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The set model for Weighbridge in its black box: a booth on a rostrum, a corrugated wall flown behind, lit hard white and red

Weighbridge · 1:25

1Weighbridge 2Open Till Friday 3Mrs Pellew’s Garden 4Low Water

Choose a play to see its model.

Season 2027 · Prompt copy

SM: Places, please.

Four plays a year, made in a workshop in Bowden.

Groundrow is a small company with its own theatre. Pick a play, watch the set fly in on its lines, then press Go and run the cues yourself.

  1. 1Weighbridgepreviews 11 Feb · opens 13 Feb · to 6 Mar
  2. 2Open Till Fridaypreviews 6 May · opens 8 May · to 29 May
  3. 3Mrs Pellew’s Gardenpreviews 5 Aug · opens 7 Aug · to 28 Aug
  4. 4Low Waterpreviews 21 Oct · opens 23 Oct · to 13 Nov

Act one · The season

Four plays, February to November.

Two new plays, a new comedy and an old comedy made new. Each runs about four weeks, previews first, with one captioned matinee in every run.

Weighbridge

The set model for Weighbridge in its black box: a booth on a rostrum, a corrugated wall flown behind, lit hard white and red
The model at 1:25, in first light.

a new play by Ottilie Brankston

Two sisters run the grain weighbridge at a Yorke Peninsula silo through one harvest, and only one of them wants to stay.

(Directed by Wynne Halloran.)

The persons of the play

  • Maree, who weighs the trucksRuth
  • Jo, her sister, who writes the ticketsNell
  • Kev, a growerTobias
  • A carter from the next districtguest

About 1 hr 40, no interval.

Previews Thu 11 Feb · opens Sat 13 Feb · to Sat 6 Mar · CC Sat 27 Feb, 2 pm

Guide price $48, previews $32

Book See it on the model

Open Till Friday

The set model for Open Till Friday: three bookcases hanging at different heights over a ladder and a returns trolley
The model at 1:25, with the tubes on.

a new comedy by Caspar Nwosu-Lathe

A suburban library is told it shuts on Friday, so its three staff quietly carry on issuing books as if nobody said anything.

(Guest director, named at the first read.)

The persons of the play

  • Dorothy, who runs the branchRuth
  • Prakash, on the deskguest
  • Flick, who shelvesNell
  • A man from the councilTobias

About 1 hr 40, no interval.

Previews Thu 6 May · opens Sat 8 May · to Sat 29 May · CC Sat 22 May, 2 pm

Guide price $48, previews $32

Book See it on the model

(Winter in the workshop. Friday comes down, and a tree goes up for the garden.)

Mrs Pellew’s Garden

The set model for Mrs Pellew's Garden: a card tree, a bench and a gate in a fence, cottages painted on the cloth behind
The model at 1:25, in the morning.

a parlour comedy from 1911 by E. G. Tarrant-Hollis, in a new version by the company

A widow lets her front garden to a travelling botanist and the whole street takes sides.

(Directed by Wynne Halloran.)

The persons of the play

  • Mrs Pellew, a widowRuth
  • Mr Quiller, a travelling botanistTobias
  • Miss Holt, next doorNell
  • The postmanguest
  • Mrs Daintree, across the roadguest

About 1 hr 40, no interval.

Previews Thu 5 Aug · opens Sat 7 Aug · to Sat 28 Aug · CC Sat 21 Aug, 2 pm

Guide price $48, previews $32

Book See it on the model

Low Water

The set model for Low Water: steps down to a jetty, a strip of cut-card reeds along the foot of a dawn sky cloth
The model at 1:25, at dawn.

a new play by Aurelio Fenwick-Dunne

A fishing family on the Coorong waits a week for the lake to come back up.

(Guest director, named at the first read.)

The persons of the play

  • Gil, who fishes the lakeTobias
  • Annie, his wifeRuth
  • Meg, their daughter, home from the cityNell
  • A rangerguest

About 1 hr 40, no interval.

Previews Thu 21 Oct · opens Sat 23 Oct · to Sat 13 Nov · CC Sat 6 Nov, 2 pm

Guide price $48, previews $32

Book See it on the model

Act one, scene three · The running order

From a table read to opening night, in five calls.

Groundrow · prompt copyp. 14

(First read. A Monday. Everyone round one long table, the kettle on, somebody has brought oranges.) We read the play aloud, start to finish, before anyone stands up. Nobody acts yet. The writer sits in. We find out where it’s funny.

(The rehearsal room. Four weeks. Tape on the floor.) The set goes down as coloured tape, a line for every wall and door. The model sits on the bench by the door, so nobody forgets what they’re walking into.

(Tech. The theatre. The set is in.) Two long days. Every light, sound and change gets its number and goes into this book, one at a time, while the actors stand very still in the right place.

(Previews. House to half.) The first audiences see it nearly finished. Your laugh tells us what to cut, and we’ll still be changing things the next morning. Tickets are cheaper, and we’re grateful.

