We're probably really really happy right now
Theatre Works and Public Service Announcement Theatre Co
25 February 2021
Theatre Works
to 6 March
Mostly Melbourne theatre reviews
Showing posts with label Theatreworks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Theatreworks. Show all posts
04 March 2021
25 January 2021
Review: Kerosene
Kerosene
Theatre Works presents
22 February 2021
Theatre Works
to 31 January
 | |
| Izabella Yena in "Kerosene". Photo by Jack Dixon-Gunn |
Goodness, it's been a while.
This was published in Time Out.
12 December 2019
What Melbourne Loved in 2019, part 8
Today we hear from Charlotte, Beng and Christopher.
There's still time to contribute, but not much; it's not going all the way through the month this year. The form is linked on all the early parts. Or all the info is here.
Charlotte Strantzen Bair
Actor, presenter, theatre-maker and mother to two amazing humans
Favourite moments in 2019.
I'm thrilled that 2019 held more highlights than lowlights for me, with some really bright spots. My musical theatre picks for the year were Muriel's Wedding and Come from Away. I wasn't sure how I'd feel about Muriel. Would the film translate to stage? Will it have aged well? Any cynicism in me was quickly washed away by the sheer joy of the show, with Kate Miller-Heidke and Keir Nuttall's music being ably performed by a fabulous cast (including, I discovered while watching, the wonderful Caleb Vines, whom I shared a stage with many times in the early 2000s in school holiday pantomimes! It made my year to see him all grown up and working in such a successful show). Come From Away was everything it was cracked up to be and more. It felt especially personal to us as my husband was in the USAA and away from family on September 11, so the emotional reaction was strong. I'm enjoying listening to the soundtrack now!
I saw some excellent kids theatre with my children, including ROFLSHALBOWCO by The Listies (not just for children!) at the Malthouse and Mad as a Cute Snake by Amelia Evans and Dan Giovannoni at Theatre Works. It's a real treat to see companies produce work that respects their young audiences and pushes the boundaries without making a big deal of it.
In comedy, I loved Keep at MICF by Daniel Kitson – I could listen to his storytelling for hours (and have!) – and Hot Donkey by Northern Ireland's Paul Currie, which takes on particular significance this week after the death of his hero, Caroll Spinney. Months later, I still find myself randomly breaking out into "Pandas for hands, I've got pandas for hands!".
My heart was warmed to see my friend and colleague Andi Snelling back on stage with Happy-Go-Wrong, which, as already mentioned in this series, is a great achievement. And, whie it didn't hit all the marks for me, I really enjoyed Raw Material and Traverse Theatre Company's What Girls Are Made Of as part of the Melbourne Interntional Festival of Arts.
Looking forward to in 2020.
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, at long last! My brother and I are taking Mum for her 70th birthday...totally selflessly, of course! And, in a not-strictly-theatre sense, I am hanging out for My Dad Wrote a Porno in January and Tim Minchin's encore tour of Back in March.
SM: There are people who are always working and performing but we don't see them in our reviews and on the big stages. Charlotte makes theatre in homes and at parties and events. She (and her husband and colleauges) do murder mystery parties and theme parties and children's parties. They get to know their audiences in ways that few performers do. They make events become "the best day of my life". That's pretty great.
(PS. Are we allowed to start a count down to #MelbournePornoDay?)
Beng Oh
Director and theatre maker
Favourite moments in 2019.
I didn’t see as much as I would have liked to this year but having said that, stand-outs for me include:
Ars Nova’s production of Underground Railroad Game at Malthouse. A funny, subversive and disturbing look at race relations with fully committed performances. Troubling in a good way.
Samah Sabawi’s Them at La Mama was beautifully directed by Bagryana Popov with a strong cast. It’s on the Victorian Premiere’s Literary Awards 2020 drama shortlist and is coming back in 2020 at the Arts Centre.
Also at La Mama, Rory Godbold’s When The Light Leaves was a timely piece as assisted dying laws came into effect. It’s a moving production that’s coming back for Midsumma 2020.
Declan Greene’s production of Wake in Fright at Malthouse with Zahra Newman was simply brilliant and sucked you in right from the word go.
Opera Australia’s production of Aribert Reimann’s Ghost Sonata was a knockout. The singers sang some extremely tricky music with aplomb (and excellent diction) and Greg Eldridge’s production, in surreal designs by Emma Kingsbury, brought a really difficult piece to life.
Stephanie Lake’s Colossus with nearly 50 dancers was hypnotic and entrancing and I would have been happy to immediately watch it a second time. Still on dance, Hofesh Shechter’s exhilarating Grand Finale at MIAF really felt like the culmination of their work to date.
Anthem directed by Susie Dee at MIAF skilfully wove together five writers and a large cast into a memorable piece of theatre.
Last, but not least, Laurence Strangio’s The Year of Magical Thinking had a luminous performance by Jillian Murray coupled with exquisite lighting by Andy Turner.
Looking forward to in 2020.
Lots of things, not least of which are the Mozart Requiem by Romeo Castelluci, Robert Icke’s The Doctor, and Enter Achilles by DV8 (I can’t see it but I’m still excited by it) at Adelaide Festival.
Two shows in Melbourne stand out though. I missed it first time round and am excited about seeing Joel Bray’s Daddy. It’s queer, indigenous work with the lot. And sugar, lots of sugar. Not to be missed.
Susie Dee and Patricia Cornelius teaming up once more on Do Not Go Gentle... at Malthouse. I first saw the play in Julian Meyrick’s production at fortyfivedownstairs in 2010 and can’t wait to see what this latest production is like.
SM: I really enjoyed Beng's direction of Daniel Keene's Wild Cherries at La Mama, but what I remember most is how he let us see Cock though the hearts of the characters and brought a new reading to the well-known play. It was soooo hot that night in fortyfivedownstairs and, even while we melted, the audience were totally gripped by the story.
Christopher Bryant
Playwright, academic, sometimes performer
Favourite moments in 2019.
I saw Barbara and the Camp Dogs and Underground Railroad Game at Malthouse in the same week and nine months later, I'm still thinking about them both. They both expertly navigated hilarity through some really dark places, and were all the more affecting for it.
