A major new stage adaptation of Jessica Anderson’s Miles Franklin Award-winning novel Tirra Lirra by the River will come to Byron Theatre in a limited season from 5 to 13 June.
Presented by Fairbairn + Wild Productions and Byron Theatre Company, the production brings one of Australia’s best-known literary works to the stage with a locally-based cast, and a design language shaped specifically for the Byron Theatre space.
First published in 1978, Anderson’s novel follows Nora Porteous, an older woman who returns to her childhood home in Queensland after decades away, including years spent in London. As Nora recovers from illness, memory begins to open around her: marriage, escape, art, love, exile and the complicated question of what it means to return home.
The stage production stars Toni Scanlan, familiar to many from Water Rats, The Newsreader and Packed to the Rafters, alongside Murwillumbah-based performer Pirie Outridge, and Tom Anderson. The work is written and co-directed by Heather Fairbairn and Kate Wild, with a creative team including production designer Savanna Wegman, lighting and video designer Aron Murray, and composer and sound designer Julian Starr.
Using live cinema, projection mapping and sound, the production moves across 70 years, from jazz-age Sydney to post-war London, creating what the company describes as a fluid, memory-driven theatrical world.
For Byron Bay-based Fairbairn, the project is also a chance to make ambitious work close to home. ‘It’s rare to be able to make work at this level in your own community,’ she said.
Tirra Lirra by the River is the second major production from Byron Theatre Company, following its 2025 debut Displace I Call Home, and continues its push to develop locally-made theatre with national ambition. Performances run at Byron Theatre from 5 to 13 June, with evening shows at 7.30pm and Saturday matinees at 2pm.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
