Who we are

Cesar Genaro

Cesar Genaro

Co-Founder & Artistic Director

Born in Brazil, Cesar has lived in Australia since 2013, where he has been engaged with the performing arts industry as an actor, director, teacher, sound and light designer. He has a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism, from University São Judas (Brazil, 1999) and worked for 8 years in film and television production in São Paulo, Brazil. As a director and filmmaker, he has produced short films, documentaries and institutional videos. He is presently D.I.V.E.’s Artistic Director and  Theatre, Film & Media facilitator at SPIRAL, Inc. He also taught acting at TAFE Sunshine Coast.

Cesar is an experienced actor and director, having trained in Experimental Theatre, Theatre of the Oppressed, Meyerhold’s Biomechanics, Puppetry, Physical Theatre, Viewpoints and Butoh with different schools and theatre companies in Brazil and Australia. He started in acting in 2007 with Teatro Escola Macunaíma (Brazil), and has since trained with Cia. de Teatro Os Satyros, (Brazil), Cia. Pessoal Do Faroeste (Brazil), Queensland Shakespeare Ensemble, Fools Theatre Company and Zen, Zen, Zo (Australia).  

Cesar founded D.I.V.E. Theatre Collective with Priscila Da Cunha and has been Artistic Director since 2017. Performance and directing credits for D.I.V.E. include Caprichos (2022), Diver.city Inside Out (2021), Exodus (2021), Into the Light (2020), Urban Twitters: Dis.connect.ed (2019) and Stories of Dis.place.ment (2018). He also directed and edited Dis.connect.ed: A Short Documentary (2019).

Cesar’s other theatre credits include Bureau of Dodgy Dreams (Fools Theatre Company); Something, by Rebecca Dostal (Noosa Arts Theatre’s  Shorts on the Stage); Homem Não Entra for Cia. Pessoal Do Faroeste (Brazil); Brincar De Pensar by Vanessa Bruno (Brazil); Edifício London, Satyricon, Distopias, Novo Manual Prático  Para  o Anonimato and Manual Prático para o Anonimato for Cia. De Teatro Os Satyros (Brazil). On the screen, he has acted in the short films Arcano 13 and Abaixo a Ditadura (Brazil) and has directed the shorts Disability Violence Project for Queensland Advocacy Inc. and TAFE Sunshine Coast.

Priscila Da Cunha

Priscila Da Cunha

Co-founder & Creative Producer

Priscila Da Cunha is one of the founders of D.I.V.E. Theatre Collective and has been a Creative Producer since 2017. Originally from Brazil, she has lived in Australia since 2013 and is Drama & English Teacher at a Steiner school on the Sunshine Coast, where she directs and produces five full-length theatre performances per year. She completed her Master of Arts degree in Comparative Literature at the University of Toronto, Canada, in 2004. Her research interests lie in contact improvisation, physical theatre and the boundaries between literature, theatre, film and dance. She has published two articles on Comparative Literature and edited three anthologies of Australian short stories for high school students.

Priscila has been involved in the performing arts for more than 15 years. With D.I.V.E. Theatre Collective, she has led workshops for schools and community groups and has produced and performed in several projects. She worked as a producer and project coordinator for Caprichos (2022), Diver.city Inside Out (2021), Exodus (2021), Into the Light (2020), Dis.connect.ed: A Short Documentary (2019) and the street performance Urban Twitters: Dis.connect.ed (2019). In 2018, she facilitated and acted in two street performances as part of Stories of Dis.place.ment.

Credits in Brazil include Somos De Feitos, with Cia. De Feitos and Cia Les Commediens Tropicales (2008-2009); Novo Manual Prático para o Anonimato (2009) and Manual Prático para o Anonimato (2008) with Cia. de Teatro Os Satyros. She was a member of Inorgânicas Contemporary Dance Troupe (2010-2013), directed by Denise Passos, and performed in numerous contemporary dance festivals. Priscila also facilitated storytelling workshops and performances in schools, community centres, libraries and companies in Sao Paulo, Brazil, for several years.

Since starting her theatre career, Priscila has trained in contact improvisation dance with Joerg Hassmann (Australia) and Cia. Nova Dança 4 (Brazil); in contemporary dance with Ruth Rachou and Denise Passos (Brazil); in Viewpoints with Zen Zen Zo; in Linklater Voice Training with Queensland Shakespeare Ensemble (Australia); Rudolf Steiner’s Creative Speech and Drama with the Independent School for Creative Speech and the Art of Drama (New Zealand).

Alice Clapham

Alice Clapham

Performing Artist

Alice Beaver Clapham grew up in Tennessee, USA. She received her BA in Theatre Arts at Rollins College, Florida, and her MFA in Theatre for Young Audiences at Arizona State University, Arizona. She studied acting at RADA, in London, and at the Stella Adler Studio, in NYC. 

Alice has worked professionally as a performer, playwright, director, and arts educator for the past 20 years in the USA (Childsplay), Honduras (Teatro La Fragua), Hong Kong (Faust, HKYAF, AFTEC) and Singapore (Faust). 

She has worked on several community-based theatre projects ranging in communities such as foster kids to social workers to entire towns.  She has worked and studied with renowned community-based theatres, such as Cornerstone Theater in Los Angeles and Sojourn Theatre in Portland, Oregon. 