The end of Working With Children by Nicola Gunn. I'd watch her eat cereal (but like, not in a creepy way), so, of course, I loved her performance. But the way it ended – kind of, leaving the audience in all these questions she'd raised, watching all these machine-based optical illusions work in silence – was oddly touching and a little bit magical. I didn't feel like the veil of "theatre" lifted until hours later.
House Sisters by Michelle Lee and the Monash Centre of Theatre and Performance: hilarious and kind of sickening in parts and genuinely kept me unsure where it was going to end up. Just really well made and written, directed and performed by some wonderful young actors.
Daddy by Joel Bray. Beautiful, beautifully made, and again, sat on the knife's edge between camp ridiculousness, intelligence and a deep well of hurt. He also navigated audience involvement/interaction incredibly well.
Looking forward to in 2020.
Loaded by Dan Giovannoni and Christos Tsiolkas (directed by Stephen Nicolazzo) and Prima Facie by Suzie Miller (directed by Lee Lewis) at Malthouse.
The Feather in the Web by Nick Coyle (directed by Declan Greene) and Orlando by Sarah Ruhl (directed by Stephen Nicolazzo) at Red Stitch.
The Great Australian Play by Kim Ho and Wellbless by Debra Thomas and Ella Roth Barton at Theatre Works.
SM: I got to see two new productions of Christopher's plays in the same week: The Other Place at Theatre Works and Disinibition at MUST. Both approached and directed in such different ways; both sharing his writing and themes and emotions in such different ways. What an amazing way to get to know a writer and their work. What an amazing experience for a writer!
There's still time to contribute, but not much; it's not going all the way through the month this year. The form is linked on all the early parts. Or all the info is here.
Charlotte Strantzen Bair
Actor, presenter, theatre-maker and mother to two amazing humans
 |
| Charlotte Strantzen Bair |
Favourite moments in 2019.
I'm thrilled that 2019 held more highlights than lowlights for me, with some really bright spots. My musical theatre picks for the year were Muriel's Wedding and Come from Away. I wasn't sure how I'd feel about Muriel. Would the film translate to stage? Will it have aged well? Any cynicism in me was quickly washed away by the sheer joy of the show, with Kate Miller-Heidke and Keir Nuttall's music being ably performed by a fabulous cast (including, I discovered while watching, the wonderful Caleb Vines, whom I shared a stage with many times in the early 2000s in school holiday pantomimes! It made my year to see him all grown up and working in such a successful show). Come From Away was everything it was cracked up to be and more. It felt especially personal to us as my husband was in the USAA and away from family on September 11, so the emotional reaction was strong. I'm enjoying listening to the soundtrack now!
I saw some excellent kids theatre with my children, including ROFLSHALBOWCO by The Listies (not just for children!) at the Malthouse and Mad as a Cute Snake by Amelia Evans and Dan Giovannoni at Theatre Works. It's a real treat to see companies produce work that respects their young audiences and pushes the boundaries without making a big deal of it.
In comedy, I loved Keep at MICF by Daniel Kitson – I could listen to his storytelling for hours (and have!) – and Hot Donkey by Northern Ireland's Paul Currie, which takes on particular significance this week after the death of his hero, Caroll Spinney. Months later, I still find myself randomly breaking out into "Pandas for hands, I've got pandas for hands!".
My heart was warmed to see my friend and colleague Andi Snelling back on stage with Happy-Go-Wrong, which, as already mentioned in this series, is a great achievement. And, whie it didn't hit all the marks for me, I really enjoyed Raw Material and Traverse Theatre Company's What Girls Are Made Of as part of the Melbourne Interntional Festival of Arts.
Looking forward to in 2020.
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, at long last! My brother and I are taking Mum for her 70th birthday...totally selflessly, of course! And, in a not-strictly-theatre sense, I am hanging out for My Dad Wrote a Porno in January and Tim Minchin's encore tour of Back in March.
SM: There are people who are always working and performing but we don't see them in our reviews and on the big stages. Charlotte makes theatre in homes and at parties and events. She (and her husband and colleauges) do murder mystery parties and theme parties and children's parties. They get to know their audiences in ways that few performers do. They make events become "the best day of my life". That's pretty great.
(PS. Are we allowed to start a count down to #MelbournePornoDay?)
Beng Oh
Director and theatre maker
 |
| Beng Oh |
Favourite moments in 2019.
I didn’t see as much as I would have liked to this year but having said that, stand-outs for me include:
Ars Nova’s production of Underground Railroad Game at Malthouse. A funny, subversive and disturbing look at race relations with fully committed performances. Troubling in a good way.
Samah Sabawi’s Them at La Mama was beautifully directed by Bagryana Popov with a strong cast. It’s on the Victorian Premiere’s Literary Awards 2020 drama shortlist and is coming back in 2020 at the Arts Centre.
Also at La Mama, Rory Godbold’s When The Light Leaves was a timely piece as assisted dying laws came into effect. It’s a moving production that’s coming back for Midsumma 2020.
Declan Greene’s production of Wake in Fright at Malthouse with Zahra Newman was simply brilliant and sucked you in right from the word go.
Opera Australia’s production of Aribert Reimann’s Ghost Sonata was a knockout. The singers sang some extremely tricky music with aplomb (and excellent diction) and Greg Eldridge’s production, in surreal designs by Emma Kingsbury, brought a really difficult piece to life.
Stephanie Lake’s Colossus with nearly 50 dancers was hypnotic and entrancing and I would have been happy to immediately watch it a second time. Still on dance, Hofesh Shechter’s exhilarating Grand Finale at MIAF really felt like the culmination of their work to date.
Anthem directed by Susie Dee at MIAF skilfully wove together five writers and a large cast into a memorable piece of theatre.
Last, but not least, Laurence Strangio’s The Year of Magical Thinking had a luminous performance by Jillian Murray coupled with exquisite lighting by Andy Turner.
Looking forward to in 2020.
Lots of things, not least of which are the Mozart Requiem by Romeo Castelluci, Robert Icke’s The Doctor, and Enter Achilles by DV8 (I can’t see it but I’m still excited by it) at Adelaide Festival.
