David Berthold

David Berthold is an Australian theatre and festival director, who has also been artistic director of several major Australian arts organisations.

Early life and education David Berthold was born in Maitland, New South Wales.

He spent some years training as an opera singer, and won the Joan Sutherland Scholarship at the Sydney Opera House..

Career Berthold has been active in theatre since at least 1984, acting and directing.

He has been director of several theatre companies in Australia. He was associate director of Sydney Theatre Company from 1994 to 1999, until 2019.

Since January 2020, Berthold has been artistic director-in-residence at the National Institute of Dramatic Art in Sydney.

Other activities He was on the judging panels of Time Out's 2021 Future Shapers Awards, Nick Enright Prize for Playwriting in 2020/21, and the Sydney Theatre Awards in 2023.

Berthold was a member of the NSW Government's Theatre and Musical Theatre Arts Advisory Board.

he is on the boards of Hothouse Theatre and Australian Plays Transform. He is also a trustee of the Rodney Seaborn Playwrights Award.

Recognition and awards In 2010, Berthold was nominated for a BroadwayWorld UK Award for Best Direction of a Play, for his London West End production Holding the Man.

In 2010, Berthold won a Matilda Award for his "repositioning of La Boite Theatre Company and his direction of Hamlet".

Productions From 1984 until the present (2024), Berthold has assumed the role of actor, adaptor, artistic director, assistant director, director, and co-director on numerous productions, notably with the Sydney, Griffin, La Boite, and Queensland Theatre companies as well as the Australian Theatre for Young People.