Review: Georgy Girl –The Seekers musical

Georgy Girl –The Seekers musical
Richard East, Dennis Smith, Sue Farrelly
22 December 2015
Her Majesty's Theatre
georgygirlthemusical.com

Georgy Girl –The Seekers musical. Photo by Jeff Busby

The most moving part of Georgy Girl –The Seekers musical is a film of the audience watching The Seekers at Melbourne’s Myer Music Bowl in 1967. There were about 200 000 people, around a tenth of the city’s population and still the most people to ever attend a concert in Australia. The film showed young men without shirts in newspaper hats next to middle-aged women in their Sunday best; all totally in love with a Melbourne-formed folk-pop quartet who had such insane success in the UK that they pushed The Rolling Stones and The Beatles off number one spot in the charts.

It’s easy to let the love of The Seekers and their unmatched sound influence the enjoyment of this new musical, which is lost somewhere between a juke box musical and bio show.
The close harmony of this group is captured perfectly by the music team – Stephen Amos, arrangements; Julian Spink, sound design; the orchestra; and Pippa Grandison (Judith), Phillip Lowe (Keith), Mike McLeish (Bruce) and Glaston Toft (Athol) as the quartet – and their concert numbers feel so close to seeing The Seekers in the 1960s that I’d love to see them perform at the Music Bowl.

But great moments don’t make a great musical and this new work suffers from an underdeveloped book and a confusing tone.

The mixed feelings start with a practical set, that looks like it was made of rejected grey office dividers, clashing with costumes that turn up on the paisley and colour of the grooviest of the late 1960s. They seem part satire and part celebration without settling on either. This is also reflected in the choreography and the direction, which never satirises the group but appears to laugh at the society that made and loved them.

Georgy Girl –The Seekers musical. Photo by Jeff Busby

The book (by Judith’s brother in law) starts with an absolute love of this group and this love may be its downfall. It links facts through a narrator (whose presence makes sense after the interval) or projections, and throws in obvious jokes without ever finding a story or even questioning the image they presented on their album covers.

Facts about record sales aren’t story and this show doesn’t let us see the people behind the success, understand the impact of this success or what it is was about this group that made them so loved. Let alone reflecting on what is it about Australian society today that makes us want to hear and celebrate The Seekers again?

Georgy Girl –The Seekers musical. Photo by Jeff Busby

The limited focus is on Judith and her ongoing “what will I wear?” and “I’m too fat” jokes almost dismiss her skill and talent. There’s so little about the men that they are the one who slept around, the one who rang his mum, and the one who wanted to play Albert Hall.

It almost begs to be compared to the remarkable Melbourne-made Flowerchildren: The Mamas and Papas Story. The recreation of the music was glorious but the show left it’s audience unable to hear that music again without thinking about the people who made it.

Georgy Girl – The Seekers musical left me wanting so much more than the title-song earworm.

This was on AussieTheatre.com.

Review: Shane Warne, the Musical

Shane Warne, the Musical
Arts Centre Melbourne, Adelaide Cabaret Festival
20 June 2013
Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne
to 21 June
artscentremelbourne.com.au

Oh Eddie Perfect! You gorgeous, sexy, magnificent beast. You're as hot as King Kong and if you had a fraction of the resources that developed the magnificent monkey, Shane Warne The Musical could tour Australia for ever – or until Warnie does something else that begged for a new song.

The original 2008 version of Shane Warne the Musical (review) made me kind of love our Shane. He's our ultimate anti-hero who finally realises that acting like a dick leaves you looking like a dick.

The concert version has cut some of the old to make room for the introduction of Liz Hurley – I remember when the tweets started and I didn't believe that Liz Hurley would ever date Warnie – and the new stuff's as great as the old.

The new concert version (only seen at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival and here in Melbourne for two nights) clearly lacks the spectacle of full staging, but continues to prove that this show isn't dependent on anything but its music and writing.