Two shows in Melbourne stand out though. I missed it first time round and am excited about seeing Joel Bray’s Daddy. It’s queer, indigenous work with the lot. And sugar, lots of sugar. Not to be missed.
Susie Dee and Patricia Cornelius teaming up once more on Do Not Go Gentle... at Malthouse. I first saw the play in Julian Meyrick’s production at fortyfivedownstairs in 2010 and can’t wait to see what this latest production is like.
SM: I really enjoyed Beng's direction of Daniel Keene's Wild Cherries at La Mama, but what I remember most is how he let us see Cock though the hearts of the characters and brought a new reading to the well-known play. It was soooo hot that night in fortyfivedownstairs and, even while we melted, the audience were totally gripped by the story.
Christopher Bryant
Playwright, academic, sometimes performer
 |
| Christopher Bryant. Photo by Sarah Walker |
I saw Barbara and the Camp Dogs and Underground Railroad Game at Malthouse in the same week and nine months later, I'm still thinking about them both. They both expertly navigated hilarity through some really dark places, and were all the more affecting for it.
The end of Working With Children by Nicola Gunn. I'd watch her eat cereal (but like, not in a creepy way), so, of course, I loved her performance. But the way it ended – kind of, leaving the audience in all these questions she'd raised, watching all these machine-based optical illusions work in silence – was oddly touching and a little bit magical. I didn't feel like the veil of "theatre" lifted until hours later.
House Sisters by Michelle Lee and the Monash Centre of Theatre and Performance: hilarious and kind of sickening in parts and genuinely kept me unsure where it was going to end up. Just really well made and written, directed and performed by some wonderful young actors.
Daddy by Joel Bray. Beautiful, beautifully made, and again, sat on the knife's edge between camp ridiculousness, intelligence and a deep well of hurt. He also navigated audience involvement/interaction incredibly well.
Looking forward to in 2020.
Loaded by Dan Giovannoni and Christos Tsiolkas (directed by Stephen Nicolazzo) and Prima Facie by Suzie Miller (directed by Lee Lewis) at Malthouse.
The Feather in the Web by Nick Coyle (directed by Declan Greene) and Orlando by Sarah Ruhl (directed by Stephen Nicolazzo) at Red Stitch.
The Great Australian Play by Kim Ho and Wellbless by Debra Thomas and Ella Roth Barton at Theatre Works.
SM: I got to see two new productions of Christopher's plays in the same week: The Other Place at Theatre Works and Disinibition at MUST. Both approached and directed in such different ways; both sharing his writing and themes and emotions in such different ways. What an amazing way to get to know a writer and their work. What an amazing experience for a writer!
10 April 2019
MICF: Robot Song
MICF for kids
Robot Song
Theatre Works and Arena Theatre
2 April 2019
Theatre Works
to 13 April
comedyfestival.com.au
Robot Song is all kinds of wonderful and then some. It finishes on Saturday.
Juniper's 11 and doesn't like going to school. She'd rather be at home with her parents or her best friend, who's a skip bin who makes toys and more friends out of rubbish. Juniper (Ashlea Pyke) also likes singing (Nate Gilkes wrote the music) and, with the help of her mum (Jo Abbott) and especially her dad (Phil McInnes), she wants to tell the story about why she stopped going to school and how a robot helped her to see her world differently.
Juniper knows she a bit different from her classmates. She doesn't like this, but she's ok with it because she has an art teacher who knows how creative Juniper is and she has a family who love and understand her. Although it's not discussed in her play, Juniper's story was inspired by the director/writer/designer Joylon James's son, who has autism.
One day Juniper's class give her a letter saying that they don't want her at their school. They call her a robot and the letter is so horrible that, even as an adult, it's hard to accept it as children not understanding the effect of their words.
Juniper can't dismiss it either and refuses to go back to school. Until a robot from a 1980s video she watched with her dad appears in her back yard.
As Juniper is played by an adult, we are always seeing the story from an adult point of view where her trauma is understood and her unconditional love and safety is assured. This allows children to be engrossed in her story, feel her pain and still feel safe.
Robot Song is far more than an insight into to being a child on the autism spectrum. It's a story about empathy, understanding and creativity and how difference is a way to connect far more than a reason to reject.
Robot Song
Theatre Works and Arena Theatre
2 April 2019
Theatre Works
to 13 April
comedyfestival.com.au
 |
| Robot Song |
Robot Song is all kinds of wonderful and then some. It finishes on Saturday.
Juniper's 11 and doesn't like going to school. She'd rather be at home with her parents or her best friend, who's a skip bin who makes toys and more friends out of rubbish. Juniper (Ashlea Pyke) also likes singing (Nate Gilkes wrote the music) and, with the help of her mum (Jo Abbott) and especially her dad (Phil McInnes), she wants to tell the story about why she stopped going to school and how a robot helped her to see her world differently.
Juniper knows she a bit different from her classmates. She doesn't like this, but she's ok with it because she has an art teacher who knows how creative Juniper is and she has a family who love and understand her. Although it's not discussed in her play, Juniper's story was inspired by the director/writer/designer Joylon James's son, who has autism.
One day Juniper's class give her a letter saying that they don't want her at their school. They call her a robot and the letter is so horrible that, even as an adult, it's hard to accept it as children not understanding the effect of their words.
Juniper can't dismiss it either and refuses to go back to school. Until a robot from a 1980s video she watched with her dad appears in her back yard.
As Juniper is played by an adult, we are always seeing the story from an adult point of view where her trauma is understood and her unconditional love and safety is assured. This allows children to be engrossed in her story, feel her pain and still feel safe.
Robot Song is far more than an insight into to being a child on the autism spectrum. It's a story about empathy, understanding and creativity and how difference is a way to connect far more than a reason to reject.
31 January 2019
MIDSUMMA: The Butch Monologues
MIDSUMMA
The Butch Monologues
Theatre Works and Stage Mom
28 January 2019
Theatre Works
to 3 February
theatreworks.org.au
I'm still getting my heart around The Butch Monologues.