Alice is also an accomplished voice actor working for companies such as Disney, Cartoon Network, Animax, and V-Tech. After recently relocating to Australia, Alice joined D.I.V.E. Theatre Collective in 2022 as an ensemble member on the Sunshine Coast.

Daniela Lavorenti

Daniela Lavorenti

Performing Artist

Daniela is a passionate Italian and Brazilian performer who loves travelling around the world, spreading art, love and healing. She has worked in the performing arts for 23 years; she is an experienced voice actor, dancer and professional clown.

Daniela has a Bachelor's degree in Performing Arts from Faculdade Celia Helena (Brazil) and a Diploma in Dance Teaching and Management from the Australian Dance College.

Credits in Australia include Peculiar River (The Factory Theatre Company), Hamlet (Sydney Foreign Actors Association) and the comedy Philosopher’s Hospital, for which she was one of the finalists in the Short and Sweet Festival in 2020. She also worked as a full-time clown at Luna Park in Sydney for two years.

In Brazil, Daniela worked and toured with some of the leading theatre companies in Sao Paulo for 20 years. She also facilitated workshops and worked as a hospital clown doctor for five years with Doutores da Alegria.

Daniela joined D.I.V.E. Theatre Collective in 2022. She is excited to reconnect with her true source and breathe fully again.

Mary Eggleston

Mary Eggleston

Performing Artist

Mary Eggleston is an actor, performance artist, director, writer and producer of performing and visual arts. She’s a keen collaborator and has worked with national and international artists since 1997.  She trained in physical theatre with Zen Zen Zo and then went on to study mime and movement theatre at dieEtage in Berlin.

Mary has toured extensively with Artslink and QLD Music Festival’s Youth Touring. She was selected to be part of the 2020 PlayLab mentorship under the guidance of Maxine Mellor and she’s currently writing collaboratively on a new work for theatre with Dr Nycole Prowse. Mary is also the producer of Project 24 – a council-funded arts residency program at 2nd Space in Nambour.

Megan O’Hare

Megan O’Hare

Performing Artist

Originally from Ireland, Megan is a performing artist and student at the University of Queensland.

She joined D.I.V.E Theatre Collective's Ensemble in 2021 due to her shared belief in the potential of art to effect change. She is convinced that there is immense value in exploring and celebrating the multitude of (sub)cultures and experiences existent within Australian society, particularly those that are provocative, marginalised or misunderstood.

Megan has performed in Pandemonium, directed by Ms Stephanie Dimitriou, and Caprichos, directed by Cesar Genaro. She has trained in Biomechanics, Theatre of the Oppressed, Improvisation and the Meisner Technique, and she is eager to expand and improve her knowledge and skills.

Mia Hollingworth

Mia Hollingworth

Performing Artist

Mia Hollingworth (b. Melbourne 1975) is an Australian Educator and Performance Artist based on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland. Hollingworth has been creating, producing and performing in intimate shows in the family home since the age of four.

A dance graduate of the Victorian College of Arts in 1996, her career as a contemporary dancer for live and film work has seen her collaborate and tour with some of Melbourne’s leading experiential contemporary companies and choreographers from 1997 to 2007.

During a lengthy hiatus from practice and performance, Hollingworth became a mother and returned to studies, completing a Bachelor of Education.

Since moving to the Sunshine Coast, Hollingworth has slowly returned to her practice and has since been a grant recipient to create in Place2Play, a Sunshine Coast Council initiative, 2020; Creative Spaces Artist in Residence recipient, 2021. She collaborated with LJ Projects for the premier of Poetical Inhabitants as part of Horizon Festival, Sunshine Coast 2020/2021, and Caprichos with D.I.V.E. Theatre Collective in 2022.

Hollingworth co-facilitated a Community Development Art Project - The Creative Catalogue, supported by RADF and launched in 2022.

She is now primarily interested in exploring performance opportunities that enable a more authentic mode of expression and connection to the public.

Paula Tura

Paula Tura

Performing Artist

Paula is a Brazilian-born author and performer based on the Sunshine Coast since 2014.

The past decade has seen Paula engaged in multi-artistic creative projects. She has developed Body Poetics, a series of visual arts representations of the human body in the natural environment, as part of her Master's degree in Contemporary Arts.

Paula has written and published the academic articles: Bare Life and postpartum in performing arts, Primal scream, Body Poetics; and Gaia’s daughters, published by Cambridge Scholars. She also performed Bare Life and postpartum in performing arts at the L.O.T.E exhibition in São Paulo, Brazil. 

In 2016, Paula started touring schools and libraries in QLD and NSW, performing a play based on her children’s books: Tresses, the story of a girl with wild and curious hair, and Nina’s Wish, the tale of a girl who lives near the sea and wants to be a mermaid.

Her passion for the ocean and surfing has led Paula to write and produce the short documentary The Surfing Mum’s Journey, about local Sunshine Coast mums who swap weekly childminding for surfing. The movie was screened at the Sunshine Coast Surf Film Festival in 2019.

Paula has also studied active theatre, stand-up comedy, clown, singing, and contemporary dance and is now experimenting with new characters and content on social media platforms.

She is feeling privileged to be part of D.I.V.E. Theatre Collective in 2022.