Aarne started his professional theatre career in 1962, as a dancer in a Christmas pantomime at Melbourne's Tivoli Theatre. 

He has worked mainly as a director and a lecturer in both vocational and academic institutions, throughout Australia and in New Zealand and Singapore.

He has been the Artistic Director of a number of organisations, and has been the recipient of a number of awards and fellowships.

In recent years, he has also turned his hand to television directing.

Aarne has a 30 year history with Rep, having directed a number of plays, from Tom Stoppard's Enter a Free Man in 1983, with Peter Robinson; to most recently, John Doyle's The Pig Iron People in 2011 with Judi Crane and Sam Hannan-Morrow. 

He has also had long term associations with Helen Vaughan-Roberts, Liz St Clair Long, Russell Brown, Jeanette Brown, Mandy Brown, Quentin Mitchell and Joyce Gore, to name but a few.

And he is delighted to rejoin the Rep family once again.

Sam has most recently appeared in Rep’s productions of Calendar Girls directed by Catherine Hill, Speaking in Tongues directed by Ross McGregor, Pride and Prejudice directed by Duncan Ley and Pig Iron People directed by Aarne Neeme.

Sam’s involvement with Rep goes back many years, starting with The Madness of George III and Communicating Doors. In between he has appeared in numerous Rep productions including Arcadia, Life x3 and Moon Over Buffalo.

He has also appeared in various ANU, Free-Rain and Looking Glass productions, as well as last year’s Short and Sweet in The Bret I Haven’t Met by Rep’s own Simon Tolhurst.

Sam has, as always, found it a pleasure to work with the talented people of the Canberra Repertory Society, and a particular pleasure to be working with Aarne again.

For anyone who counts these things this is now Sam’s ninth play since quitting theatre.