Butches, masculine women, transmen and gender rebels tell the collected stories of others who identify as butch. There are about 50 short stories in each performance. They have been collected since 2013 by director Julie McNamara (Mac) and writer Laura Bridgeman (Doc), and are from the UK, Europe, USA and Caribbean. Some from Australia will be added after their visits to Melbourne and to Sydney.
They are stories we don't see on our stages, on our tvs, in our books. And if we do, they are peeping in from the edges of the story and rarely seen saving the day or are being fought over for love.
Each city it comes to has a new cast and no one tells their own story. Melbourne sees Fiona Jones, Anne Harris (Dan), Quinn Eades, Jax Jacki Brown and Jacques De Vere, along with Mac and Doc. And there's nothing hotter than people being their authentic selves.
I've said the word "butch" more in the last few days than I've ever said it because it used to be such an insult. In the late 1980s, "butch" was so insulting that butch women were called "trucks" in the club I went to every Sunday night – wearing short shirts, brogues and long hair. Butch women were othered within a community that claimed to be inclusive. We were little shits.
Bridgeman – who has set a new standard for well-dressed even by Melbourne standards – was also around in the 1980s and says in her introduction to the script that she was scared it was going to be "a collection of rage".
Many stories do come from rage, anger and shame, but they are full of humour and a lot of love, especially as they witness how gender expression continues to change – and stay the same.
And the more stories that are told, the more they are not stories of otherness. Ashamed to wear the clothes you love in public? Stayed in a relationship for every wrong reason? Been embarrassed at the gym? Kept secrets from your family? Denied yourself love because you're not meant to like that type of person? One of the many frustrations of being on the edges looking in is knowing that your stories are pretty much the same as those about the people dancing in the centre.
The stories in The Butch Monologues are real, but they're not told verbatim. While their natural voices are kept, the writing is structured and styled to be as poetic as it is natural. Bridgeman's writing and McNamara's direction ensure that the heart of each story is heard, sometimes most loudly in the silent subtext. And while each new show includes different stories, they are ordered and chosen to tell a much bigger story about identity and ultimately inclusiveness.
This ongoing process of collecting experiences and five people reading stories on a stage creates community among people who may never have known they were all together. I hope it has a chance to come back to Melbourne and be seen more widely.
And I will never look at the IKEA logo without thinking of fisting again.
The Butch Monologues
Theatre Works and Stage Mom
28 January 2019
Theatre Works
to 3 February
theatreworks.org.au
 |
| Melbourne cast of The Butch Monologues |
I'm still getting my heart around The Butch Monologues.
Butches, masculine women, transmen and gender rebels tell the collected stories of others who identify as butch. There are about 50 short stories in each performance. They have been collected since 2013 by director Julie McNamara (Mac) and writer Laura Bridgeman (Doc), and are from the UK, Europe, USA and Caribbean. Some from Australia will be added after their visits to Melbourne and to Sydney.
They are stories we don't see on our stages, on our tvs, in our books. And if we do, they are peeping in from the edges of the story and rarely seen saving the day or are being fought over for love.
Each city it comes to has a new cast and no one tells their own story. Melbourne sees Fiona Jones, Anne Harris (Dan), Quinn Eades, Jax Jacki Brown and Jacques De Vere, along with Mac and Doc. And there's nothing hotter than people being their authentic selves.
I've said the word "butch" more in the last few days than I've ever said it because it used to be such an insult. In the late 1980s, "butch" was so insulting that butch women were called "trucks" in the club I went to every Sunday night – wearing short shirts, brogues and long hair. Butch women were othered within a community that claimed to be inclusive. We were little shits.
Bridgeman – who has set a new standard for well-dressed even by Melbourne standards – was also around in the 1980s and says in her introduction to the script that she was scared it was going to be "a collection of rage".
Many stories do come from rage, anger and shame, but they are full of humour and a lot of love, especially as they witness how gender expression continues to change – and stay the same.
And the more stories that are told, the more they are not stories of otherness. Ashamed to wear the clothes you love in public? Stayed in a relationship for every wrong reason? Been embarrassed at the gym? Kept secrets from your family? Denied yourself love because you're not meant to like that type of person? One of the many frustrations of being on the edges looking in is knowing that your stories are pretty much the same as those about the people dancing in the centre.
This ongoing process of collecting experiences and five people reading stories on a stage creates community among people who may never have known they were all together. I hope it has a chance to come back to Melbourne and be seen more widely.
And I will never look at the IKEA logo without thinking of fisting again.
22 January 2019
MIDSUMMA: Truly Madly Britney
MIDSUMMA
Truly Madly Britney
Theatre Works and Stage Mom
20 January 2019
Theatre Works
to 9 February
theatreworks.org.au
Pop icon obsession is dismissed as much as it is understood. Can anyone really say that there isn't at a pop star that will be your bff as soon as you find a way to meet? Truly Madly Britney dives hilariously into the frustration and pain under the glittery joy of knowing too much about your icons and the chorey to every video.
Adam (Adam Garner) loves Steve (Nick Clark) so much that he's happy to max their credit cards to go on a pilgrimage to LA to pay homage to Britney Spears circa 2007 – the year the Mousketeer-cum-teen-superstar-cum-queer-guiding-light-goddess is remembered by photos of her shaved head – that culminates with meet-and-greet tix for her Vegas show. Or LIVING THE DREAM for a boy, who was once in teen pop band, in love with a boy, who works in retail at the biggest shopping mall in the southern hemisphere.
Of course following the dream of a breakdown is never going to go smoothly, especially as they meet fellow Britney fans. There's airbnb host Chad (Alex Threw) who isn't at all gay, and Judy (Louisa Wall) who has backstage passes for her and her terminally-ill son Kevin (Karl Richmond). And Chanella Marci is everyone else, starting as a Savage Garden fan; all Australian boy couples look like Savage Garden.
Writer Alberto Di Troia began developing the script when he was studying at VCA and met director Hannah Fallowfield. They bonded over Britney and it's since had a reading at the MTC Cybec series and been welcomed by Theatre Works for Midsumma.
