John Kachoyan: Writer and Director

John Kachoyan is a multi-award-winning queer Armenian-Australian screenwriter, director and producer who began his career in the theatre. John was recently selected to take part in Imagine’s Impact Australia 2 with his feature film script, Gaia, which was subsequently optioned by Hoodlum and Gentle Giant Media. In 2022, John won Screenworks AACTA Regional Landscapes Pitch with his feature film, Lands End, co-written with Lou Sanz. His TV series, Ellie Ruins Everything, co-created/written with Lou Sanz, is in development with Orange Entertainment Co and Gambit Media, after launching on the Australian Writer’s Guild’s Pathways Programme. He is developing two genre features with LA-based, Canadian director Jim Morrison IV. As director, John is currently on Film Victoria’s Key Talent Register, completing a Director’s Attachment on The Blake Mysteries for Channel 7/December Media. He studied playwrighting at NIDA and script-editing at AFTRS and has developed projects for Cinespace, Invisible Republic, Gambit Media and Hype Republic.

John’s worked across the USA, UK, Canada and Australia directing, writing and producing over 25 productions since completing his MA at the Royal Central School of Speech & Drama in 2009. Highlights include the Green Room award-winning critically-acclaimed sell-out seasons of Mr Burns, A Post-Electric Play by Anne Washburn, The River by Jez Butterworth, Elegy by Douglas Rintoul and Neverending Storage by Lou Sanz which won the Time Out Critics Choice Award. His own plays You’re Welcome, The Collectors and Just for Me have been produced in New York, Toronto, London and Sydney.

John has previously been the Literary Manager of Australian Plays, Creative Director & CEO of MKA : Theatre of New Writing (winning an Green Room Award for Producing The Trouble With Harry at Melbourne Festival), Director in Residence for Bell Shakespeare and part of the Australian Council’s Emerging Leaders Development Program and originally trained as a journalist.