There have been few shows produced in Australia over the last decade received as enthusiastically as Sydney Theatre Company’s The Picture of Dorian Gray. Directed by STC’s Artistic Director, Kip Williams, and starring Eryn Jean Norvill in a solo performance that defies all superlatives, the production has received unanimous rave reviews (including a five star review from Limelight) extended its season twice, and sold out.

Eryn Jean Norvill as the aging Lord Henry Wotton live and on screen. Photograph © Daniel Boud

With its extensive use of live and pre-recorded video, the staging has been praised as a triumphant return for Sydney’s theatre scene. But for Williams, the journey to The Picture of Dorian Gray started five years ago, when he was working on a production of Tennessee Williams’ Suddenly Last Summer.

“It was probably the biggest turning point I’ve had, creatively,” Williams recalls. The director had just started using live video in his work, and had a sudden vision of how he wanted a key moment to play out: the climactic monologue (performed by Norvill) would be staged with an enormous white screen separating the audience from the action. On the screen,...