It's so wonderful to see Theatre Works's Midsumma season mixing international shows with new writing, emerging creatives and a cast who are on their individual ways to becoming favourites. Without this kind of support, shows like this don't get the chance to develop and new voices aren't heard. Truly Madly Britney will develop further, but don't wait for the next season.
Like a pop star having a really shit year, extreme is the only way to go. And they do. Although it's a bit uneven, director Fallowfield finds a lovingly outrageous tone that's backed up with close harmonies of camp, consent, and finding comfort in knowing that you're not the only one going through hell. Designer Bethany J Fellows creates a Vegas mood with a single light-globe budget and adds layers of meaning by being anti-Vegas and showing all the stagecraft secrets. And it all works towards a climax so magnificently wrong that anything less would be offensive.
Truly Madly Britney
Theatre Works and Stage Mom
20 January 2019
Theatre Works
to 9 February
theatreworks.org.au
 |
| Truly Madly Britney. Photo by Lachlan Woods |
Pop icon obsession is dismissed as much as it is understood. Can anyone really say that there isn't at a pop star that will be your bff as soon as you find a way to meet? Truly Madly Britney dives hilariously into the frustration and pain under the glittery joy of knowing too much about your icons and the chorey to every video.
Adam (Adam Garner) loves Steve (Nick Clark) so much that he's happy to max their credit cards to go on a pilgrimage to LA to pay homage to Britney Spears circa 2007 – the year the Mousketeer-cum-teen-superstar-cum-queer-guiding-light-goddess is remembered by photos of her shaved head – that culminates with meet-and-greet tix for her Vegas show. Or LIVING THE DREAM for a boy, who was once in teen pop band, in love with a boy, who works in retail at the biggest shopping mall in the southern hemisphere.
Of course following the dream of a breakdown is never going to go smoothly, especially as they meet fellow Britney fans. There's airbnb host Chad (Alex Threw) who isn't at all gay, and Judy (Louisa Wall) who has backstage passes for her and her terminally-ill son Kevin (Karl Richmond). And Chanella Marci is everyone else, starting as a Savage Garden fan; all Australian boy couples look like Savage Garden.
Writer Alberto Di Troia began developing the script when he was studying at VCA and met director Hannah Fallowfield. They bonded over Britney and it's since had a reading at the MTC Cybec series and been welcomed by Theatre Works for Midsumma.
It's so wonderful to see Theatre Works's Midsumma season mixing international shows with new writing, emerging creatives and a cast who are on their individual ways to becoming favourites. Without this kind of support, shows like this don't get the chance to develop and new voices aren't heard. Truly Madly Britney will develop further, but don't wait for the next season.
Like a pop star having a really shit year, extreme is the only way to go. And they do. Although it's a bit uneven, director Fallowfield finds a lovingly outrageous tone that's backed up with close harmonies of camp, consent, and finding comfort in knowing that you're not the only one going through hell. Designer Bethany J Fellows creates a Vegas mood with a single light-globe budget and adds layers of meaning by being anti-Vegas and showing all the stagecraft secrets. And it all works towards a climax so magnificently wrong that anything less would be offensive.
14 October 2018
MELBOURNE FESTIVAL: Frogman
MELBOURNE FESTIVAL 2018
Frogman
curious directive
presented with Theatre Works
12 October 2018Theatre Works
to 14 October
www.festival.melbourne
www.curiousdirective.com
Everyone sits in a white plastic chair that let us swivel all the way around; I don't trust anyone who doesn't spin around as soon as they sit down. We're on the four sides of a rectangular stage covered in beige shag carpet, but the virtual reality headset waiting for us is far more interesting. Frogman is theatre made using VR.
But it starts on, and regularly goes back to, the stage – eyes need rests – where 35-year-old Meera (Georgina Strawson) is being questioned about the 1995 disappearance of her classmate Ashleigh. Meera still lives next to the Great Barrier Reef, where its assumed the girl drowned. As the evidence on cassette tapes is played, she remembers the sleepover she was having with her friends on the night divers searched for Ashleigh's body.
UK company curious directive self describes as "theatre through the lens of science". Led by artistic director Jack Lowe, the small company works with new people and organisations on every project, including the Brisbane Powerhouse for the 2017 development of Frogman.
The VR experience takes us into Meera's bedroom, with its beige shag carpet, and into the reef as the divers look for Ashleigh before the coral bloom destroys visibility. The combination of scratchy tape evidence feels perfect with the VR footage that's always a little bit blurry; its not-quite-focus feels like being in the faded memory with her.
The technology is fascinating – I reached out to touch things – and there are times when it takes us deeply into the world, but the story doesn't always take advantage of the technology. When the mystery story hints at magical realism, there's a possibility of diving into a world where children can breath under water and fire coral burns. We don't, and the story may be just as strong if played out only on the stage.
Technology is incredible and this early step into VR in theatre is an exciting beginning.
PS. My set stopped working twice, so I got to see the more fascinating spectacle of a room of people spinning in their chairs and reaching out to people who weren't there.
Frogman
curious directive
presented with Theatre Works
12 October 2018Theatre Works
to 14 October
www.festival.melbourne
www.curiousdirective.com
Everyone sits in a white plastic chair that let us swivel all the way around; I don't trust anyone who doesn't spin around as soon as they sit down. We're on the four sides of a rectangular stage covered in beige shag carpet, but the virtual reality headset waiting for us is far more interesting. Frogman is theatre made using VR.
But it starts on, and regularly goes back to, the stage – eyes need rests – where 35-year-old Meera (Georgina Strawson) is being questioned about the 1995 disappearance of her classmate Ashleigh. Meera still lives next to the Great Barrier Reef, where its assumed the girl drowned. As the evidence on cassette tapes is played, she remembers the sleepover she was having with her friends on the night divers searched for Ashleigh's body.
UK company curious directive self describes as "theatre through the lens of science". Led by artistic director Jack Lowe, the small company works with new people and organisations on every project, including the Brisbane Powerhouse for the 2017 development of Frogman.
