alas, nothing eventuated. We were so sad to see the Port Cinema demolished and now here it is; nearly six years later and it is now a temporary car park, when it was a perfect venue for us. We also made application to move into the Fremantle [[../schools/boysschool.html|Boys School]] when that was an option, but alas we lost out on that too.

While we were the oldest and only Community Theatre in Fremantle, we are certainly not the oldest theatre group in Perth and it is sad that we are now in Mosman Park rather than in our true home of Fremantle. Harbour Theatre have performed in many venues since being established in 1963, with every move being a very traumatic experience for all involved. We strive to one day move just one last time - into a dedicated building we can call our own … in Fremantle.

All the original members of the theatre have now sadly passed away or are in declining health and the banner for Harbour needs to be carried on by the next wave.

If only we had a home of our own to do it in.

References and Links

Sterkenburg, Jo, 'Where art thou council?', Fremantle Herald, 2 November 2019.

Harbour Theatre website.

Freotopia

This page incorporates material from Garry Gillard's Freotopia website, that he started in 2014 and the contents of which he donated to Wikimedia Australia in 2024. The content was originally created on 12 October, 2016 and hosted at freotopia.org/clubs/harbourtheatre.html (it was last updated on 8 December, 2023), and has been edited since it was imported here (see page history). The donated data is also preserved in the Internet Archive's collection.