One of Canberra’s most flamboyant personalities is about to bid farewell to her adopted home. CityNews arts editor and friend HELEN MUSA salutes Coralie Wood one last time.

Coralie Wood, famous for her flaming red hair and her fluttering fake eyelashes, is also known as the queen of Canberra’s publicists.

And one whose exploits in hosting personalities such as Roy Orbison and Sir Les Patterson have been chronicled in the Ginninderra Press book, Floating in Foyers: Coralie Wood Lashes Out, by Maria Glyn-Daniel.

Wood’s skills as a raconteur are legendary and stories such as the one about accommodating actress Shirley Maclaine and her admirer, the late politician Andrew Peacock, are just some of her prize yarns.

She was also beloved of journalists, always taking care of them royally with hospitality and interview opportunities as if they were part of her brood.

Born Coralie Cohen, she was part of a Russian Jewish family, raised in Melbourne, and schooled at MLC. She trod the boards as a child actor and musician star when she was small, but arrived in Canberra as a housewife married to an RAAF officer in the late 1960s with two young children, Shani and Arron, in tow.

While settling into life as an Air Force wife, Wood quickly made contacts in the Canberra theatre scene and, at age 34, got the role of the redheaded bridesmaid in a production of Jack Hibberd’s play Dimboola. That was the source of her trademark hairdo, styled by hairdresser-to-the-stars Charles Oliver, later a lifelong friend and travelling companion. 

Wood and British-born theatre identity Jim Hutchins, who had played the MC in Dimboola, picked up the show as a commercial proposition, formed the Wood Hutchins Organisation (later Super Flak) and turned it into a cult success.

In 1976, Wood Hutchins was offered an office in the Canberra Theatre Centre by founding director Terry Vaughan, who became her mentor and advised her that the way to program theatre was to “have three good shows then have your wank”.

This was a golden period for Wood, who was taught the ropes by Vaughan. He also introduced her to the movers and shakers in Australian showbiz, most notably to circus and ballet entrepreneur Michael Edgeley, with whose family company she still enjoys a professional role.

While at the theatre centre, she introduced popular lunches featuring guest artists, something she would continue long after she left Canberra Theatre. 

After Vaughan’s retirement, Wood and Hutchins were offered an office in London Circuit as well as the contract to operate the ticketing agency Canberra Bass. 

Wood cemented her place in the community, and still occasionally performed, including at the Queanbeyan School of Arts Cafe, where she played in the autobiographical show, Eyes Wide Shuttered.

But she had other plans in mind. She and actor/theatre agent Kate Peters got together in 1994 to found the Canberra Area Theatre Awards – the CATs – which highlighted amateur theatre productions in Canberra’s immediate region and is still going in 2025.

After Peters left for the Gold Coast, Wood became the undisputed monarch of the CATS which, although never supported by the ACT government, picked up considerable funding under the watch of former deputy premier of NSW John Barilaro.

In 2008 Wood was honoured with a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) for service to the entertainment industry in the ACT. 

In recent years she has experienced a variety of health problems and her capacity to carry out major publicity projects has waned. 

With her extended family living down south she has decided to relocate to a Jewish aged-care facility in Caulfield, Melbourne. She tried it out recently and enjoyed the colourful characters, the good cuisine and the activities, which she reports included “kosher exercise classes”, performed seated. 

As Wood packs out of her Deakin home for a March 19 departure, she’s busy deciding how much of her memorabilia to take with her to Caulfield.

It will be the end of an era for Canberra theatre-lovers but the beginning of a new era of fun for Canberra’s – and Australia’s – most enduring theatre publicist.

As a sign off, Wood says: “I want people in Canberra to know how much they took to me and involved me… it always felt like home here.”

Coralie Wood would be pleased to hear from old friends at her new email, coraliewood1940@gmail.com