The VR experience takes us into Meera's bedroom, with its beige shag carpet, and into the reef as the divers look for Ashleigh before the coral bloom destroys visibility. The combination of scratchy tape evidence feels perfect with the VR footage that's always a little bit blurry; its not-quite-focus feels like being in the faded memory with her.
The technology is fascinating – I reached out to touch things – and there are times when it takes us deeply into the world, but the story doesn't always take advantage of the technology. When the mystery story hints at magical realism, there's a possibility of diving into a world where children can breath under water and fire coral burns. We don't, and the story may be just as strong if played out only on the stage.
Technology is incredible and this early step into VR in theatre is an exciting beginning.
PS. My set stopped working twice, so I got to see the more fascinating spectacle of a room of people spinning in their chairs and reaching out to people who weren't there.
17 March 2018
Review: FOLA, Unknown Neighbours
Unknown Neighbours
Ranters Theatre, Creative VaQi, Theatre Works
15 March 2018
St Kilda
to 18 March
fola.com.au
Developed by Melbourne's Ranters Theatre and Seoul's Creative VaQi over four years, Unknown Neighbours is somewhere between a walking meditation and sticky-beaking in stranger's houses and a stranger's head.
Four actors, from both companies, stayed in a house when the owners were away and were left to create. The experience begins at one of the houses; you get the address when you book.
In an Acland Street house – one that no one I know could ever afford – Korean actor Soo-Yeon Sung uses a hand-help projector to Google translate her thoughts about the house, the woman who owns it and how the plants in the garden know that they are loved.
While the house is clean and decluttered enough to be ready for an open real estate inspection, it's hard to hide personality. Still, the heart of the experience is about getting to know Soo-Yeon far more than getting to know who lives there. (Our group knew that we had the people who lived in the house with us, which made the option of snooping and discovering awkward.)
And this is only part one work.
Next, we followed the performer down one of those streets that's so old-school St Kilda that it's possible to forget just how many chain stores are now open in the malled-up part of Acland Street or that renting here is now so expensive that the groovy people have moved to the burbs. There's the Secret Life of Us exterior block, 1940's deco apartments with round windows and dark staircases, 1970's brick boxes that are hideous on the outside and gloriously huge on the inside, and slick new buildings that blend so well that you have to actively notice them. Or it's walking to the next venue. Or stomping along and feeling a bit sad because you moved to the burbs.
So much of this work is the choice to make your own story. Or listen to the people around you; the things I heard about an actor!
The four house-groups meet in the park by the adventure playground that St Kilda people know about – that's now safe and less adventury. As the sun sets, we can see buildings built in the nineteenth century, and five performers ( I don't know how they were shared among the houses) gather in front of a tent.
There's a guitar, wind chimes and a dog.
I repeat, there's a dog.
On the way back to Theatre Works – there is a lot of walking –, a little girl waves from the window of a 1970s brick box. She seems shocked that only a couple people notice her.
After a quick trip through Anglican church built in the 1850s, it's time to sit in the theatre and watch as the pieces of the last couple of hours float into place and. And the dog totally stole the show.
Ranters Theatre, Creative VaQi, Theatre Works
15 March 2018
St Kilda
to 18 March
fola.com.au
 |
| Soo-Yeon Sung . Photo by Andrew Bott |
Developed by Melbourne's Ranters Theatre and Seoul's Creative VaQi over four years, Unknown Neighbours is somewhere between a walking meditation and sticky-beaking in stranger's houses and a stranger's head.
Four actors, from both companies, stayed in a house when the owners were away and were left to create. The experience begins at one of the houses; you get the address when you book.
In an Acland Street house – one that no one I know could ever afford – Korean actor Soo-Yeon Sung uses a hand-help projector to Google translate her thoughts about the house, the woman who owns it and how the plants in the garden know that they are loved.
While the house is clean and decluttered enough to be ready for an open real estate inspection, it's hard to hide personality. Still, the heart of the experience is about getting to know Soo-Yeon far more than getting to know who lives there. (Our group knew that we had the people who lived in the house with us, which made the option of snooping and discovering awkward.)
And this is only part one work.
Next, we followed the performer down one of those streets that's so old-school St Kilda that it's possible to forget just how many chain stores are now open in the malled-up part of Acland Street or that renting here is now so expensive that the groovy people have moved to the burbs. There's the Secret Life of Us exterior block, 1940's deco apartments with round windows and dark staircases, 1970's brick boxes that are hideous on the outside and gloriously huge on the inside, and slick new buildings that blend so well that you have to actively notice them. Or it's walking to the next venue. Or stomping along and feeling a bit sad because you moved to the burbs.
So much of this work is the choice to make your own story. Or listen to the people around you; the things I heard about an actor!
The four house-groups meet in the park by the adventure playground that St Kilda people know about – that's now safe and less adventury. As the sun sets, we can see buildings built in the nineteenth century, and five performers ( I don't know how they were shared among the houses) gather in front of a tent.
There's a guitar, wind chimes and a dog.
I repeat, there's a dog.
On the way back to Theatre Works – there is a lot of walking –, a little girl waves from the window of a 1970s brick box. She seems shocked that only a couple people notice her.
After a quick trip through Anglican church built in the 1850s, it's time to sit in the theatre and watch as the pieces of the last couple of hours float into place and. And the dog totally stole the show.
07 October 2017
MELBOURNE FESTIVAL: All My Friends Were There
MELBOURNE FESTIVAL 2017
All My Friends Were There
The Guerrilla Museum
7 October
Theatre Works
to 11 October
www.festival.melbourne
Everyone I know to who experienced The Guerrilla Museum's two-person-audience show Funeral still talks about it. All My Friends Were There is about another inevitability in most lives – birthdays. And enough people come to every show to make a party.
Literally. We made a flippin' party!
No one knows who's party it's going to be until the show starts. Audiences are sent questionnaires about their birthday memories and someone, and their memories, are chosen for the day's party.
Today we celebrated Fleur's birthday. I'm not allowed to share the photos because The Guerilla Museum are all about having personal experiences. The guerillas want us to be in the moment and create memories – knowing that they change and are never be exactly like what happened.
