Lachlan MacLeod is a Creative Artist based in Melbourne, Victoria.
Lachlan MacLeod is a performer, musician, puppeteer and videographer from Melbourne who has worked as a part of Polyglot Theatre’s core creative team since 2008. In his time with the company, he has performed in the large-scale, interactive Play Space works Tangle, We Built This City, Sticky Maze, Paper Planet, Boats, Bees and Ants; toured to England, Scotland, Ireland, China, Taiwan, Singapore, Japan, Korea, Brazil, Canada and the United States of America, and performed the beloved stage show Muckheap both in the United States of America and across Australia. Most recently, Lachlan has performed in the highly sensory neuro-diverse work When The World Turns at the Lincoln Centre in New York for the Big Umbrella Festival, and toured throughout Australia and to Hong Kong, London and Singapore as Composer and Sound Designer for Pram People.
Lachlan spent much of the pandemic years developing, premiering and touring the live theatre puppet spectacular Bluey’s Big Play around Australia. Starring as Australia’s favourite cartoon dog Bandit, Lachlan worked with Rose Myers from Windmill Theatre to help bring the show from the small screen to the big stage. Continuing the relationship with Windmill Theatre, in 2023 Lachlan toured the hilarious and action packed Hiccup! to audiences throughout America and Australia. In 2022 Lachlan worked with long time collaborator Niow to create The Super Amazing Dolphin Show, a water-fuelled spectacular that has soaked Audiences around Australia. Their second collaboration, Snow Globe, premiered in 2024 at Wyndham Children’s Week Picnic and follows the surreal adventures of Kent Rockwell and Snowflake the Bunny, trapped in a giant snow globe. 2025 saw Lachlan and Niow’s third collaboration, The Wodsworth Annual Dog Revue hit the grass of Glenroy Festival, transforming children and adults alike into owners and dogs in a delightfully silly Best-In-Show spectacular.
Lachlan was previously involved in the development and performance of A Moon Safari By Steam Bicycle (ACMI) with the Academy Award nominated filmmaker Anthony Lucas. Also writing the original score & songs for the production. The following year he also worked as a puppeteer on No Strings Attached – a web-series that uses puppets to narrate real-life disaster interviews. It was screened on iView (Australian Broadcasting Corporation), and NBC Universal in the United States of America. In the 2019 Australian film Judy & Punch Lachlan was brought in to help realise some tricky acrobatics for the lead puppet featured in the film.
Lachlan has written songs for local and international touring theatre productions, produced five full-length original musical-comedy Christmas albums, toured as a musician to the United States of America, Canada, Singapore, Japan and Korea, and had his musical compositions performed at leading Australian venues such as the Sydney Opera House, and Hamer Hall in Melbourne. In his collaborations with Niow Lachlan has created a myriad of songs ranging in style from classical and electronic, to musical theatre and ambient. Lachlan’s original music and sound design for Polyglot Theatre’s Pram People blends together poignant and vibrant sounds with carefully curated voice recordings from local parents, children and carers to create something truly unique and wonderful that has toured to the UK, Singapore and Hong Kong. Whether creating the simulated memories held within a beating heart (Heart), collaborating with classically trained musicians in a tsunami devastated region of Japan (Paper Planet), or capturing the delicate lament of a young girl’s desire to ride a bicycle on the moon (Moon Safari By Steam Bicycle) Lachlan is constantly striving to create beautiful sonic experiences.
In his time with A Blanck Canvas, Lachlan has worked as part of an eight-man puppetry ensemble that brought a five- and-a-half metre puppet to life at the Cricket World Cup under the direction of King Kong director Peter Wilson, brought the iconic dinosaur lollies to life for the Natural Confectionary Company, wowed Melbourne Zoo with a giant Southern Corrobboree Frog and acted as Head Puppeteer for the The White Knight Messenger, a large-scale angel/knight puppet that has been a prominent part of White Night festivities. In 2019 Lachlan puppeteered a giant dancing crab and marine iguana for the premiere performance of The Waterhole, a bringing to life of the beloved Graeme Base picture book at Melbourne Zoo’s Neon Playground, and took the helm of The Guardian, a giant crystal lion, for its world premiere prowling the grounds of the exhibition centre at White Night. In 2024, Lachlan travelled with the team to Ithra Museum in Saudi Arabia to operate The Horse for Founding Day.
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