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Raw storytelling and the power of Kerosene

Off the Ledge is bringing kerosene to the Canberra Theatre Centre, a sharply written new Australian play that dives into love, unfiltered emotions and female power. We spoke with director and producer Lachlan Houen and actor Winsome Ogilvie, who plays Millie, about what drew them to the production, why this story matters now and what you can expect from a night of fiercely honest theatre.
FUSE  |  Art & Culture
Winsome Ogilvie, playing Millie

Fresh, fierce and deeply Australian — Kerosene a new production by Off the Ledge Theatre is heading to the Canberra Theatre Centre. We caught up with director and producer Lachlan Houen and actor Winsome Ogilvie about the new play’s raw emotion, powerful storytelling and why audiences won’t forget Millie in a hurry. 

“It’s just pure, unbridled emotion and the vulnerability of Millie is beautiful. — FUSE MAGAZINE

Kerosene will be showing at the Canberra Theatre 16 – 19 July 2026.

Winsome Ogilvie, playing Millie

Winsome : What was your first reaction to Millie as a character?

Millie's voice was so immediately vivid on my first read. She emits such an unapologetic fierceness while unravelling a heartbreaking vulnerability as she tells her story. I've never encountered a character quite like her in a play, and yet she's a person who shapes much of Australia's darker suburban life.

Winsome : How do you keep grounded as the play moves you through so many big emotions?

Breath plays an integral part in keeping grounded while performing.

It's easy to get swept up in the adrenaline of live performance and the emotion of a character, especially one as fierce as Millie.

Keeping connected to a flow of breath grounds my energy and my body to strike a balance between the aliveness of performing and staying grounded and present throughout the duration of the show, which better serves the work as a whole.

Bold, gritty, and contemporary works confronting uncomfortable truths and the complexity of modern life. Image: Photox – Canberra Photography.

Winsome : What’s your favourite line from the play and why?

I'm sure I'll collect a plethora of favourite lines as rehearsals go on, but right now it's "Love is a perfect stain that you never want to see fade". There's something equally passionate and off-kilter about referring to love as a stain. I think the play as a whole is stained with love, for better or for worse.

Winsome : Why is it important that these uncomfortable themes are shown from a woman’s perspective?

Society has a hard time confronting violence committed by women. I think so often when it comes to acts of violence, women's stories are kept quiet as a way of preserving patriarchal expectations. It's expected that a woman stays silent. An angry woman makes people uncomfortable, and the beauty of kerosene is its brutal honesty in portraying the unravelling of anger when Millie is constantly dismissed by the world she lives in.

Winsome : Why should people come and see Kerosene?

Benjamin Nichol has written a passionate exploration of love and revenge, themes universal in storytelling. What is so special is its uniquely Australian voice and a voice that is often turned a blind eye to. It's not an easy story to bear witness to, but it's one that will leave you at first speechless, and then you'll be discussing perspectives the whole car ride home. I believe audiences will be immersed in the writing and the vision of the team that's behind it.

Lachlan Houen, Director and Producer

Lachlan : What drew you to kerosene for Off the Ledge’s next play at Canberra Theatre Centre?

The decision to choose kerosene stemmed from a holy trinity of factors for me: finding this breathtaking piece of theatre from a contemporary Australian playwright I admire, my close collaborator and dear friend Winnie having a period of time in the middle of the year that she would be on break from acting school, and a venue that happened to have the theatre we wanted available in the time period we needed. The rest, as they say, is history (or will be come closing night!).

But beyond that, I saw Ben’s latest plays, Milk and Blood, in Melbourne a couple of years ago and was absolutely spellbound by his storytelling prowess, which sent me on a journey to read more of his work. That led me to discovering kerosene, a glorious monodrama that I knew would be a gift for a performer like Winnie, and so both the producer and director within me lit up, and we’ve just been super lucky that everything else has just lined up.

Lachlan : What’s your favourite line from the play and why?

