Showing posts with label Susie Dee. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Susie Dee. Show all posts

16 December 2021

What Melbourne Loved in 2021, part 5

Eugyeen Teh and Keith Gow are both regulars on SM and supporters of SM. Both talk about how they using the endless time of lock down.

Eugyeene Teh
Designer, sewer, really butch gardner

Man in plaid shirt emerging from the smoke of a burning tree
Eugyeene Teh: always dressed perfectly

What theatre/art/creative experience did you love the most 2021 (or 2020)?

When the severe June storm came with its gale-force winds and ravaged many of the trees around us, I noticed that the root balls that used to support these giant 30-metre tall trees were quite small. Which meant that all the other hundreds, thousands of trees that swayed in the winds, bending rhythmically with one another, stayed firmly in place against all odds. There is a lesson to be learnt from this, and I’ve been trying to figure it out.

When we wrapped up Grey Arias at Malthouse in February 2020, just before bumping into the theatre, I parted ways with the production team with a 'farewell' and 'happy projects'. At that time, nobody knew what those words implied, but in hindsight, the cancellation of live performance also meant dedicated time and space for other things that had perpetually been put aside.

What surprised you about finding new ways to make art in locked-down worlds? 
A vast development in digital works that still had a feeling of 'liveness' to them. I feel that our industry has been pushed to reckon with its own form, so creating exciting synergies with new media. It has also a key tool for us as artists to use to push through to the next era, find new forms to engage with audiences, reconsider our values and let go of staid conventions. Also pleased to see creative new ways to make affecting works with more consideration and less resources.

I loved that Lou Wall subverted everything with her online film Lousical the Musical, not just redefining the form of live performance but got even more personal than we’ve ever experienced with her.  I watched Raina Peterson and Govind Pillai explore bodies through online dance works from shower cubicles to the bush in the form of a blob made from Melbourne Fringe festival guides made redundant by endless lockdowns. Earlier on, I witnessed a very live, riotous, meta-theatrical A Disorganized Zoom Reading of the Script from Contagion with a Melbourne all-star cast playing Kate Winslet, Jude Law, Matt Damon, Marion, Laurence, Gwyneth and beyond. Marcus McKenzie blew my mind with The Crying Room for the Melbourne Arts Centre Take Over!  at home residency by plunging us into the dark minds of the internet, reminiscent of Gaspar Noe’s Enter the Void

Stephen Nicolazzo and the students from Sir Zelman Cohwen School of Music and Performance’s Body Horror at Melbourne Fringe justified the black holes existing in our brains with raw, explosive and incredibly fun imagery channeled from the students’ bloodied bedrooms. Finucane and Smith also brought all the intimacy of live performance to the home screen, via a bathtub that reminded us of the plight of the planet and the melting icebergs in Antartica. Patricia Piccinini’s exhibition, A Miracle Constantly Repeated, the only surviving artwork from RISING festival, pushed through with an outpouring of empathy. And Cheryl Ho and her collaborators summoned memories of my displaced home and family in 落叶归根 (Luò yè guī gēn) Getting Home at Melbourne Fringe.
 
What did you do to stay connected to your arts community?

Apart from steadily working through five solid shows that got cancelled just before bump in, I instigated ways to creatively engage with the community through various forms. Ultimately, they served as a documentation or marker of this very significant time that we are all experiencing.

Less minimalist tasks included co-creating an awards ceremony and hand-crafting its physical awards, (my 71-year-old neighbour helped me chainsaw the wood when my chainsaw was getting fixed) on a voluntary capacity, and making customised masks for anyone who wanted them. They were both ultimately rewarding, though unsustainable, and a great learning curve. As an exercise, I was interested in seeing how much I could create and share, with as little time, resource and energy as possible – a mindset or skill I knew that is essential to take into the next era. One of these is a simple, lateral social media persona I created re-framing some menial activities I was already doing: #gardeningwitheugyeene is ironic glam gardening based on true events.
 
What are you looking forward to in 2022?

I look forward to working creatively in the flesh, the thrill of putting up a show, seeing shows again, and seeing friends, in foyers, and free champagne – all in moderation!

SM: Eugyeene became the co-President (with Sapidah Kian) of Melbourne's Green Room Awards in 2020. His discussion of reconsidering our values and letting go of staid conventions is very relevant (and exciting) here.

I have one of Eugyeene's early masks – I have an original Teh! – and he helped inspire me to start sewing. 400+ masks later, the one I was most proud of was one I made for Eugyeene (from sarong fabric I bought in Kuching). I knew that if I could give one to a master stitcher, my skills were heading in the right direction.

Keith Gow
Playwright, reviewer,  knows that sci-fi is as good as those plays we revere
Very productive in lockdown

Man with beard in Alien t-shirt

What theatre/art/creative experience did you love the most 2021 (or 2020)?
For a year that was strangled by multiple lockdowns in Melbourne, I still got to see some great theatre. Come From Away, which I saw for the second time, felt like the perfect return to big budget musicals after a complete absence in 2020. Sexual Misconduct of the Middle Classes was an excellent well-made play at MTC. The immersive experience of Because the Night was truly memorable because of the excellent design and some searing performances, even if the narrative didn’t quite work. The fact we got a new Patricia Cornelius/Susie Dee collaboration in RUNT was very special. And two shows at La Mama Courthouse from new writers made me excited to see where those writers would go: This Genuine Moment and Cactus.

I also adored the Patricia Piccinini exhibition at Flinders St Station, the only part of the first Rise Festival that survived lockdown.

And Daniel Lammin’s Ink & Paint podcast is a truly wonderful thing that has helped me through both years, prompting me to watch classics I’ve never seen or haven’t seen in years, prompting lots of discussions with friends and loved-ones about Disney animated classics.

What surprised you about finding new ways to make art in locked-down worlds?
Even though one particular show I’ve been working on was bumped from two Melbourne Fringes in a row, I’ve been quite lucky to make a few little things over 2020 and 2021 that have been really satisfying. Some of it has been online and some in the flesh (one show I directed ended up doing both) and it felt like a real privilege to being making work happen during these disastrous years.

Zoom rehearsals were a blessing and a curse. Keeping up momentum was really important, particularly during our most recent lockdown with Fringe 2021 in sight. We’d started rehearsing earlier in the year, thinking we had plenty of time and then the floor disappeared from under us again. But being able to keep in touch with actors and have them learn the text during those months was really satisfying. And allowed us to hit the ground running when Melbourne started to open up again.

I had a short play live-streamed last year. I directed a monologue that was filmed in 2020 and then staged in 2021 – and even though those two mediums have fundamental differences, it was fun to find ways to play the same piece differently.

And that play I’ve been working on for two years, well it’s better now than it would have been had we done it at Fringe 2020. Even better than if we’d done it at Fringe 2021. And luckily we get to stage Shakespeare Aliens at Theatre Works in January; our two years of development was not in vain.
 