I can say there was cake, streamers, vegan snags, booze, pass the parcel and surprsies. But no one gets to enjoy all of it and – like all birthdays – there are moments of "I want to do THAT".
The audience are split into groups and then smaller groups who visit spaces in and around Theatre Works. Each mini experience is about creating the final party, but it's more about evoking personal birthday memories. Knowing the birthday girl actually worked against the experience.
And while the final party is like mainlining glitter, we're still left knowing little about the person we're celebrating.
The experience that will stay with me is filling in the questionnaire, choosing five photos and trying to remember 49 birthdays.
The first question is about our fifth birthday.
I don't remember my fifth birthday. But I remember my grandma letting me choose two presents from the toy shop. I chose a gold-coloured teddy bear – I called him, definitely a him, Golden – and a plastic doll that came in her own matching bag. Gran told me not to take her to school the next day because I'd lose her. I remember being angry that she'd think that; I loved that new doll and wouldn't lose her. I lost her. I don't remember what she looked like, but I realised why I never say "Don't lose ..." to a child; I say "Be careful" or "Keep ... safe".
I remember my fourth birthday because I have a photo of it. I had a cake with pink icing and Yogi Bear chocolates around the side. I remember the cake vividly and the photo (below) proves how wrong memories can be. I had an ice cream cake. And I look pretty happy about it. Maybe the pink cake was from my forgotten fifth?
There was my 25th party in an activist share house where I drunkenly remember asking my brother how he lost his virginity but was too drunk to remember his answer.
There was the unnecessary aging crisis of turning 30. The only person who seemed to get that I wasn't keen on celebrating was a woman I worked with. She was about to turn 40 and facing IVF. I remember thinking how I'd have my life together by 40 and that ten years is such a long time.
I remembered 38 where I looked at my father's funeral memorial card from ten years earlier. This was the first time I'd looked at the date of his death (he took his own life) and saw that it wasn't the day before my birthday. No one ever checked that I knew; knowing made a difference.
I avoided 40 – turns out I didn't have my life together and ten years is a very short time – and had a last-minute pub lunch. My favourite 40-something birthday was feeding giraffes at Werribbee Zoo, but the best party was the Party For Pets where friends gave a donation to Lort Smith Animal Hospital. We wore animal masks and looked like we were at a really cheap middle-aged swingers party.
I suspect that I'll also avoid 50, but I am going to Sri Lanka a few weeks before my birthday and I want to go on a leopard safari that costs more than the airfare so I might accept presents this one year. #AllIWantForMyBirthdayIsALeopardSafari
All My Friends Were There
The Guerrilla Museum
7 October
Theatre Works
to 11 October
www.festival.melbourne
Everyone I know to who experienced The Guerrilla Museum's two-person-audience show Funeral still talks about it. All My Friends Were There is about another inevitability in most lives – birthdays. And enough people come to every show to make a party.
Literally. We made a flippin' party!
No one knows who's party it's going to be until the show starts. Audiences are sent questionnaires about their birthday memories and someone, and their memories, are chosen for the day's party.
Today we celebrated Fleur's birthday. I'm not allowed to share the photos because The Guerilla Museum are all about having personal experiences. The guerillas want us to be in the moment and create memories – knowing that they change and are never be exactly like what happened.
I can say there was cake, streamers, vegan snags, booze, pass the parcel and surprsies. But no one gets to enjoy all of it and – like all birthdays – there are moments of "I want to do THAT".
The audience are split into groups and then smaller groups who visit spaces in and around Theatre Works. Each mini experience is about creating the final party, but it's more about evoking personal birthday memories. Knowing the birthday girl actually worked against the experience.
And while the final party is like mainlining glitter, we're still left knowing little about the person we're celebrating.
The experience that will stay with me is filling in the questionnaire, choosing five photos and trying to remember 49 birthdays.
The first question is about our fifth birthday.
I don't remember my fifth birthday. But I remember my grandma letting me choose two presents from the toy shop. I chose a gold-coloured teddy bear – I called him, definitely a him, Golden – and a plastic doll that came in her own matching bag. Gran told me not to take her to school the next day because I'd lose her. I remember being angry that she'd think that; I loved that new doll and wouldn't lose her. I lost her. I don't remember what she looked like, but I realised why I never say "Don't lose ..." to a child; I say "Be careful" or "Keep ... safe".
I remember my fourth birthday because I have a photo of it. I had a cake with pink icing and Yogi Bear chocolates around the side. I remember the cake vividly and the photo (below) proves how wrong memories can be. I had an ice cream cake. And I look pretty happy about it. Maybe the pink cake was from my forgotten fifth?
There was my 25th party in an activist share house where I drunkenly remember asking my brother how he lost his virginity but was too drunk to remember his answer.
There was the unnecessary aging crisis of turning 30. The only person who seemed to get that I wasn't keen on celebrating was a woman I worked with. She was about to turn 40 and facing IVF. I remember thinking how I'd have my life together by 40 and that ten years is such a long time.
I remembered 38 where I looked at my father's funeral memorial card from ten years earlier. This was the first time I'd looked at the date of his death (he took his own life) and saw that it wasn't the day before my birthday. No one ever checked that I knew; knowing made a difference.
I avoided 40 – turns out I didn't have my life together and ten years is a very short time – and had a last-minute pub lunch. My favourite 40-something birthday was feeding giraffes at Werribbee Zoo, but the best party was the Party For Pets where friends gave a donation to Lort Smith Animal Hospital. We wore animal masks and looked like we were at a really cheap middle-aged swingers party.
I suspect that I'll also avoid 50, but I am going to Sri Lanka a few weeks before my birthday and I want to go on a leopard safari that costs more than the airfare so I might accept presents this one year. #AllIWantForMyBirthdayIsALeopardSafari
23 April 2017
Review: Joan
Joan
The Rabble
22 April 2017
Theatre Works
to 30 April
theatreworks.org.au
Damn you, The Rabble. Just when I think I can’t love you any more, you go and make Joan.
I felt burnt alive and risen from the ashes.
Joan. Joan D’Arc. Saint Joan.
A young woman. Whispered to by saints. Virgin. Sinner. God’s holy soldier.
