John Frost AM
Producer
John Frost AM
Producer
John Frost is Australia’s most prolific and successful theatre producer, having produced almost 200 productions around the world. He began his career at age 16 as a dresser on the J.C. Williamson tour of Mame and worked his way up through the ranks. Early productions included Jerry’s Girls and Night Mother. The company moved on to national tours of large-scale musicals such as Big River, The King And I, South Pacific, Hello, Dolly!, The Secret Garden, Smokey Joe’s CafeĢ, Cabaret and Crazy For You. In 1996, the Gordon Frost Organisation’s production of The King and I won the Tony Award for Best Revival of a Musical on Broadway. Two years later, John co-produced Grease – The Arena Spectacular! Then came The Sound of Music and The Man of La Mancha. In 2003, he won his second Tony Award as a co-producer of Hairspray on Broadway. John subsequently co-produced The Producers and presented the Australian tour of The Phantom of the Opera, starring Anthony Warlow and was one of the original producers of Priscilla: Queen of the Desert. In recent years, John produced Australasian tours of Chicago, Doctor Zhivago and Wicked. In Melbourne, he produced A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, starring Geoffrey Rush. In London, he co-produced the West End productions of The Bodyguard and Blithe Spirit, starring Angela Lansbury, while in the US he produced An Act of God, Exit the King and Fiddler on the Roof. In partnership with Opera Australia, he co-produced South Pacific, The King and I, Anything Goes and Evita. In 2015, John toured The Rocky Horror Show, Dirty Dancing and The Sound of Music. Recent productions have included We Will Rock You, Dream Lover,Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, My Fair Lady, directed by Julie Andrews and the Broadway smash The Book of Mormon. Over the years, John has presented many plays including, the Tony Award-winning Art, National Theatre of Great Britain’s celebrated production of An Inspector Calls, Lady Windermere’s Fan starring Vanessa Redgrave, Googie Withers, Joely Richardson and John McCallum at the Theatre Royal Haymarket and Driving Miss Daisy starring Angela Lansbury and James Earl Jones. He was awarded the prestigious J.C. Williamson Award for his outstanding contribution to the Australian live entertainment and performing arts industry at the 2014 Helpmann Awards. For his contribution to the Arts John was awarded an Order of Australia in the 2014 Queen’s Birthday Honours and in 2016 received an honorary doctorate from Griffith University.