What did you do to stay connected to your arts community?
I watched some streaming theatre. I chatted with theatre makers on and off Twitter. And I kept writing and sending things off for feedback and development. I kept making work and it’s probably been the most productive two years I’ve had for a decade. It only took a pandemic…

These two years have taught me what my real priorities would be going forward. I’ll probably be writing less reviews in 2022. I’ll still see lots of theatre but I also hope to keep making more. I wrote a full length play this year that’s the best thing I’ve written, so I want to take time to develop it.
 
What are you looking forward to in 2022?
I’m so excited that La Mama is re-opening  with a festival and I can’t wait to see shows in the newly built recreation of the original theatre space. I can’t wait for Looking for Alibrandi at Malthouse, as well as Stay Woke. MTC has a solid year of brand-new works, though I’m excited to see Fun Home again and I can’t wait to catch up with Cyrano and Sunshine Super Girl after they were delayed. And I want to make it to Sydney to finally see The Picture of Dorian Gray after missing out four times (!) so far. I mean, I literally had four different dates over the last two years and two cancelled flights to see it. I need to make this happen.

SM: Shakespeare Aliens. SHAKESPEARE ALIENS!!!!! I love Aliens. (I love Alien more, but that's a different show.) I've been looking forward to this for a long time and it may take an alien invasion to stop me seeing it in January at Theatre Works.

I've missed talking to Keith after shows. He sees so many shows and is one of the biggest supporters of indie theatre in Melbourne. I look forward to much more talking next year.

04 March 2021

Review: Runt

Runt
Dee/Cornelius/Wilks
2 March 2021
fortyfivedownstairs
to 7 March

Nicci Wilks 'Runt' Photo by Pier Carthew

This is a something special.

05 October 2019

MIAF: Anthem

MELBOURNE INTERNATIONAL ARTS FESTIVAL
Anthem

3 October 2019
Playhouse, Arts Centre Melbourne
to 6 October
www.festival.melbourne

"Anthem". Photo by Pia Johnson

Anthem
is the 20-year follow up to the much celebrated 1988 production of the Melbourne Workers Theatre's Who's Afraid of the Working Class. I didn't see it. I wasn't living in Melbourne and somehow even missed the tour. When I moved to Melbourne, I saw some of the MWT's last productions but still regret missing Who's Afraid. And I miss an arts political culture that supported a company called the Melbourne Workers Theatre (1987–2007). Sometimes we don't realise how important some voices are until they are gone – even if it's nice to not hear so much of Kennett.

The Who's Afraid writers were Andrew Bovell, Patricia Cornelius, Melissa Reeves and Christos Tsiolkas, who have since individually made significant impacts on our theatre and other writing. Each have also written at least one thing that I've loved so much – SO much – that I've asked myself why I haven't loved all of their work.

To see them all writing new work for a main stage in an international arts festival is something to cheer about. Thank you Arts Centre Melbourne.

To re-visit independent theatre 20 years after it was first made, find a way to get the gang back together – including director Susie Dee, who conceived the idea of original work, and composer Irine Vela –, and to offer enough financial support to cast, create and stage a follow up is so positive and exciting that it offers hope in a bleak arts scene. Let's hope it also leads to re-staging some of those Cornelius, Reeves and Bovell plays that only got one run; Tsiolkas is already read by a lot of people.

On a simple level, Anthem asks what we sing about today; hands up if you know your AFL team's song and mumble the words to Australia's national anthem. Like the first play, the four wrote an individual story and these stories are interwoven into a bigger story about the issues that face our city, and world, today.

Their common ground is trains. Trains are a social equalisers in Melbourne with most lines beginning in very far out suburbs and passing through some of our wealthiest suburbs.

"Anthem". Photo by Pia Johnson

Marg Horwell's striking design creates the mood. Her designs consistently get into the heads of the writers and bring their worlds to a visual life that I doubt any writer could imagine until they saw it. It looks like an underground station that reminds me of the old Spencer Street station. But they could be anywhere with functional concrete walls, stairs to the places we don't see and benches that are moved and reconfigured to create the feel of crowded trains while giving the stories as much emotional space as they need.

With a consistently remarkable cast of 14 – bloody Nora, they are good –, Vela's score played live and building the emotional complexity, and Dee's direction that never lets go of the big picture, it's easy to see it as one work, even if the writing voices are different.

Bovell's chorus of commuters makes the ritual of public transport feel mythic and his story of a Myki ticket confrontation leaves it impossible to chose whose side you're on. Cornelius brings the still-too-rare sight of middle aged and ageing women onto the stage. These women should be at the best time of their lives and yet have no way to even imagine a safe, let alone a comfortable, future. Reeve's story of exploitation and unpaid wages becomes a love story that finds joy even when everything else is pretty horrible. And Tsiolkas's continues to create Melbourne characters who are so recognisable that I don't want to see him write a middle-aged arts writer still struggling to rent in the Bayside area.

There's empathy, anger and frustration in these stories but it's hard to know who this show is talking to and what we are laughing at when it's easier to laugh than to despair. We happily cheer a woman singing for coins on a fictional train, but did any of us give $1 to the young woman begging for change on Princes Bridge when we walked back to Flinders Street station to get a train home?

And I didn't even do that; I drove because the Frankston line only runs a twice an hour after 10.00, which correlates to who catches the trains at night (end of the line suburbs) compared to those who catch it during the day (close to the city suburbs). Try relying on trains if you don't have a car, live way beyond the tram zone and don't have an Uber account because you don't have a credit card. Public transport might be an equaliser if it really served the people who need it.

And try talking about class, race and equity during a capital-A Arts festival.

Anthem is a passionate reflection of a city that struggles with its own inequity, even as it sings along to that Courtney Barnett song about having to move to Preston. But there's a degree of political and social writersplaining that takes away from its authenticity; you has me at Northcunt and lost me at nihilism.

These are stories about people who face so many of the barriers explored in this work that they may never see themselves on the stage.

And perhaps that's the point.

Having a large cast means that there are always observers to each story. And while we're following stories, it's being with the observers that create the moments when Anthem spits on our assumptions and forces us to be on the train wondering what we would do if it were us. Or what we didn't do the time it was us. Or when we complained that a train was delayed...

The biggest hope is that this isn't the only production of Anthem. Like its inspiration, it's a work that needs to develop and be seen far wider than a festival audience.

27 December 2017

What Melbourne Loved in 2017, part 11

Because last minute.

Andrew Westle
Finished his Phd
Delving into Dance podcast
Andrew Westle

Favourite moments in 2017
A year that was tarnished by the inauguration of DT (SM: He self-googles; we don't want him here by searching for his name) and the divisiveness of his politics of hate. The same year we saw the expensive and divisive postal vote and the increased focus of gender inequities in the creative industries, alongside the increased reporting of sexual abuse. 2017 is the year that appears to mark a precipice. A call for action; what is the trajectory we have set ourselves?

