Alexander Sparrow

Alexander is an award-winning comedian, MC, director, and humour scholar. He has performed in LA, New York, and Boston; Belgium; France; Scotland; England; and all over New Zealand. Alexander has featured on TVNZ’s Breakfast, TV3’s The Project, and PRIME TV’s Back Benches; and in The Wall Street Journal (US).
He directed Pat Goldsack’s Swingers Club & Brothel (2022 tour with Arts on Tour NZ), Macbeth (2021-22 NZ tour), King John (2020 with Shakespeare Globe Centre NZ), The Merry Wives of Windsor (2019 NZ tour), and A Collection of Noises (2013, 2015, 2020 seasons). He was character director for The Nutcracker at Nelson’s Theatre Royal (2021).
Alexander has presented his thoughts on comedy at conferences and universities in New Zealand, Australia, the USA, Belgium, Croatia, Italy, and the UK. He received the International Society of Humor Studies’ DANYS Award at their 2023 conference for his paper on cringe comedy. In 2024 he earned an MA Philosophy with Distinction at Victoria University of Wellington for his thesis Humour and the Appearance of Authenticity. The thesis can be downloaded HERE. In 2026 he graduated with an MA in Comedy Writing with Distinction from Falmouth University.

Email: asparrowcomic@gmail.com

Awards

WON

2023 DANYS Award for excellence in humour studies research
2022 Best MC, Comedy Hub Awards
Best Comedy, Whangarei Fringe Festival (dir.)
2020 Best Joke, Comedy Hub Awards
2019 Best Out-of-Towner, Comedy Hub Awards
2018 Best Out-of-Towner, Comedy Hub Awards
Best Comedy, Palmy Fringe Festival (dir.)
2017 Best Show, Wellington Comedy Awards
Outstanding Achievement, Wellington Comedy Awards
2016 Breakthrough Act, Wellington Comedy Awards

NOMINATED

2025 Best Out-of-Towner, Comedy Hub Awards
2023 Best Comedian, Comedy Hub Awards
Best MC, Comedy Hub Awards
Best Comic, Nelson Fringe Festival
2022 Best Comedian, Comedy Hub Awards
Best Joke, Comedy Hub Awards
Best Comedy, Whangarei Fringe Festival
2021 Best Joke, Comedy Hub Awards
Best Male Comedian, Comedy Hub Awards
2018 Best Comedy, Palmy Fringe Festival
Edgiest Show, Nelson Fringe Festival
Outstanding Performer, Nelson Fringe Festival
Best Solo Show, Nelson Fringe Festival
Best Comedy, Nelson Fringe Festival (dir.)
Best Solo Show, Nelson Fringe Festival (dir.)
Best Solo Show, Wellington Comedy Awards (dir.)
2017 Best Show, Wellington Comedy Awards
Best Design, Nelson Fringe Festival
Best Actor, Nelson Fringe Festival
2016 Best Show, Wellington Comedy Awards

Katie Boyle

Katie is the comic behind the multi-award-winning Pat Goldsack: New Zealand’s favourite swinging nana. Pat Goldsack has appeared at gigs in the USA, Belgium, France, and the UK, and performed a 20-date tour of New Zealand (2022 Arts on Tour NZ). Pat Goldsack won Best Comic at the 2023 Nelson Fringe Festival; the show Pat Goldsack’s Swingers Club & Brothel won Best Comedy at the 2022 Whangarei Fringe Festival and the 2018 Palmy Fringe Festival. For her work as Pat, Katie has won Best Female Comic at the 2021 and 2019 Comedy Hub Awards.
She is also one of New Zealand’s most noted Shakespearean actors, with 12 Elizabethan productions performed over the last nine years. Past shows include Hamlet at the Pop Up Globe (Guildenstern and Laertes), Romeo and Juliet (Juliet), Dr Faustus (Faustus), and Macbeth (Macbeth). She also undertook a 45-date solo tour of Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor (everyone). She co-produced and co-hosted the award-nominated comedy line-up show Sing It Wrong, and has MCed Armageddon (Auckland and Wellington).

