It was during Zachary's period of intensive piano training and concertising that he began to write and direct for theatre, beginning first musicals and then broadly across several genres including radio drama (BBC 4), Greek tragedy, Beijing opera, plays, and dance theatre. In the UK, he joined theatre workshops and masterclasses, including with Complicité theatre (Annabel Arden, Marcello Magni, Antonio Gil-Martinez, Toby Jones), Voicemotions (Guy Dartnell), and in playwriting (John Burgess, former Head of New Writing, National Theatre). His original works, which he has written and directed, have been produced at the Pleasance Theatre, Bloomsbury Theatre, Brighton Underbelly, Embassy Theatre, Camden People’s Theatre, several Edinburgh-fringe productions (Fringe-First nominated), and the Junge Hunde festival (Denmark).

He also has over twenty-five years of experience as an MD, most recently Charlotte Jones’ The Diva in Me (Brighton Pavilion Theatre – Argus Angel Award, UK tour). As writer, he has produced three musicals:

Texas Eddy, The Year of the Pig (with Chinese Opera), and The Year of the Pig (Edinburgh; RCSSD). As director, recent productions include Euripides’ Bacchai (Royal Central School of Speech and Drama) and sold out performances of Martin Crimp’s The Country (London Camden Festival). Residing in Australia, his more recent works include Florida, an investigation into the queerness of masculinity, which had a performed reading at La Mama (2016), and AntigoneX (director, writer, producer) at Theatre Works, Midsumma Festival. Other creative developments: Outback Orpheus (with Katy Maudlin) as part of the Co.Lab series at The Malthouse, Melbourne; a Mandarin translation of the musical Sweet Charity, set in Shanghai (with Singapore-based director Rei Poh); a short film script Pathetic  (2021), based on a true story about a musician during COVID lockdown; a book Memoirs of the Meerkat (2022) and currently two feature length film scripts Divo and Being Guy. 

As a performing artist coach he has given master classes in acting through song in London, Santiago, Toronto, New York, and in Australia (Perth, Adelaide, Hobart, and Melbourne).