There were three works that answered the call, all significant departures from the path our political leaders appear to want to take us and complicating the status quo. They have marked me in distinct and significant ways. They have all changed me!

Hannah Gadsby, Nanette.
What the fuck! This was just a phenomenal performance. I was blessed to see the return season. One microphone and one enormous Hamer Hall stage, a stage too often reserved for "high art". A stunning juxtaposition for the critique of high art outlined during the show. Ask Hannah what she thinks of Picasso… and rightly so. The show was perfectly structured and bravely performed. The unresolved tension at the end was palpable. A call for action. I turned to Bec Reid with the knot in my chest as we looked for the words: “WHOW!” What else can be said?

Taylor Mac, A 24-Decade History of Popular Music
24-Decade, like Nanette, was a provocation and a call to action. The audience were implicated as part of the mode of delivery. Generally, I loath audience participation and seek to hide from any invitation to participate. But for a radical faerie realness ritual sacrifice, I was there! The audience participation felt so natural as inclusion as part of the mode of performance and the nature of its creation.

Vote one Taylor for President. The performance models what it would be like if we had a leader that valued the diversity of voices, including queers, women and people of colour.

It was unapologetically queer in its politics. A protest. A celebration. A radical faerie realness ritual sacrifice. It was everything and more. A temporary community that reflected my politics and my love of what and who humans can be.

Jonathan Holloway said to me on the first night that the work would change the city (a huge call, I though at the time). BUT YES! Not a single person couldn’t have been changed. Personally, Taylor gave value to my queer politic in a way that doesn’t often feature in theatre of a generic LGBTIQ nature.

Not a day that has passed without reflection upon Taylor’s show. From slow dancing with strangers to the validation of anonymous cock sucking! Machine Dazzle, Tiger and the whole crew! Incredible!

All the Queens Men, The Coming Back Out Ball
The vision of Tristan Meecham, The Coming Back Out Ball paid homage to our LGBTI Elders. While involved in the ball as the maître d', I can say without bias this was the best night of my life. An artistic intervention based on research that literally changed peoples lives. The project embraced and celebrated our elders, with a room of over 500 people full of love and joy.

I was embraced by a lesbian who was in tears of joy saying, “This is the best night of my life". It is the first time I have been recognised as a lesbian and an elder.” I spoke to a 68-year-old trans woman who used the ball as her post-op debutante. Then there was a couple who were celebrating their 26th Anniversary. This was a truly safe and celebratory space, with a three course meal for all the Elders and amazinging performances from the likes of Robyn Archer, Deborah Cheetham and Toni Lalich.

The Ball embraced everything wonderful about inclusion and community!

Honorable mentions: Attractor at Asia TOPA; Angels in America; Piece for Person and Ghetto Blaster, Nicola Gunn; Do Not Collect $200; Gabrielle Nankivell’s Wildebeest for Sydney Dance Company; All the Sex I've Ever Had; Melanie Lane’s Nightdance; and Wild Bore.

Looking forward to in 2018
In 2018 I will be spending significant time in the UK, so really looking forward to the experience the new and unknown. Seeking works that profile a diversity of voices, the queer, the unique and works that engage their audiences in re-imagining the world we could inhabit.


Cathy Hunt
Director, dramaturg


Cathy Hunt
Favourite moments in 2017
The Happy Prince
Little Ones Theatre, La Mama.  In this almost unbearably delicate production, the series of encounters and gradual entwining of the hopelessly selfish prince even in her compassion and the beautiful reckless generous obliviousness of the roller-skating swallow with his tiny strength which he gives up accidentally. As they began to see each other they disintegrate and that love was devastating.

The Encounter, Complicite, Malthouse. It stopped, shifted and altered time when I was within it, a huge feat and one that made the world sit differently afterwards. Despite the vastly British framing, familiar if effective storytelling tricks to make us trust, a huge interior journey became possible.

Free Admission, Ursula Martinez, Arts Centre Melbourne. Ursula brought in and broke down (by constructing) a wall! She freely admitted through a "Sometimes I..." structure drawing from the free association much that isn’t usually allowed to enter into theatrical or our mental space. Potent, unique and challenging.

Passenger, Footscray Community Arts Centre and Arts Centre. Not so much for what happened on the bus, but for the incremental inroads this work made into the real world beyond. How the uninspiring Docklands we drove through became part of the audience’s imaginative terrain. The pleasure of spotting strange characters, a Clint Eastwood-esque figure on horseback, and the way it shifted our relation to overlooked, ordinary over-developed urban spaces, has stayed with me.

Book of Exodus part 1 and part 2, Fraught Outfit, Theatre Works. Navigated the weight of time, of history, of cultural destiny with first two children then a whole band trying to find their way through the dark desert. From a slow journey through (part 1) a white world of futile foam with discoveries like a gingerbread house through (part 2) into a shadowy black space shining with gold and a lamplike sun in which childhood objects like sleeping bags and scooters alternated with displays of power and detachment that were never held onto too tightly, but slipped through young fingers like uncomprehended ash. The final moment of the babies having a bacchanal, suckling and the deus ex machina descent of Euygeene Teh’s incredible gold-breasted milk-dispensing contraption was unparalleled.

Queen of Wolves, Nick Coyle, Hares and Hyenas. An Act of indomitable mental and imaginative fortitude in which Nick Coyle embodies Frances Glass, a determined governess-type charged to restore a haunted house to a semblance of order. I marvelled as I felt so many things. The Hares and Hyenas wallpaper became the peeling veneer of a cobwebby mansion. The cello-playing frenzy and channelling of a louche Southern former mistress of the house was unfathomably funny. A seriously glorious work of theatre with crazy high production values. Must see! Crying out for another season.

Merciless Gods, Little Ones Theatre, Darebin Speakeasy. This work transported me into the dark subterranean places of our unbridled uncensored feelings and was so intense and violent in parts, yet terribly tender in others. The drive to display and dramatise what surges underneath even apparently ordinary moments and relationships masquerading as familial, the unabashed blatancy of the project and its incredible realisation by the ensemble and the whole team made for compelling theatre. The palette of reds and the spatial design like a tongue sticking out between the seating banks seemed like the only possible setting for this act of collective calling up of the spirit of a whole decade.

One of the Good Ones, Cope St Indigenous Arts Collective, Metanoia. I delighted in this ambivalently nostalgic retro-ridiculous offering with a set made from outmoded technology, that asked the audience to read the work on multiple levels. With their child self believing a hairdryer was a blaster, with their adult self who was nostalgic for the time when it was possible to believe a hairdryer was a blaster and with their current self noticing colonial triggers (such as music from the bicentennial) while being made aware of the racist tropes invoked (like "one of the good ones"). Smart writing and hilarious performances. By setting this struggle in space, in the future, the audience drew their own parallels about Aboriginal heroism in the struggle for sovereignty in a hostile (solar) system.