(Opening.) The stage manager says “Go” from the top, and nobody stops it. After that the play belongs to the people doing it, and to you.

Call sheet

Seven of us all year, and guests for every play.

Scripts, pencils and tea on a rehearsal table, hands marking a script, the set taped out on the floor beyond
The rehearsal room in week three, the set taped out on the floor.

Call sheet · Weighbridge · rehearsal week 3 · Tuesday

  • 10.00 Full company, rehearsal room. Scenes 4 to 7.
  • 13.00 Lunch. Soup in the foyer.
  • 13.30 Fight call: Tobias, Ruth. The fall off the deck.
  • 15.00 Costume: Nell, in the workshop.
  • 17.30 Notes, then home.

The company

  • Wynne Halloran, artistic director (sweeps the stage after)
  • Petra Lindqvist-Moyo, stage manager (this is her book)
  • Jasper Ekwueme, designer (builds every model on the bench by the door)
  • Iggy Maranta, lighting and sound
  • Nell Sarafian, actor (runs the Monday readings)
  • Tobias Ferreira-Quaid, actor (fights and falls)
  • Ruth Okonkwo-Bell, actor (voice warm-ups at the half)

Guest artists join for each play and are named at its first read.

The same seven people work together all year, so by the second play everyone knows how everyone else works: who wants the line again, who finds it on the third run. Each play brings its guests, a director or a writer or two more actors, and they keep the room honest.

The room

The empty stage in the old workshop under working light, one bulb on a stand at centre, steel grid overhead

An old workshop with the working lights on.

(The theatre.) About a hundred and ten seats on a raked bank, facing an end-on stage. Over the stage is a steel grid you can walk on, and the old truck doors at the back are now the get-in, where every set comes in.

(The rehearsal room.) High windows, a long table and a timber floor, with the next set taped out on it in coloured lines, so the actors walk the rooms before anyone builds them.

(The workshop.) Every set is built full size from the model, on the benches by the truck doors: flats, rostra, treads, a door that has to slam, and now and then a tree.

Front of house

Pick a seat and hear the room from it.

Seating plan: the stage at the top, and eight rows of fourteen seats climbing away from it, with sightlines pencilled from three seats ABCDEFGH Get-in (the old truck doors)Setting lineCentre stage

a seat a wheelchair space your sightlines floor the heads in front hide

Section through the house: the stage floor, and the rows rising behind it, each eye just clear of the head in front StageAH
The house in section, to scale: your eye, the head in front, and the floor it hides.

Every seat in the room is on the plan: eight raked rows of fourteen, with an aisle down the middle. Choose one and we’ll work out what you see and hear from it, then press Play for a knock on the stage floor and a sung note, as they reach that seat.

  • Row A, seat 7: 5.1 m from centre stage, and you see the whole stage floor. The room’s first echo, off the back wall of the stage, comes 20 ms after the voice; you hear the voice and the room about equally, and the room rings for about 1.3 s. Close enough to hear the actors breathe.
  • Row E, seat 3: 9.2 m from centre stage, and you see the whole stage floor except the front 2.0 m, which the heads in front take. The room’s first echo, off the house-left wall, comes 14 ms after the voice; you hear 2 dB more of the room than of the voice, and the room rings for about 1.3 s. Near the wall, so the room answers from your side first.
  • Row H, seat 12: 12.1 m from centre stage, and you see the whole stage floor except the front 2.7 m, which the heads in front take. The room’s first echo, off the ceiling, comes 11 ms after the voice; you hear 2 dB more of the room than of the voice, and the room rings for about 1.3 s. The whole picture from up here, with the room all round you.

(worked out for this room)

Box office

  • Fullguide price $48
  • Previewsguide price $32
  • Under 26guide price $25
  • All four playsguide price $160

Two seats at every performance are kept for whoever asks at the door; pay what you can. Book below, or at the box office from an hour before each show.

Step-free from the footpath to your seat; wheelchair spaces in row A; one captioned matinee in every run, marked CC in the season.

Call board

Open on Mondays, and most mornings.

Monday readings

New South Australian plays read aloud, chairs in a circle, and free. Come to listen, or bring one.

Mondays, 7 pm, the rehearsal room

Send us a play

Leave a script at the box office. Someone in the company reads each one, though it can take a season, and there’s no fee.

Any length, any kind

The rehearsal room

For other companies and classes, between our seasons: a sprung timber floor, high windows, a long table and chairs for twenty. Ask at the box office for the weeks it’s free.

By the day or the week

The foyer cafe

Open from an hour before curtain and on weekday mornings: tea, coffee, fresh juice, soup and bread at lunch, and a cake from a Bowden baker.

Weekdays from 8

A short walk from Bowden station.

Box office

Hold seats for a night.

The slip the box office keeps: the play, the night and how many seats. You pay when you collect the tickets.

Booking slipSeason 2027

Seat needs