I think my current favourite line from the play is “wet with my love, wet with my rage, wet with kerosene.” It comes at a pretty climactic part of the play, and I think it really sums up the flurry of emotions Millie feels in the moment. Winnie and I have also been having really interesting conversations recently about how often we as a society feel the need to stipulate when it is a woman feeling rage, rather than just someone feeling rage when it is a man.
 
What is this ‘female rage’ stuff? It’s just pure, unbridled rage! And it’s referred to as such in this play – there are no punches pulled, no desaturation, just a character and their rage. It’s beautiful.

Lachlan : The play has themes of DV, coercive control, and female-led revenge. What makes this a story worth telling now?

I think part of the answer lies directly within the question – domestic violence and coercive control continue to rear their ugly heads, and it would be insanely remiss of us as storytellers not to acknowledge that in cultural conversations. The play is about so much more than just those themes – it touches on the double-edged sword of hope, the epidemic of loneliness we are living through (despite supposedly being more ‘connected’ than ever), the many faces of love, and more. But despite this, there is no shying away from the ugliness of domestic violence and coercive control, and I think it’s so important that we as a society are having these (at times) uncomfortable conversations in a range of forums, including in our theatres.

Lachlan :What makes this story worth telling now?

Because it isn’t just a breathtaking and captivating piece of theatre, it’s a story that speaks directly to the lives of so many people in our community.

Lachlan : What do you hope Canberra audiences take away from this play?

I actually had a really intense conversation with a friend recently about why I was doing this play and what I wanted people to take away from it, and there are a few things. I think above all, the play speaks to what a beautiful thing hope is, while warning us that there needs to come a time to let go. I am hoping audiences leave feeling happy for Millie, while also feeling this gnawing sense of sadness at where we leave her in her story. It will make more sense when people see it, but I think the whole show is filled with double-sided emotions, and it makes the audience flip between how they’re feeling throughout the night.

More broadly, as I hope for with every show I produce, I want audiences to come away with either a newfound or reinforced love for contemporary Australian theatre – we genuinely have some of the best playwrights in the world making daring, original theatre, and it energises me to be able to share their work with new audiences!
 

Kerosene : 16 – 19 July 2026 Canberra Theatre

From the company that brought you Never Closer comes an electric and heartfelt one-woman show exploring the complex, gritty and dangerous symptoms of love.

Millie yearns for love and acceptance, finding instead rejection and backlash at every turn… except from her grandfather, and best friend Annie.

She shapes her devotion to Annie into a bond that burns hotter than any romantic furnace. Life sends them on different paths, but when Annie turns up bruised and bloodied on the doorstep, Millie sets out to honour her childhood friend in the only way she knows how: revenge.

kerosene is a homage to the loyalty that accompanies lifelong friendships and the realities of what it means to grow up young, quiet and forgotten in modern day Australia.

The play is the debut work of playwright Benjamin Nichol, who has since been called “one of [Australia’s] most accomplished playwrights” (Time Out), and marks the start of his anthology of monodramas exploring (in his own words) “love, loneliness, violence and resilience”. This production gives Canberra audiences a chance to experience the work of a young Australian playwright in the early stages of a prolific trajectory.

Following her award-winning performance in The Almighty Sometimes, Winsome Ogilvie reunites with director Lachlan Houen to present a blistering portrayal of love, loneliness and obsession in the suburbs – in the play’s first staging outside of Melbourne.

Founded in 2025, Off the Ledge Theatre was born from the desire to bring important, provocative, stories to the stage—works that speak to the heart of contemporary life and resonate with our community. A strong focus on Australian voices, queer identity, and authentic storytelling drives the company’s artistic direction, ensuring each production reflects the complexities of modern life and sparks conversations that matter.

“Nichol builds a world that is dense and rich with life” – Australian Arts Review

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Kerosene

Fresh, fierce and deeply Australian — Kerosene a new production by Off the Ledge Theatre is heading to the Canberra Theatre Centre.

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