It's hilarious and smart and so full of heart and sass that the only disappointment is its two-night run.

I haven't followed cricket since Kim Hughes was captain, but I know what Warnie gets up to. He's a brilliant choice for a musical hero, and Eddie Perfect wrote (and stars in) a show that celebrates the spin bowler who changed cricket, without denying that he's been a bit of a douche along the way; all the while laughing and totally loving everything about the public and media's obsession with his celebrity.

And having what may be the most gorgeous mass of talent ever is just a bonus. There's Perfect, Shane Jacobson (Kenny), Verity Hunt-Ballard (Mary Poppins), Christie Whelan Browne (A Funny Thing happened...), Rohan Nicol, Mike McLeish (Keating), Jolyon James (Moonshadow), Amy Lehpamer (Margaret Fulton), Andy Conaghan and Lisa McCune (easier to list what she hasn't been in). Throw in tight direction from Simon Phillips and music direction from Iain Grandage (whose conducting leads the enthusiasm and joy) and it's hard to get a better night in a concert hall.

As the last week has been filled with ridiculous fighting over the value of King Kong, Shane Warne, the Musical is an apt reminder that there are you-bloody-beauty musicals made in Australia about Australians and Australia (Keating, Margaret Fulton) that don't need squillions to be created.

And let's not forget the absolute gorgeousness of Flowerchildren by Melbourne's Magnormos that finishes on Sunday! (I don't understand how everyone who sees this show falls in utter love with it, but it's not getting the sold out signs that it so deserves.)

But tonight's all about Warnie. If you missed it in 2008, you have to see it to get what the raves were about, and if you loved it then, you'll love it again.

I'd love to see this show out of expensive velvet concert halls and into town halls and local theatres all over the country. It's an awesome work for us theatre snobs, but it reaches way beyond us. This is a show that blokes come to and get up during the show to get another beer. It happened in 2008 and happened in Hamer Hall last night. Dudes got up during the show and came back with beers to watch their Warnie. I scowled at their lack of theatre etiquette, but I fucking love the intent. Yep, this is a show that can be watched while drinking beer and I now wish that I'd asked them to get me one.

Photos by Meredith O'Shea

MICF review: ... Plus One

MICF 2012
... Plus One
Mike McLeish and Fiona Harris
7 April 2012
Trades Hall
to 22 April
comedyfestival.com.au

... Plus One had me at Hootie & The Blowfish and a navy-blue sleeveless floral wrap top with a subtle frill. Hilariously nostalgic and as zeitgeist capturing as a Facebook Instagram album of mock-polaroids of zeitgeists, its interwoven story of old uni friends in their late 30s, original music and terrific performances makes it like The Big Chill for our generation, but much funnier – and no one lost their junk at war.

Fiona Harris (Skithouse, The Librarians, The Circle etc) and Mike McLeish (Keating, Shane Warne: the Musical etc) play six friends who met at uni in the 90s. This was a time when university still meant being in a nearly-popular band, share houses, unrequited love, plenty of sex, and drinking 'til you spewed.

Fast forward to now. There's a mummy blog, rewarding husbands with TV box sets, smart phone addiction, unrequited love, occasional sex, and vegan or goats cheese hors d'oeuvres at an installation opening. And as one friend wants to celebrate their bonds in art and a song (which deserves its own category at the ARIAs), others wonder if there's anything left to drink to.

As Harris and McLeish (yes, the are real-life spouses) morph between characters, it's easy to forget that there can't be a scene with all six, but smart complex writing and tight direction (Kate McLennan) ensure that there's no disappointment. Melding the observation of stand up, the speed-joke of sketch and the satisfying arc of story, each character is instantly recognisable and if there isn't one who's a bit too close for comfort, you'll recognise your parents or your adult children.

 ... Plus One is a brilliant excuse to get together with some of your old friends, especially if you've only seen them on Facebook in the last few years. It left me snorting-out-loud and looking forward to the next round of nostalgia fashion: 90s floral.