Bridget, Actor, radio presenter, academic, Barkers Creek, Dja Dja Wurrung Country

Content Warning: Child sexual abuse

Bridget moved to Castlemaine many years ago so that her child could attend the Steiner school here. She lives in a house up on a hill, overlooking acres of bush and dams below. She hosts a radio show, Femme Fortissimo, which sees her interview female artists, musicians and poets. 

She’s travelled a lot in her life – she grew up in Melbourne, but struggled with anorexia and alcoholism after her mother left when she was fifteen. So she decided to run away to London at twenty two. Whilst there she studied acting and partied with musicians and movie stars, and she worked with Dustin Hoffman for three months. She spent more than six years in London before returning to Australia, where she undertook a PhD about how creative emergence from trauma is written – a very personal issue for her after having her mother leave, and her father sexually abuse her as a child. She learned through creative writing she was able to discover a trauma she hadn’t realised was there, and use the process to help herself heal. Through theatre she was able to show this creative emergence from trauma to audiences.

Bridget works in many roles now – she’s a mother, an actor, a radio presenter, and she creates courses for Collarts. She uses meditation to help her overcome challenges; she was recently diagnosed with genetic breast and ovarian cancer, and she’s found having practised meditation for 20 years has helped her to not feel overwhelmed by her diagnosis.