30 years of love and finally a marriage fit for a theatre

The course of love does not always run smooth, to paraphrase the great bard, but sometimes it’s just meant to be.

Antony McManus and his husband Ron Van Houwelingen have waited 30 long years to be able to marry, and finally they were able to do so on 9 January, 2018 at Melbourne Polytechnic’s David Williamson Theatre, thanks to the passing of the Marriage Amendment Act 2017 on 7 December, 2017.

Antony and Ron met 30 years ago at Prahran Tech, a previous incarnation of Melbourne Polytechnic, while studying VCE Drama.

“It was attraction at first sight,” says Antony. “We clashed in class, we’re both strong-willed, but we were a couple by the September semester break.”

The young couple hitchhiked to Sydney during the break and within that week the attraction had turned to love.

Since then, the two have been inseparable, and have campaigned tirelessly for marriage equality with the Equal Love community, even staging a wedding outside Margaret Court Arena in July 2017 to protest the tennis player’s controversial comments about same-sex marriage.

“I was more optimistic than Ron about whether it would ever happen,” muses Antony. “Six years ago he said ‘This will be the last rally!’ The passing of the legislation was a shock, but a fabulous shock.”

“We are absolutely thrilled to be married in the place we met.” 

We wish Antony and Ron the very best for their married life!

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Melbourne Polytechnic operates across seven campuses and five specialist training centres throughout Melbourne. The institute delivers high quality vocational and higher education in industry-standard facilities.