About the Speakers

Dan Daw – Director and Performer

Dan is the Artistic Director/CEO of Dan Daw Creative Projects. Dan Daw Creative Projects is a disabled-led company that works collaboratively with a growing network of companies and artists to develop and tour new performance work that blurs the divide between theatre and dance. Dan has presented his work at British Dance Edition (UK), Swedish Performing Arts Biennale (SWE), Sydney Festival and Rising Festival (AUS), Kampnagel and Sophiensaele (DE), SoHo Playhouse (USA) and Sadler’s Wells and Battersea Arts Centre (UK) amongst others. From 2023 – 2025 his company has been in residence at Kampnagel, Hamburg as Agents for Change, exploring what accessibility looks like across a venue, including programming, residencies, audience experience, capital development and human resources.

Making his Australian mainstage theatre debut, Dan is Co-Directing and starring in ‘Cost of Living’ by Martyna Majok at Queensland Theatre/Sydney Theatre Company, Dan began working as a performer with Restless Dance Theatre (AUS) in 2002, and since then has gone on to work with Australian Dance Theatre (AUS), Force Majeure (AUS), FRONTLINEdance (UK), Scottish Dance Theatre (UK), balletLORENT (UK), Candoco Dance Company (UK), Skånes Dansteater (SWE) and National Theatre Scotland (UK). Throughout his performance career, Dan has worked with Kat Worth, Garry Stewart, Kate Champion, Janet Smith, Adam Benjamin, Wendy Houstoun, Sarah Michelson, Rachid Ouramdane, Nigel Charnock, Matthias Sperling, Marc Brew, Claire Cunningham, Martin Forsberg, Carl Olof Berg, Charlotte Spencer, Javier de Frutos and Priscilla Jackman. Working as Internationale Tanzmesse NRW Associate Curator (2021 – 2024), Associate Artistic Director of Candoco Dance Company (2021), Sadler’s Wells Summer University Artist (2015 – 2018) and Associate Director of Murmuration (2015 – 2022), Dan continues to work at the forefront of disability-led performance making and international performance programming.

Michelle Cheng – Head of Creative Diversity, SBS’s Television and Online Content division

Michelle works adjacent to the SBS Commissioning team, supporting SBS’s content and industry initiatives focused on providing tangible pathways and opportunities for diverse practitioners under-represented in the sector. Michelle joined SBS in January 2021. She has worked as a media advisor, with a background in TV presenting/writing, journalism and law (as a qualified solicitor). From 2016 to 2020, she worked with ITV Studios and Channel 7 as a television writer on the quiz show, The Chase Australia. In 2018, she was an ABC TV panellist on the quiz show Think Tank in over 75 episodes. Michelle also has extensive experience as a digital journalist with by-lines that include The Guardian, ABC, Yahoo News and the Daily Mail Australia, and has been Curation Coordinator for TEDxMelbourne, as well as Media & Communications Advisor at Monash University.

Michelle was also the co-chair of the Screen Diversity Inclusion Network (SDIN) from June 2021 to June 2023. SDIN brings together Australian broadcasters, screen agencies, business associations and industry-aligned education and training organisations to work together towards a more inclusive and diverse screen industry. SBS is a founding member of SDIN and is participating in ‘The Everyone Project’, an initiative led by the SDIN to implement a simple yet comprehensive way of measuring and reporting on diversity in productions.

Fiona Murphy – Writer, Editor and Arts Critic

Fiona’s work has appeared in The Guardian, The Saturday Paper, Griffith Review, Sydney Morning Herald, amongst many others. Her memoir ‘The Shape of Sound’ explores her experiences of deafness. It was shortlisted for the 2022 Victorian Literary Premier’s Awards. Fiona is the founder of the Accessible Communications Collective, which is a feelgood way to learn about accessible brand and content strategy.

Ryan Enniss – Playwright and Actor

Ryan is a playwright, actor and voice-over artist originally from Tasmania, currently based in he moved to Sydney to study a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Acting) from the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) and graduated in 2021. His play Drizzle Boy won the 2022 – 2023 Queensland Premier’s Drama Award, and was the first mainstage show in Australian history to feature an autistic lead, as well as be written by an autistic playwright. Drizzle Boy was published by Currency Press early in 2024, and is touring with Queensland Theatre towards the end of the year.

Accessible Arts is proudly supported by Create NSW and this Hybrid Event has been made possible with support from the City of Sydney, Sydney Theatre Company and Livecrowd.

ENDS

Image Description: A photo of the MC and panellists from The Future of Disability Storytelling, standing in a line and smiling in front of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. From left to right: Ryan Enniss, Fiona Murphy, Michelle Cheng and Dan Daw. Photo by Dieter Knierim.