Rate My Professor Alys Daroy

Dr Alys Daroy is the Academic Chair of Theatre and Creative Production and Lecturer in English and Theatre in the School of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences at Murdoch University on Whadjuk Noongar Country, Western Australia. She holds a PhD awarded jointly by Monash University, Australia, and the University of Warwick, United Kingdom. Daroy's research specializes in environmental humanities and ecological arts, emphasizing Shakespeare ecocriticism, biophilia, adaptation, ecoperformance, and ecoscenography. Her work investigates biophilic design principles to enhance actors' ecological embodiment and audience connections to biodiverse environments. Current projects include creative research methods to address extractive agricultural systems via counter-imaging digital archives and narratives of threatened indigenous carnivorous plant species in south-western Australia.

Alys Daroy's distinguished career spans performance, direction, and academia. As a former actor in the UK and Australia, she performed at the Royal National Theatre and received a Sunday Times Ian Charleson Award Commendation for Yelena in Chekhov's The Wood Demon. Acclaimed reviews highlight her portrayals of Emma Bovary, Ophelia, Anna Karenina, and Queen Margaret. She founded Shakespeare South, Australia's first eco-Shakespeare company, served as Sustainability Consultant at Shakespeare’s Globe, and is an Affiliate Researcher at Gloknos: The Centre for Global Knowledge Systems, University of Cambridge CRASSH. At Murdoch, she has directed Much Ado About Nothing (2023) and provided dramaturgy for The State of Grace (2024). Daroy is a frequent speaker at international conferences, including the World Shakespeare Congress, and was named one of thirteen sustainable performance leaders in Australia’s Culture for Climate Report (2023).

Her scholarly output includes co-authored books Shakespeare, Ecology, and Adaptation: A Practical Guide (Bloomsbury Arden Shakespeare, 2025, with Paul Prescott) and Sydney’s Food Landscapes: Agriculture, Planning, Sustainability (Palgrave Macmillan, 2025, with Joshua Zeunert). Key journal articles comprise ‘From Stanislavsky’s System to Ecosystem: Biophilic Landscape Mapping as a Tool for Actors’ Eco-Embodiment’ (Stanislavski Studies, 2025), ‘Solidarity as Spectacle: Resistance, Resilience and Renewal in the Latvian Song and Dance Celebration’ (RiDE: Research in Drama Education, 2024, with Joshua Zeunert), and ‘I Would Give You Some Violets: Renaissance Collections, Shakespeare and the Troubled Act of Gathering’ (Renaissance Studies, 2022). Notable book chapters are ‘Woke Ecology: How ‘Woke’ is Eco-Shakespeare?’ (Woke Shakespeare, 2024, with Joshua Zeunert) and ‘Waves of Cognition: Towards a Blue Shakespeare Ecocriticism’ (Critical Approaches to the Australian Blue Humanities, 2024, with Joshua Zeunert and Rahul K. Gairola).