Article by Rick Stoker

Jack Heywood’s first visit to Port Douglas was in 1958 when he was working as an agronomist with the New South Wales Department of Agriculture on a trip to study pasture species in Queensland.  

It was love at first sight: A run-down fishing village straight from the South Pacific stories of R.L. Stevenson.

A career change occurred when Jack won a scholarship to study acting at the newly formed National Institute of Dramatic Art, in Sydney.  

His apprenticeship years covered working in all aspects of theatre which included performing, stage managing, producing and company administering, all in the scenic workshops of the Elizabethan Theatre Trust.  

He toured with companies throughout regional Australia and when they reached Cairns, Jack always grabbed the opportunity to visit Port.

For five years during the 1960s Jack worked throughout England, Europe and North America including Hollywood.  

Returning home, he surfed the East Coast until settling in Noosa where with a partner, he successful started and ran a catering business.  

This financed the leasing, refurbishment and licensing of the then run-down ‘Nautilus Restaurant’ in Port Douglas.

When the partnership dissolved Jack worked as a cook and lived in a driftwood shack at the far end of Fourmile Beach, thereby earning the nickname ‘Driftwood’.

With a volunteer committee he instigated the PlayDay Port Douglas Festivals of 1977-78 and 79.  

These were the forerunners of Carnivale.

Fearing life was passing him by, Jack fled Port to pursue a theatrical career and worked for the Melbourne Theatre Company, PlayBox and the Stage Company of South Australia.

He wrote, directed and performed in the Fringe Theatre in Melbourne and Adelaide, and appeared in popular T/V shows such as ‘Prisoner’ Homicide’ ‘Dusty’ and ‘Dead Man’s Float’ plus historical dramas.  

In that period, Mr Heywood also worked in film. 

After another Melbourne winter, in 1990 Jack settled on the Gold Coast whilst commuting to Brisbane to work with the Queensland Theatre Company and La Boite Theatre.  

Concurrently, at Gold Coast studios he worked on films and American-made T/V shows.

Jack continued to explore new work with fellow actors, in profit-share productions.

A new interest in the visual arts brought him to study at Cairns Tafe. 

The Jute Theatre Company (Cairns’ professional theatre company), employed his talents in five productions and mounted a production of his play ‘Summares’. 

Finally, after 25 years AWOL, Jack’s friends elatedly welcomed him back when he re-found his spiritual home at Fourmile but alas, the driftwood shack was no-more. 

With the assistance of the Queensland Regional Arts Development fund, he wrote and staged local plays for the Clink Theatre.

These included ‘The Sins of Ellen Thompson’ ‘Too Good to be True – the Christopher Skase Musical’ ‘The Amalgamation Play’, and he designed and directed ‘Mano Nera’, ‘Art’ and independently, his play ‘Max and Diane of the Nautilus’.

With Idris Alkamraikai, Jack recently completed a love story set against the background of the Daintree Blockade, called ‘Love in the Treetops’.

He hopes for a production of Love in the Treetops later this year.   

Those of us who are familiar with his work hope this too, and can’t wait to see what next, Jack springs out-of-the Box.