Christine Harris is the Managing Director of HIT Productions, a Melbourne based company she formed in 1993. An award winning actress known for her role as Amy Carson in Carson’s Law for which she received a prestigious Penguin Award, and roles in numerous other television productions such as Prisoner and Neighbours, she was a regular on our television screens in the 1980’s and 1990’s. A self taught marketer and producer, it was her commitment to providing a platform for female actors that was responsible for her initial drive into theatre with her first Melbourne based seasons of Duet for One, Crimes of the Heart and Hotel Sorrento.
In the 14 years since HIT Productions was formed, Christine’s talent and tenacity have been rewarded with extraordinary results reflected in the many business awards and accolades she has received. These include her 1995 inclusion in the inaugural Australian Business Women’s Network Inspiring Women of Australia Calendar, the 1997 Victorian Entrepreneur of the Year Award, 1998, 2000 Finalist – Telstra Business Women’s Awards, the 1998 Executive Woman of the Year Award (National Small Business Owner Category) and her inclusion in the 1999 Business Women’s Hall of Fame. In 2000 Christine was one of 80 business and community leaders chosen to be a delegate at the Growing Victoria Together Summit held at Parliament House (Melbourne) and she was recently included as one of 32 successful Australian businesswomen in Pru Goward’s book A Business of Your Own.
Since 1993 HIT has grown under Christine’s direction and vision from a one-woman operation to a business now employing over 50 people per year with the accrual of over $15 million worth of government and corporate funding/sponsorship. The company is now a market leader in its two arms, theatre and education. As a theatrical producer, HIT, undeniably one of Australia’s most significant and active theatre companies, is committed to profiling Australian artists via outstanding productions, with the major focus on touring accessible, mainstream theatre Australia wide to capital city, outer metropolitan and regional theatre venues and their communities. Since its first tour in mid 1999 with Hotel Sorrento, which received funding support from the Victorian Government via Arts Victoria’s Touring Victoria Program and which followed on from a 1998 Melbourne Season, HIT Productions has built up a remarkable body of work. Between 1999 and the end of 2007, HIT will have delivered 33 major theatre tours. These productions will have reached over 350,000 patrons across 300 plus weeks of touring, in capital city, outer metropolitan, regional and remote venues Australia wide.
In fact, HIT Productions has presented some of the most extensive tours ever staged in Australia. Patrick Edgeworth’s Girl Talk 2000 and 2001 starring Jacki Weaver toured to 69 venues and was the most extensive tour of a single theatre production ever funded by Playing Australia. HIT’s 2007-2008 production of David Williamson’s The Club now breaks that record. Other tours have included Hotel Sorrento by Hannie Rayson (three tours), Goodbye Mrs Blore by Robert Hewett, Love Child by Joanna Murray-Smith (four tours), Music 2001 (concert series), Nick Enright’s Daylight Saving (two tours), Alan Bennett’s Talking Heads, Speaking in Tongues by Andrew Bovell,Neil Simon’s Last of the Red Hot Lovers (two tours), An Evening With (further Alan Bennett Talking Heads monologues), Peta Murray’s Wallflowering (three tours), Geraldine Aron’s My Brilliant Divorce (two tours), The Gin Game by D.L. Coburn (two tours), The Breath of Life by David Hare, Barmaids by Katherine Thomson (two tours), President Wilson in Paris by Ron Blair, Deckchairs by Jean McConnell, Double Act by Barry Creyton and Willy Russell’s Educating Rita. Productions slated for 2008 include Shirley Valentine by Willy Russell and David Williamson’s Travelling North as well as a remount of My Brilliant Divorce.
Now into its eighth year of touring, HIT works with a well-established base of over 100 venues, who regularly buy one to five productions per year. HIT’s entire premise is to expand audiences in Australia by creating greater access to theatre. A growing number of venues now rely on HIT to provide a major proportion of their annual theatre presentation. HIT’s tours now have an even stronger focus on delivering to regional and remote venues, and typically travel for around 13 weeks, reaching 30-35 venues per tour, across the length and breadth of Australia from capital city venues to smaller volunteer run venues.
From 1995 – 2003 the company was market leader in the provision of sponsored educational/motivational talks via their highly successful educational programs such as Dream And Achieve™ and Follow Your Dreams™. Their reach - 5,700 schools and over one million students, demonstrated the success of these programs. Whilst these programs are no longer active, HIT’s commitment to young people continues via the company’s theatre arm through its community activities whilst on tour, such as the free Sharing the Experience of the Arts talks at schools.