The Chairs,  Jenny Kemp, designed by Dale Ferguson, La Mama. Like dwelling at the bottom of the sea, living in a lighthouse, being part of an elaborate ritual in which a couple attempt to work out how to extricate themselves from life, re-capture and experience each other’s affection, by instituting space between them, in preparation for saying goodbye to everything. That moment of Jillian Murray and Robert Meldrum progressing up separate staircases nearly obliterated me. Unbearably powerful!

Ash Flanders is Nothing,  Hares and Hyenas. Kaleidoscopic collision nigh impossible to encapsulate. A bit like dwelling within a cabana made of Muriel’s Wedding, your childhood sense of The Neverending Story as tragedy and a reflux-like experiencing of Ash Flanders’/one’s own less than ideal life. All generously given to you on a slightly chipped but really lavish platter with full flourish. Consummate performance by an ascerbically insightful marvel making a Christmas sacrifice of his own bravado for your delight.

Looking forward to in 2018
Good Muslim Boy, Melancholia, Blasted (Australian premiere!) at Malthouse, and the return of Belarus Free Theatre.

The Nightingale and the Rose by Little Ones and Dybbuks by Samara Hersch and Chambermade - both at Theatreworks

Hungry Ghosts by Jean Tong at MTC and much much more on and off stages.


Yvonne Virsik
Director
Artsistic Director, MUST


Yvonne Virsik

Favourite moments in 2017

Susie Dee and Nicci Wilks doing their best to adjust to a sudden (devlishly angular) rainstorm during a performance of Caravan – adjusting their caravan/set, trying to stay in character but not– gloriously entertainingly live.

Brilliant, hilarious and insightful women taking about where we are at in The Festival of Questions,  especially "The Handmaid's Tale WTF",  Wheeler Centre, Melbourne Festival.

Bizarrely serendipitous programming one night at The MUST Cabaret Festival: a dramatic duet of "Total Eclipse of the Heart" performed in German followed a few minutes later by an equally dramatic solo version in Russian, then the hosts joining in with their English version and...

Great sport Tim enduring black goo poured over his head again and again in pursuit of the "great promo shot" for Frankensteinxx at MUST.

The razor-sharp choreographic flourishes in How to Kill the Queen of Pop, Hotel Now.

Turning around suddenly in response to the 360 degree soundscape of The Encounter at Malthouse.

The moments of humble, shared humanity between those on the stage, those in the audience and those on and off in All the Sex I've Ever Had, Melbourne Festival.

People's unreserved joy at experiencing Taylor Mac, of whom I only got a little first hand, but an enormous amount vicariously.

The incredibly dramatic, fiery, epic-action-movie-like scene changes in MTC's Macbeth.

The wondrous final image of Angels in America Part 1: the inventive canvas-curtained set dropped down to reveal a beautifully glowing hand-painted stained glass effect.

The stunning images of Exodus, Part I and Part II, Fraught Outfit at Theatre Works.

Glimpses of Joan, just caught by light, The Rabble at Theatre Works.

The focused fleeting images of In Plan, Melbourne Festival.

The Nose in The Nose, Bloomshed at Melbourne  Fringe.

Some surprises:
The shifts in tone in Hannah Gadsby's Nanette and Kaitlyn Rogers's Can I Get an Amen. They both totally succeeded in keeping us with them, through all their heart wrenching terrain. (Ok, so by the time I saw Nanette, it wasn't a surprise, but the power of the experience of was.)

Realising it wasn't just a genius marketing ploy in Wild Bore at Malthouse.

Realising it wasn't just my niece enjoying As You Like It at the Pop Up Globe from The Groundlings area.

The sometimes jarring, sometimes fluid relationship between movement and text in Nicola Gun's incredible work Piece for Person and Ghetto Blaster.

Discoveries – why have some of these taken me so long?
Trygve Wakenshaw in Nautilus – A fluid rubbery joy.
The Travelling Sisters – looking forward to more.
Rama Nichols – she's just so good.
Seeing Joe Fisher juggle for the first time at The MUST Cabaret Festival–  not a form I generally go crazy over, but the electric tension he brings to his performances is something else.

Show I loved (but, as always, there are so many):
Angels in America at fortyfivedownstairs, directed by Gary Abrahams I think has affected me the most. I've always loved the texts but what a privilege to experience them brought to life with such theatrical ingenuity, extraordinary performances and searing humanity. One of my favourite moments of the whole year is returning for Part Two, scanning the audience and catching the eyes of familiar faces from the night before, full of excitement at continuing our epic journey together.

What I'm looking forward to in 2018
Melancholia at Malthouse. The film has stayed just under my skin since I saw it and I've always thought it would make a fascinating piece of theatre. With Declan Greene and Matt Lutton as creators, I tingle at the possibilities.

I only saw a bit of Taylor Mac, but will be keeping an eye out for judy's work all over the world. Determined to also check Mac out as a playwright, I bought a copy of Hir afterwards and am now looking forward to Daniel Clarke's Production at Red Stitch very soon.

Generally, I'm looking forward to more surprises, more diversity in programming and in the breadth of artists engaged, which does seem to be growing. Bring on the surprises, the discoveries and the sheer theatrical joy!


part 10
part 9
part 8
part 7
part 6
part 5
part 4
part 3
part 2
part 1
2016
2014
2013
2012



28 November 2017

What Melbourne Loved in 2017, part 5

Part 5 is brought to us by Sam and Matilda from Lab Kelpie because they have the best headshots.





Lyall Brooks
Actor
Artistic Director, Lab Kelpie 


Lyall Brooks
Favourite moments in 2017
The short answer is “new Australian writing”. Whether it was a production, a development or reading, or just a script – the breadth and quality and incisiveness and timeliness of the local voices I experienced this year blew me away.

The production of Kim Ho’s Mirror’s Edge, directed by Petra Kalive and performed with buckets of talent and passion by a bunch of Melbourne Uni students, was phenomenal. A brave expanse of ideas that crossed eras and skimmed its perfectly formed text across both a figurative pond of magical realism – and a literal onstage lake. It warmed my heart and poked my brain and made me cheer.

I also loved the silliness and charm of the only Melbourne Fringe show I was in town for, The Lounge Room Confabulator’s Survival Party. With my favourite dog on my right and my favourite cat lady on my left*, I laughed myself a damn headache for over an hour of what was basically a microcosm of Fringe: raw, sometimes-miss-but-mostly-hit, form-pushing and joyous theatre.