IG: @pat.goldsack

Awards

WON

2026 Best Newcomer, Stone Revellers Musical Theatre Awards
Best Supporting Actor, Stone Revellers Musical Theatre Awards
2025 Best Character, Spitfire Comedy Awards
Best Musical Act, Spitfire Comedy Awards
2023 MVP, Comedy Hub Awards (Joint)
Best Comic, Nelson Fringe Festival
2022 Best Comedy, Whangarei Fringe Festival
2021 Best Female Comedian, Comedy Hub Awards
2019 Best Female Comedian, Comedy Hub Awards
2018 Best Comedy, Palmy Fringe Festival

NOMINATED

2025 Best Performer, Greater Manchester Fringe Festival
2023 Best Comedian, Comedy Hub Awards
Best MC, Comedy Hub Awards
2022 Best Comedian, Comedy Hub Awards
2019 Best Out-of-Towner, Comedy Hub Awards
2018 Outstanding Female Performer, Palmy Fringe Festival
Best Comedy, Nelson Fringe Festival
Best Solo Show, Nelson Fringe Festival
Best Solo Show, Wellington Comedy Awards
Best Joke, Wellington Comedy Awards
Outstanding Achievement, Wellington Comedy Awards
Best Out of Towner, Comedy Hub Awards
2017 Best Regular Show, Wellington Comedy Awards

The Ballad of Maria Marten
Stone Revellers Musical Theatre

“It’s been a year since I died, and still nobody has found me.”

Summer, 1827. In a red barn in Suffolk, Maria Marten awaits her lover. A year later, hidden in a grain sack beneath the floor of the barn, Maria’s body is discovered, barely identifiable – and a nationwide manhunt begins.

The Red Barn Murder has all the hallmarks of a classic crime drama: a missing body, a rural setting, a disreputable squire, and a village bound by age-old traditions. Yet while the case sent shockwaves throughout the country, Maria’s own story was largely forgotten. The Ballad of Maria Marten rediscovers that story, bringing it back to vivid and urgent life. Beth Flintoff’s acclaimed play reimagines one of Britain’s most infamous true crime stories, shifting the focus away from sensationalism and placing Maria herself at the heart of the narrative.

Starring Katie Boyle as Maria Marten, alongside a six-strong all-female cast, this powerful and inventive production combines storytelling, music, movement and ensemble performance to create a theatrical experience that is both moving and unforgettable.

From Beth Flintoff, writer: “The murder of Maria Marten is a story that has been told and retold for the last two hundred years, with much lip-smacking enthusiasm for the gruesome details and unsubtle musings over whether or not she ‘deserved it’. Here is the reversal of that telling. It’s the story of Maria’s murder, but it’s an un-murdering.”

Tickets are just £16 Adults / £14 Concessions 

Recommended Age 14+

Wednesday 9th - Saturday 12th September, 7.30pm
Crown Wharf Theatre
1A Crown St, Stone ST15 8QN

Jack Absolute Flies Again
A crown Wharf in-House Production

From the team who brought you Crown Wharf Theatre’s unforgettable opening production of Shakespeare in Love comes another dazzling in-house production that promises love, laughter and a touch of chaos in the skies!

The second Crown Wharf Theatre in-house production will be the brilliant comedy Jack Absolute Flies Again, a hilarious and heartfelt play by Richard Bean (One Man Two Guvnors) and Oliver Chris, originally co-produced by the National Theatre.

It’s 1940, and the Battle of Britain is raging. At a makeshift RAF base in Sussex, dashing pilot Jack Absolute has returned to duty, only to discover that his old flame Lydia Languish is now stationed nearby as part of the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force. What follows is a riot of mistaken identities, romantic rivalries, and the kind of British humour that soars as high as the Hurricanes and Spitfires themselves.

Based on Sheridan’s classic play ‘The Rivals’, this is a joyous blend of farce, sharp wit, and tender romance.

Starring Alexander Sparrow as Jack Absolute, and Katie Boyle as Lydia Languish.

At Crown Wharf Theatre, we believe in the power of storytelling to unite, uplift, and entertain. Jack Absolute Flies Again is a show that embodies all of that — a sparkling comedy that reminds us to laugh, love and be brave, even when the world is upside down.

Tickets £15 – £18 (Contains strong language)

Friday 6th - Saturday 14th November, 7.30pm/2.30pm
Crown Wharf Theatre
1A Crown St, Stone ST15 8QN