Mullum High’s Ruby Walters and Millie Hauritz, below, will feature in the Byron performance of NORPA’s upcoming production, Engine, written by Janis Balodis and directed by Julian Louis. Managing to extract a positive message from the tragic effects of teenage road crashes, Engine shows a way forward for young people, particularly teenagers, as they work through their loss and grief.

Staring Home And Away’s Bob Baines and Brisbane actor Melanie Zanetti, each performance will feature drama students from local high schools. The Byron performance is at the Byron Community Centre on August 13-14, with the premiere in Lismore on July 29.

Melanie Zanetti plays teenager Natasha who has lost her brother Stevie in a road crash. She wears Stevie’s clothes and sleeps in his unfinished project car.
The only way Natasha can think of restoring her memories of Stevie is by completing to build the engine from his car. Each performance, Natasha rebuilds an engine on stage, an unusual thing for a young girl to learn to do and it poses the question – how do you actually build a car on stage?

Engine is a show made in Lismore and it is about to tour nationally. After touring the Northern Rivers region and Brisbane, Engine will be presented in Sydney and Melbourne and then will go on to tour nationally in 2012.
See more details at www.norpa.org.au.

Photo Jeff Dawson