I got to glimpse a lot of unproduced work this year, too. Scripts by Emilie Collyer, Emina Ashman, Dianne Stubbings and Katy Warner (among others) all excited me – and Lonely Company’s brilliant Beta Fest: Theatre in Various States of Undress was an inspiring exhibition of new works currently under construction, and Lonely Company deserve a HUGE huzzah for making it happen.

[Self Promotion #1…] Personally, being a part of Patricia Cornelius’s Big Heart this year, as Theatre Works Associate Artist and the luckiest assistant director alive to work and learn under Susie Dee, was also one of my favourite moments (if a moment can still be spread over the months-long process). It was a big, brave work with both a beautiful team and relentless challenges, and I learned so much being on the other side of the table for once.

I could bang on for pages about what I loved this year, but I’ll stop.

No, sorry, one more thing.

Even though they weren’t in Melbourne, some of the theatre Adam and I saw overseas in 2017 (Small Town Boy by Maxim Gorki and Situation Rooms by Rimini Protokoll in Berlin, Cheese by Java Dance Theatre in New Zealand) and interstate (Bitch: The Origin of the Female Species by Edith Podesta at Brisbane Festival) made us stupidly excited about the potential of the form back home.

Looking forward to in 2018
The general answer is the same: New Australian stuff. Patricia’s long overdue mainstage debut, The House of Bernada Alba, finally catching Picnic at Hanging Rock at Malthouse, Jean Tong’s Hungry Ghosts, and all the vibrant indie stuff Melbourne does so freeking well.

[Self Promotion #2…] Lab Kelpie has a massive 2018 ahead with two new major works: Petra Kalive’s Oil Babies and the Victorian premiere of Mary Anne Butler’s Broken, on top of three or four shows in development and a national tour of A Prudent Man. This is only partly a plug! I genuinely am so looking forward to a MAD year presenting and developing new projects and working on building new avenues of support for our local theatre writers.

SM: There were Lyall's undies and his snot – and the rest of Spencer. But I'm going for his Frank in Merrily We Roll Along. And Sam.  I haven't met Matilda.

* I know who it is.

Keith Gow
Playwright, reviewer

Keith Gow

Favourite moments in 2017
Wild Bore was an absolute marvel of satire and craft and pure theatrical madness. I laughed so much it hurt, and then it gave me so much to think about in regard to theatre criticism and the conversation between critic and artist. Whenever I’ve written a review since, I’ve interrogated my point of view more and tried even harder to dig in to what the artist was striving for, whether it worked for me or not. I’m so thrilled this show has travelled far and wide this year.

Nanette was so simple and so powerful and would have always been so, but in the year of the marriage equality survey, it had so much resonance throughout the community. Stand-up comedy can be so immediate and respond to politics and society in a way traditional forms of theatre cannot because of its lengthy development process. This, though, is the culmination of Hannah Gadsby’s stand-up career; a show she has been writing and not writing for her whole career. Astonishing and brave and remarkable. And, as with Wild Bore, I’m glad this show has toured all over the place.

Looking forward to in 2018
I’m looking forward to Stephen Nicolazzo and Eugyeene Teh and Katie Sfetkidis being let loose at MTC for Abigail’s Party. I’m excited for The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime, also at MTC. The Malthouse line-up looks thrilling from beginning to end, but I am hanging out for Melancholia, Blackie Blackie Brown and the shows from Belarus Free Theatre.

Outside the main stages, I want to see Strangers in Between at Midsumma, directed by Daniel Lammin. And whatever is happening at Theatre Works, which had a really great 2017.

SM: Keith is a writer who sees and supports a LOT of independent theatre. I read his reviews and they often influence my choice to see a work, especially if it's new writing.

Tom Middleditch
Playwright, director

Tom Middleditch

Favourite moments in 2017
Awakening, remounting  MUST's season last year. It's rare to find a work that speaks for teenagers across the ages, corrects the faults of the original text while making the heart of said original stand strong. Vibrant, unapologetic, necessary, it's the sort of work that reminds you what we were really in danger of in the teen years, and fondly remembers those who didn't get to tell the tale themselves.

Germinal, as part of the Melbourne Festival. As a lover of Absurdism and anything involving the universe, I was sold from the blurb alone. What I wasn't expecting was the most joyful experience in theatre I've had in years. It collects its silly moments like the grandest and most adorably astute Absurdist on the open mic and climaxes, making not so much a point but a celebration of the stuff that just happened. Also, the joy of seeing a group of actors take to the Malthouse stage with pickaxes and ramming trees through the stage had me giggling for a good long time.

Looking forward to in 2018
Top of the list is The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime (which is here years before I expected), telling a neurodiverse story that will be the genre and pop culture reference point for those on the spectrum for years to come, and on which all evolution towards acceptance and empathy will sprout from.

I'm also pumped for Jean Tong's Hungry Ghosts at the MTC. Seeing our generation of theatre makers and playwrights get the main stage attention they deserve is vindicating, and after catching their work in the Poppy Seed festival, Jean is one of the voices I want front and centre of this new wave.

SM: Tom's Alexithymia recently premiered at the Poppy Seed Festival. Full of heart and understanding, and I really hope it gets the chance for some development and another season. So much of power of theatre is seeing the world through different eyes;  writes neurodiverse characters and stories that remind us that we all see and understand the world differently.

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20 November 2017

What Melbourne Loved in 2017, part 1

Sometime after the comedy festival, I stopped writing the list of shows I'd seen; I regret that. But it's been a quiet year for me; at best count I'm at around 160 shows so far. No doubt that this series is going to remind of some of the amazing ones and make me regret missing at least another 160.

Remember that everyone is welcome to contribute and that the best way to hear from an artist that you love is to ask them to get writing.

Stephen Nicolazzo 
Director
Little Ones Theatre

Stephen Nicolazzo

Favourite moments in 2017
My favourite moment of Melbourne theatre in 2017 was the breathtaking opening segment of The Rabble's Joan. The light, sound and bodies gloriously choreographed – it was thrilling, completely alive and completely made on its own terms. All that followed it, too, was stupendous. Each visual sequence an example of sumptuous, elegant and inspiring theatrical practice.

Also adored Fraught Outfit’s The Book of Exodus Part 1; Malthouse Theatre’s The Real and Imagined History of The Elephant Man; Lucy Guerin’s Split, Susie Dee, Patricia Cornelius etc's Caravan; Melanie Lane’s Nightdance; Tangi Wai as part of Dance Massive; Fringe Wives Club’s Gliitery Clittery; and the emotional and vulnerable ride that was All The Sex I’ve Ever Had as part of Melbourne Festival.

Standout theatre moment of the year, though, happened at Dark Mofo when I finally got to see The Second Woman by Nat Randall. Fuck. That is just the best piece of theatre I think I have ever experienced. Truly brilliant and addictive.

Looking forward to in 2018
I am desperately excited to see Patricia Cornelius’s House of Bernarda Alba at MTC and everything and anything that plays at Theatre Works and Arts House in 2018.

