Annie trained as an actor at the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) and completed post grad study at RADA in London. After acting professionally for many years she became a casting director and acting coach. She has worked as casting director on 38 screen dramas shot in WA since 1993 including “Rabbit Proof Fence”, “Japanese Story”, “Last Train to Freo”, “The Circuit 1 and 2”;”Drift”; “Claremont Murders” and award winning feature “Runt” including more than 21 TV series.  Annie has been acting coach on more than 22 screen productions and has taught screen acting as sessional and guest lecturer at WA Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) regularly since 1996 . She co-founded and runs PAC Workshops and PAC Advanced Studio (PACAS) and is a private acting coach. In addition, her many years experience as a professional voice over artist gives her first hand knowledge in this area and Annie loves helping class members develop and enrich their speaking voices in the PAC Voice course. Annie was casting director and acting coach of the 60 episode TV series “The Heights” for ABC TV /Matchbox Pictures. To hear what previous participants in PAC Workshops say about the courses check out our Testimonials page.

Emma started her adult acting training with PAC Workshops and has gone on to forge an amazing career as a professional actor in Australia and overseas. She has played roles in feature films and TV series including “Hounds of Love”, “Glitch”, “Gods of Egypt”, “The Boys are Back”, “Underbelly”,”Cloudstreet” and “H is for Happiness”. She has been honoured for her acting roles winning awards in Australia and overseas.  She enjoys sharing her skills tutoring in PAC Workshops when her schedule allows her time back in WA.

Michael originally hails from Glasgow, Scotland, but spent his formative years in Western Australia. He is a graduate of Curtin University (1997), with BA English (Theatre Arts/Creative Writing), as well as a graduate of the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) Acting Course (2001). In 2008, he completed Honours in Performance Studies, looking at the role the media plays for emerging playwrights, again at Curtin. He completed a Masters in film and television directing and screenwriting at the WA Screen Academy (2008-09). He has also completed a PhD at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) in 2018.  Working professionally in theatre since 2002, his directing credits include: the WA premiere of The Addams Family: a New Musical at the Regal Theatre, Perth (2021, remount 2022); Side Show, with the 3rd Year Musical Theatre students (2022); Me Too: The Musical at Perth’s Fringeworld in 2021. Michael was the Program Coordinator of the Communications and Media degree at the University of Notre Dame Fremantle and Course Coordinator for Film & Screen Production and Theatre Studies from 2014-2021.

Also a graduate of the NIDA, Caroline has a wealth of experience as a professional actor and is known for her role as Cleaver Greene’s ex-wife Wendy on the popular TV series Rake and for the role of Chrissy Merchant in “Packed to the Rafters” and the starring roles of Veronica Johnson and her twin sister Betti in the children’s television series “Parallax”. Caroline is a skilled stage and screen actor appearing on stage with Black Swan State Theatre Company and in Sydney Theatre Company’s production of “Dinner”. She enjoys sharing her skills tutoring in PAC Advanced Studio.

Renée Webster is an award-winning writer and director for film and TV. Her debut feature film, “How to Please a Woman” (Sally Phillips, Erik Thomson) was released in Australian cinemas in May 2022.

Most recently, Renée was the series Director on Season 2 of the critically acclaimed series “Aftertaste”. She was the set up Director on the first season of the children’s TV series “Itch” and a series Director on both Seasons of “The Heights”, receiving an ADG nomination for her first episode of adult television. Her short film “Edgar and Elizabeth” was nominated for an AWGIE and along with her first short film, “Scoff”, played in festivals worldwide. Renee enjoys coaching PAC Advanced Studio.

Ben Young is an award winning writer/director who began his career acting for screen at the age of 12. He completed a BA at Curtin University in 2003 and an MA at the WA Screen Academy in 2005. He has since directed music videos, commercials, fashion film, and written and/or directed series television. His 2016 feature debut was “Hounds of Love”. Funded through ScreenWest’s West Coast Visions, the film won numerous awards around the world, most notably at the Venice Film Festival. Ben’s second film “Extinction” premiered on Netflix in 2018 and featured Michael Pena and Lizzy Caplan. Ben directed a block of Netflix’s “Clickbait” in 2020 and the season finale of the second season of Amazon’s The Wilds . His movie Devil’s Peak starred Billy Bob Thornton and Robin Wright. He recently directed episodes of “Twelve 2” and “Silver”. Ben is directing back to back TV series but he enjoys coaching PAC Advanced Studio when he is home in Perth.
More info on Ben can be found on Ben’s IMDB page:

Kelton Pell has performed on stage since 1985, performing for Yirra Yaakin Theatre, the Black Swan Theatre Company, and the Sydney Theatre Company. Many of these performances were of plays which grew from Indigenous themes. In 2000 Kelton, along with Ningali Lawford and Phil Thomson, wrote a show for Yirra Yaakin called Solid, whose premiere performance was at the Perth International Arts Festival. Because of its sensitive Indigenous subject matter, before the premiere the play was performed for, and was approved by, 2000 Indigenous Australians. Kelton performed in several productions of Bloodland, a play directed by the Stephen Page with a Romeo and Juliet-type of story. The play features traditional Aboriginal languages and Pidgin English, as well as song and dance. He has also acted in performances of Twelfth Night and A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Kelton acted in the children’s TV show The Adventures of the Bush Patrol and played a lead role in the SBS series The Circuit, a legal drama set in the Kimberley. In 2012 he starred in the TV series Redfern Now. He plays vampire hunter Jalingbirri in Warwick Thornton‘s 2021 horror / comedy series Firebite for AMC+ (later shown on NITV). In 2022 Kelton appeared in the ABC drama series Mystery Road: Origin, and in March 2024 in the Stan Original movie Windcatcher.

Maziar is a Norwegian born and raised child of refugees who fled the Iranian revolution. He grew up in Bergen, Norway, before his family immigrated to Perth, Australia when he was a teenager. Today, Maziar is a Perth based Iranian/Norwegian/ Australian writer and director of feature films. After years of writing and directing several short films that accrued significant global festival selections and award considerations, Maziar completed his directing debut feature film, BELOW, in 2019, adapted by Ian Wilding off his stage-play. BELOW premiered at Melbourne International Film festival in August 2020 and has since been distributed on DVD and streaming by Madman Entertainment. Maziar’s speculative screenplay, DIE WELL, made the finals in several high-profile global competitions for unproduced screenplays, notably the Nicholls Fellowship (run by the academy of arts and sciences in the U.S). In 2018, this screenplay won Maziar the Warner Brothers / Blacklist screenplay competition. It is currently under option pending production in the U.S. He has since worked for Warner Brothers Studios, Causeway Films, First Option Pictures, Tony Ayres Productions, Roadshow Rough Diamond, and other companies in the capacity of a screenwriter. He also works as a story producer on factual content.

Andrew is a directing graduate of the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA) and holds two Masters degrees – one in Film and TV Directing from The Australian Film, Television and Radio School (AFTRS) and the other in Film and Theatre Studies from the University of New South Wales as well as his PhD from ECU. Andrew has extensive experience in directing film, television and theatre. In television he has directed episodes of the series Castaway, Sleepover Club, Streetsmartz, Parallax, Something in the Air, Home and Away, Ocean Star, Snobs, Going Home, Breakers and Pacific Drive. He has also produced, directed and written documentary and magazine programs for the ABC. At the 2007 Western Australian Screen Awards Andrew won an award for Outstanding Achievement in Drama Directing for his work on the series, Sleepover Club. Andrew recently left the position of Associate Professor in the Acting Department at WAAPA and also Associate Director of the WA Screen Academy which he helped to create.