SM: It's been an amazing year for Little Ones Theatre with The Happy Prince, The Moors (as part of the Red Stitch season), and Merciless Gods (which has sold out it's current Sydney season and become the highest-selling Griffin indie show!). Find the artists who see the world like you do and the ones who will challenge you, make the work you want to make, don't listen to the voices that don't get it, and you will find an audience who love you and share your vision of the world. I loved all three Little Ones shows this year, but The Happy Prince at La Mama, with it's tiny proscenium and roller skates, was my favourite favourite. I can't wait for Abigail's Party at MTC next year.

I also saw The Scarlet Pimpernel by the all-female Takarazuka Revue in Tokyo because I knew they were Stephen's favourite company. It was totally sold out and I missed out on returns. Then a women who didn't speak English gave me a ticket and she will be getting theatre karma for ever because I am so grateful that I saw this incredible company. It was like being in his head. I still don't know if it was the queerest or the straightest piece of theatre I've seen, and I would go back to Japan for 24 hours just to see them again.


Tim Byrne
Critic, writer, interviewer

Tim Byrne

Favourite moments in 2017
I missed some heavy hitters this year – was overseas during the festival and I know, Taylor Yakkity Mac, shut up already! – but my favourite moment in a Melbourne theatre was the two nights I spent at fortyfivedownstairs being pounded and broken and remade by the glorious ensemble of Gary Abrahams’s production of Angels in America. It was sublime and searing and reminded me of where I’d been as a gay man on the fringes of our own destruction, back in that dark time we old people like to call the ’90s.

Looking forward to in 2018
The thing I most look forward to next year is any work by director Stephen Nicolazzo. He’s finally getting a gig on MTC’s main stage, and I suspect we will only see more and more from this extremely talented man. I adored his The Moors for Red Stitch, was impressed but not as moved as everyone else by his Merciless Gods, and cannot wait for him to direct for Opera Australia in the near future. He has Barrie Kosky’s brazenness but his aesthetic is far more sophisticated and nuanced. As long as he takes his spirit animal along with him – designer extraordinaire Eugyeene Teh – he can’t fail to impress.

SM: Every disagreement Tim and I have about a show is a favourite moment. If you don't read all of Tim's reviews in Time Out, you're missing out on some of the best critical writing around.

Sayraphim Lothian
Craftivist

Sayraphim Lothian
Favourite moments in 2017
In a way, this was a bad and excellent year for art for me. I'm not sure I went to see anything this year ... apart from one of my fabourite bands doing a caberet on one of my favourite topics. Idiot Magnet did The Big Book of Conspiracies at Fringe and I was there every night to see it and I fricken LOVED it. Disclaimer: I may be married to one of them.

But apart from that, I've had my head down working all year and recovering from an exhausting year last year. And then when things started to clear, the Marriage Equality postal nonsence was looming and I spent time doing and sharing the hell out of the YES side and their awesome, creative activism.

And then i got a book deal. HOLY GODS I GOT A BOOK DEAL to write about Craftivism and Creative Resistance. (It's called Guerrilla Kindness and Other Acts of Creative Resistance – Making the World a Better Place Through Craftivism and it's out in April! EEEEE!!) So I slowed everything else to work on that.

So I saw the inside of my house a lot. I stared at my computer screen and sewing machine a lot. I researched a bunch of amazing activism from around the world a lot. And I made a bunch of cool stuff and wrote a lot of words.

I'm sorry Melbs Art Scene, I didn't see you much this year. But I'll be back next year, I promise.

SM: Sayra thought that she hadn't seen enough this year to take part, but she inspired me so much this year that I didn't give her a choice. I spent a lot of time channeling frustration and anger and ultimately a lot of love into yarn this year. There were #pussyhats in the first half of the year and then came #QueerGrannySquares. I've had so much joy from seeing these out in the world.

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20 October 2017

MELBOURNE FESTIVAL: Caravan

MELBOURNE FESTIVAL 2017
Caravan
Malthouse Theatre, Melbourne Festival
14 October 2017
Malthouse Forecourt
to 22 October
www.festival.melbourne/2017

Susie Dee & Nicci Wilks. Photo by Tim Grey

Caravan is ready to hitch itself to the nearest tow-bar and visit festivals around the world, but it's not worth waiting to see if it finds a park at the Malthouse again.

Judy (Susie Dee) and her daughter Donna (Nicci Wilks) live in a caravan. They've stayed in places with views of power lines and bins but home is home and there's hope for 30-something Donna to get an ending that's happier than the ones she gives her Tinder dates. And hope for an ending that isn't her being as happy as Judy is – Judy sees the positive – about spending her last night on earth (again) in the same caravan.

With a bitterly dark humour and fearlessly hilarious performances, their clownish extremes are initially very easy to watch, but clowns are holders of truth. The mother–daughter relationship becomes more uncomfortable – and personal – as it explores the complications of assumed love. There's always love, and the expectation of love, but competitiveness and resentment can distort love and leave it unrecognisable, even when it's as tender as the liver Donna fries up for dinner or as obvious as the enlarged liver that Judy is so very proud of.

Written by Angus Cerini, Patricia Cornelius, Wayne Macauley and Melissa Reeves – srsly, what a team – and co-created by Dee and Wilks, it's development began with four scripts about body organs in a caravan in a Collingwood carpark – when it was 40 degrees.

Outside in the Malthouse Forecourt, it's still October-chilly at night but op shop blankets ensure that the audience are cosy while looking into the too-cosy-for-comfort van.

Their new view of Melbourne still feels like the outer suburbs in the new van that's been re-fitted and designed by Marg Horwell. Starting with a 1970s orange bedspread that's so loud it might start a new retro bedspread trend, every original fitting is filled with details from medications to toy horses, and secrets are hidden in every storage nook and cranny.

While the individual contributions are felt, none outshine the other and create a consistent voice that's been developed by years of artistic collaboration and friendship. Book a blankie now because some of the last shows have booked out.

06 August 2017

Review: Looking Glass

Looking Glass
New Working Group
3 August 2017
fortyfivedownstairs
to 13 August
fortyfivedownstairs.com


Peter Houghton Daniella Farinacci. Looking Glass. Photo by Pier Carthew

One of the many things I love about Louris van de Geer's writing is that she forces her audience question everything they see on the stage, and that any story chosen by the audience can be far from from what the playwright and creators intended.

He new work Looking Glass is presented by the New Working Group, a network of 11 independent Melbourne writers, directors and designers, and received development funding from the Australia Council, Creative Victoria and the Angior Family Foundation.

Marcus (Daniel O'Neill, who alternates with Thomas Taylor) is about nine; a time when you're not a child or a teenager and are testing independence and the limits of family love. One day he lies face down on the floor and won't get up. His parents (Daniela Farinacci and Peter Houghton) turn to outside help in the form of tall and mysterious Josh Price, who could be the doctor trying to save them, every person they meet or everyone they wish they met.

It can be seen as a standard family-psychology story – van de Geer is inspired by Charles Cooley's 1902  looking glass theory about how we develop our sense of self based on how we see ourselves reflected through others – but nothing about this production is that simple.

The story is grounded by director Susie Dee creating a strong familial connection with the family. There's a genuine warmth between the characters and the audience, even if they are struggling to find that warmth or connection, or the reflection of it, in their lives.

The counterpoint to this familiarity is the design by Kate Davis (set and costume) and Amelia Lever-Davidson (lighting) that never lets know where we are. A white floor is boxed in by heavy yellow plastic curtains – somewhere between sunshine and urine yellow – that define a room but don't fully conceal what's going on outside it' walls and allow anyone to enter or exit from any spot. The colours and mood change from a clinical clean whiteness, which could be hospital or prison, to underground dark black and reds that change any idea of yellow. It could a family home as easily as a dystopian future, an afterlife, a dream or anything we want, or need, to see reflected on the stage.

I chose my narrative early on and it worked for me – I thought the child was dead or had never been born – but there are many other interpretations of the story that are as logical and obvious.

Looking Glass is complex and fascinating theatre because it holds onto its answers tightly while creating the connection and emotion that begs for answers.

14 December 2016

What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 10

Remember that you don't have to write a lot – a sentence can say as much as an essay – and that your reflections, memories and wishes don't have to be about a specific show or performance. It could be an overheard comment in an interval, a thought the next day or anything that gave you that jolt that says "this is why we do this".



Maxim Boon
arts writer, reviewer


Maxim Boon

MB's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Doing a (not so) little audit of all the bloody wonderful things I've had the good fortune to see this year has been a real tonic. 2016 is a year many people will be happy to see the back of, myself included, but this exercise has definitely added a silver lining to the big, black, intolerant, fact-free clouds that the past 12 months have stirred up.

Witling down a list of favourites has been hard, so forgive the indulgence of citing so many top moments.

As I’ve scanned my memory for the shows that touched me the most this year, one stands head and shoulders above the rest: Wit at fortyfivedownstairs. Margaret Edson's Pulitzer-worthy text about an academic dying of cancer is, of course, an excellent springboard, but the triumph of the Artisan Collective’s production is predominantly thanks to the utterly transcendent performance of Jane Montgomery Griffiths. Words feel inadequate to properly summarise the power of that extraordinary night of theatre, but suffice to say, I have rarely felt as profoundly altered as I did walking out after this show. I was with my husband Toby and as we stepped out onto Flinders Street, neither one of us could talk,because we knew if either of us uttered a single syllable we would both have broken and unravelled. We hugged for a minute or two and summoned an Uber. Even thinking about it now is pushing me dangerously close to sobbing onto my keyboard. Jane, if you ever happen to read this, I cannot thank you enough.

I’m a passionate believer that Indigenous narratives must be a vital presence in our theatres, as it brings First Nation stories into an environment that is largely skewed white and socioeconomically privileged. Three shows this year were particularly striking for the way in which they galvanised the duality of the contemporary Indigenous experience, which simultaneously reacts to the zeitgeist while anchored to historical injustice. Ilbijerri Theatre's presentation of Jacob Boehme’s frank yet affirming exploration of being black, gay and HIV-positive in Australia, Blood On The Dance Floor, offered a view of Aboriginal life that is rarely seen, articulated in a way that was powerfully and beautifully realised. Nakkiah Lui’s Blaque Showgirls and hip-hop cabaret Hot Brown Honey both told defiant and gloriously shameless stories of what it means to be a woman of colour in a society that still clings to colonial ideals.

On the smallest scale, some great solo shows graced Melbourne's stages this year. Lab Kelpie's production of Douglas Rintoul's Elegy, based on interviews of gay men living in insurgency held Iraq, was not only a slick and resourceful staging (especially the excellent sound design by Russell Goldsmith), but also a potently affecting performance by Nick Simpson-Deeks; I left feeling shaken and ashamed and enlightened. The always masterful Susie Dee’s production of Harry Melling's Peddling, featuring an astonishingly committed performance by Darcy Brown, was a gut-punch of a show; superb storytelling executed fearlessly. Brilliant Brit playwright Duncan Macmillan’s Every Brilliant Thing, co-written and performed by Jonny Donahoe, made me laugh all the way through and sob all the way home, the kind of production that busts you open with that bittersweet joyful sorrow that only theatre can tap.

Feminist theatre, another area of the art form I feel passionately protective of, also enjoyed some excellent turns this year. Nic Green and Laura Bradshaw's Trilogy, offered probing, eccentric, gloriously irascible and occasionally naked perspectives on feminist philosophies in a show that is as potent and relevant today as it was when the pair first staged it ten years ago. Patricia Cornelius’s Shit, revived at fortyfivedownstairs following its sold-out debut season, was a brutal, bold, touching, confronting and thought provoking instigation. That Cornelius's work is so rarely recognised by Australia's major state theatre companies is, for lack of better words, fucking maddening.

Finally, this year’s Poppy Seed Theatre Festival showed why emerging theatre-makers must be championed in a space where they can flex their creative muscles, make mistakes, try things out and hone their craft. From this year’s excellent quartet of works, Three Birds Theatre's LadyCake and Riot Stage's F. were impressively accomplished in their thinking and execution, despite being fledgling works made on shoestring budgets.

Honourable Mentions

Paul Capsis in Resident Alien: a superbly observed study of Quentin while retaining the ineffable fabulousness of Capsis.
Belarus Free Theatre, Burning Doors: a model for any and all political theatre-makers.
Dance North, If____Was____ :  a nifty concept with genuinely breathtaking results.
Malthouse Theatre, Picnic At Hanging Rock: Matt Lutton may not always be the theatre-maker we want, but he is definitely the theatre-maker we need.
Vic Theatre Company, 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee: face-aching grins guaranteed.
NTS/Melbourne Festival, Our Ladies Of Perpetual Succour: Cum-filled submarine; need I say more?

PS: Maxim forgot this one.
On the smallest scale, some great solo shows graced Melbourne’s stages this year. Leading the pack was the world premiere season of Katy Warner’s incisively observed A Prudent Man, at the Melbourne Fringe Festival. Featuring a faultless Lyall Brooks as a right-wing politician negotiating a public scandal, both the writing and the performance were nothing short of forensic in capturing this political archetype with such pin-sharp accuracy.

What MB is looking forward to in 2017: Malthouse Theatre's 2017 season makes me feel physically giddy. It's innovative, it's unapologetic in its motives, it's bolshy and it's proudly nonconformist. While MTC cements its reputation as the most cynically pandering presenter in Victoria, Malthouse continues to ensure Melbourne's more discerning theatre lovers are sated. I am especially excited about Lutton's new adaptation of The Elephant Man, as I am, to be blunt, a big ol' Matt Lutton fan boy and have adored both adaptations from this year’' season.

Fortyfivedownstairs will also present plenty to get excited about next season, especially Trainspotting Live and Ben Gerrard in I Am My Own Wife, both early on in the year.

SM: Reviewers often deal with restricted word counts, so it's nice to write as much has you want. And Maxim generally writes longer reviewers that are detailed discussion rather than a pull quote and star rating. This great discussion reminded me of a few brilliant shows that I saw but didn't review and made me regret missing a couple more.

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09 December 2016

What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 7

Today we here from Penny Harpham from She Said Theatre, Morgan Rose – whose show F.  runs until 11 December – and Kerith Manderson-Galvin – whose show 186,000 runs until 17 December.

Morgan Rose
playwright


Morgan Rose

MR's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: This is easy. Conviction (Zoey Dawson and Declan Greene and, holy shit, Ruby Hughes). All the way. Made me feel every feeling there is: fear, joy, disgust, anger, jealousy, confusion, awe ... and more. It made some people uncomfortable because she writes about herself (which we all do, but she doesn't try to keep it a secret); isn't that just a really hilarious thing for people to be upset about? I say keep doing it until their heads bust open.

Incomparably different, but equally as moving was Nic Green's Trilogy at Artshouse. I wept, and I'm not a weeper. I don't know what I was feeling, I'd never felt it before, it doesn't have a name, but it was uncontainable. Seeing a bunch of women, naked, beautiful, unphotoshopped, dancing, and proud in their skin was like seeing the truth for the first time ever. Hmmmm...maybe that new unnamable feeling was just the absence of shame.

Oh! I also say Mammalian Diving Reflex's All the Sex I Ever Had at the Sydney Festival last January; it was probably in my top-three shows ever. A group of seniors sat at a table on stage and told us their entire sex lives, year by year starting at birth. It made me want to never write a play again because people talking unscripted about real things is so much better than anything any playwright could dream up.

What MR is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again. at Malthouse. Stephen Nicolazzo's direction of The Moors at Red Stitch.  She Said's Fallen (although we will all have to travel to NSW see it).

SM: I saw F. on Wednesday night (the last show of the Poppyseed Festival). Morgan wrote it in conjunction with a cast of amazing young people. It's a chance to get into teenagers heads and see the world from their points of view. Some parts of being a young adult today still scare me, but overall this work made me remember that young adults are pretty good at navigating and negotiating the world they live in and it left me feeing positive about a future that's going to be shaped by these people. It finishes on December 11.

Kerith Mandseron-Galvin
playwright


Kerith Manderson-Glavin. Photo by Cam Matheson "who captures me in photos the way I see myself"

KMG's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Church at Melbourne Fringe. All of it, but, particularly, crying with absolute joy and for one small moment freedom while singing “Natural Woman” with the Divine Femme Choir. That night I felt community and hope.

Luke Devine’s Work Bitch at Hot Hot Hot. It should be put on again and everything Luke has written should be published and put in your letter boxes. It’s nice to get mail from time to time.

DJ Donna Quixote, aka me, djing at Blue Room’s Silent Disco at Perth Fringe. Watching everyone change their silent discos away from my channel and the few that remained dance in a frenzy.

James Chance, oh my goodness, James Chance. I mean he was really, very good. Feeling like I understood music or it understood me.

The time Loretta Miller of Jazz Party removed an item of clothing at a gig and it was pure theatre. Also her costume change at the Rock and Roll Graveyard single launch.

Casey Jenkin's Programmed to Reproduce at FOLA was hard and necessary and sad and so smart and meticulous and beautiful.

Titanic was a great movie when it came out and I saw it twice but Dopplegangster's Titanic was better. Wow. World class. First class. I hope so much it happens again and again.

Gob Squad’s War and Peace or being on stage in it and so supported in a position that would usually have me running off stage, or more likely sitting quietly and disappearing. I felt safe and happy.

And finally.

Your Ever Illusory Hosts *Jimay Falcon & Sh'Gazey A Game Show Extravaganza. I smiled all night long and the corners of my mouth are turning up again when I think about how much I loved that night.

What KMG is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: I actually haven’t thought about it one bit. So that’s something.

SM: I so wish I'd been at War and Peace the night Kerith was on stage (Chris was). She's just finished her Masters at VCA and her new show 186,000 opens this week and runs until 17 December. I haven't seen it yet and am trying to find a free night.

And another terrific photo that captures the person how she really looks; it's lovely to know that Kerith sees herself how the world sees her.

15 December

I saw 186,000 last night. It's gentle and loving and shares young queer voices that are too often ignored on our stages and in our lives. The verbatim text is on screen and recorded, and the four people on the stage share their own stories. The structure comes from the staging and the movement; it's almost hypnotic. And the queer western femme dream design is gorgeous.

Penny Harpham
co-founder and co-Artistic Director, She Said Theatre


Penny Harpham. Photo by Lachlan Woods

PH's favourite moment in Melbourne theatre in 2016: For me it would be in Influx's new work, Animal, presented at Theatre Works, created and performed by Kate Sherman and Nicci Wilks and directed by Susie Dee. There is a moment towards the end of Animal where he two female performers climb and crawl all over the set, which is made entirely of stacks and stacks of solid industrial containers, and it seems to transform in front of you as the containers at the very back of the stage reveal themselves to be not solid, but full of water. One of the performers drags the other into the container and violently drowns her. The lights shift so that as her body goes limp the lights blur and darken and though we know we are watching a performance, the performer is now floating lifelessly in anonymity at the back of the stage.

It is both a masterstroke of stage craft, but also a visceral attack on the senses. It made me think of all the women who had been killed by their partners this year. It made me think of Eddie Maguire saying on national radio that AFL journalist Caroline Wilson should "drown herself".  It made me realise how powerful and strong and vulnerable and brave women are and how we are forced to shrink in this world in order to survive under this suffocating, relentless, Trump-filled patriarchy. It made me realise how a moment of live performance can leave me reeling and angry and charged and aware of the macro and micro and it made me want to make work that did for other people.

What PH is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: 
I'm very excited about the Yirramboi First Nations Arts Festival, 5-14 May. Jacob Boehme is one of the country's most exciting and versatile performance makers and I'm so excited to see the program he has curated take over the city in May. Also, Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again at Malthouse sees an almost all female team explore (or perhaps attack?) language and violence against women with a cultural diverse cast and some of my favourite creatives including Emma Valente and Marg Horwell.

SM: I love that She Said Theatre is getting lots of mentions this year. My favourite moment was seeing how HART had developed and changed since its first season. What a show!

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