She became a hero, a saint, an aspiration for young women that they too can be strong and be destroyed. She’s a great audition pieces in the play by a man written three years after she was canonised.
She was burnt alive. She was 19.
Starting with a darkness that only Emma Valente’s lighting and Kate Davis’s design can find, shapes – women? a woman? young women? – move into light or are found in the darkness. It could be the holy light above or a light to run from. With projections in front of and behind the stage, it hints of a black and white movie but is nothing like a black and white movie as the sound of breath and bodies falling to their knees asks if their kneeling is choice.
After light, they move through explorations of body, fire and voice. And to make such mesmerising imagery sound so clinical, intelligent and “artistic” is unfair.
Founded by Valente and Davis, The Rabble’s process starts with design and develops through improvisation. Text and texts are vital to their process but is one of the last things on the stage. We watch more than we hear, and when the women are finally given voices, their words are fiercer, brighter and more blistering that the fire – that fire! – that came before.
It’s hard to think when watching this work. It’s seems so clear but every moment is filled with ideas and discussions that are too complex to be reduced to words.
Luisa Hastings Edge, Emily Milledge, Dana Miltins and Nikki Sheils are Joan. Each is extraordinary and together they confront the expectations of Joan and her story, and question why pain, strength and faith are considered virtues for a woman, let alone a child.
At times, it’s like getting into Joan's soul and feeling with her. But it’s more confrontational when we’re distanced and see ourselves judging her as a Saint or Sinner and putting both on a pedestal that burns with the bundles of wooden faggots stacked around her.
The Rabble create astonishing independent theatre with an independent budget. I'm thrilled to be able to see them in small rooms, but it's beyond my understanding why festivals around the world aren't begging for work like this to be in their programs.
The Rabble
22 April 2017
Theatre Works
to 30 April
theatreworks.org.au
 |
| Dana Miltins. Joan. Photo by David Paterson |
Damn you, The Rabble. Just when I think I can’t love you any more, you go and make Joan.
I felt burnt alive and risen from the ashes.
Joan. Joan D’Arc. Saint Joan.
A young woman. Whispered to by saints. Virgin. Sinner. God’s holy soldier.
She became a hero, a saint, an aspiration for young women that they too can be strong and be destroyed. She’s a great audition pieces in the play by a man written three years after she was canonised.
She was burnt alive. She was 19.
Starting with a darkness that only Emma Valente’s lighting and Kate Davis’s design can find, shapes – women? a woman? young women? – move into light or are found in the darkness. It could be the holy light above or a light to run from. With projections in front of and behind the stage, it hints of a black and white movie but is nothing like a black and white movie as the sound of breath and bodies falling to their knees asks if their kneeling is choice.
After light, they move through explorations of body, fire and voice. And to make such mesmerising imagery sound so clinical, intelligent and “artistic” is unfair.
Founded by Valente and Davis, The Rabble’s process starts with design and develops through improvisation. Text and texts are vital to their process but is one of the last things on the stage. We watch more than we hear, and when the women are finally given voices, their words are fiercer, brighter and more blistering that the fire – that fire! – that came before.
It’s hard to think when watching this work. It’s seems so clear but every moment is filled with ideas and discussions that are too complex to be reduced to words.
Luisa Hastings Edge, Emily Milledge, Dana Miltins and Nikki Sheils are Joan. Each is extraordinary and together they confront the expectations of Joan and her story, and question why pain, strength and faith are considered virtues for a woman, let alone a child.
At times, it’s like getting into Joan's soul and feeling with her. But it’s more confrontational when we’re distanced and see ourselves judging her as a Saint or Sinner and putting both on a pedestal that burns with the bundles of wooden faggots stacked around her.
The Rabble create astonishing independent theatre with an independent budget. I'm thrilled to be able to see them in small rooms, but it's beyond my understanding why festivals around the world aren't begging for work like this to be in their programs.
13 February 2017
Review: Lifetime Guarantee
Lifetime Guarantee
Theatre Works
10 February 2017
Theatre Works
to 26 February
theatreworks.org.au
My review in The Age/SMH.
With apologies for getting Mark Constable and Julian Dibley-Hall's names mixed up.
Theatre Works
10 February 2017
Theatre Works
to 26 February
theatreworks.org.au
 |
| Izabella Yena & Julian Dibley-Hall. Photo by Pier Carthew |
My review in The Age/SMH.
With apologies for getting Mark Constable and Julian Dibley-Hall's names mixed up.
13 December 2016
What Melbourne Loved in 2016, part 9
Today we here from three amazing kick-arse women and actors: Andi Snelling, Mary Helen Sassman and Genevieve Giuffre.
And we're reminded that La Mama turns 50 next year. Here's to spending a lot of time in Carlton next year.
Andi Snelling
actor
AS's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I'm the sort of person who uses the word "love" a lot. And I do mean it when I say it. I love colour co-ordination. I love satire. I love cry-laughing. And I really, really, really super love theatre. This year, I recall saying the word "love: in relation to something I’d seen on a stage in these ways:
Am I Right Ladies? (Luisa Omielan, MICF): I loved the dance party atmosphere Luisa created as you entered and exited her show. It made me feel like everyone in the audience had suddenly come together to be in the same feminist, fist-pumping gang. Like we instantly got every other stranger in the room. It was that simple and powerful.
Nelken (Tanztheater Wuppertal, Adelaide Festival*): I loved this show and the way I ended up there. Sometimes with theatre, you don’t go to it, it comes to you. I randomly wound up with a ticket to this show via a fortuitous conversation with someone I bumped into at the Adelaide Fringe Artists Bar. You know, one of those a-performer-I-met-once-at-a workshop type connections? He had accidentally gone on the wrong night to the show, but the ushers, for whatever reason**, hadn’t noticed his tickets were for the following night and they let him in and he somehow got seats. So on the real night that the tickets were valid for, I ended up going! I had second row seats so could literally smell the Nelken (carnations) – actually, they were fake, but I could definitely smell them, that’s how excited I was to be there. Apart from the show's historical significance, I feel like this was the first time I saw Tanztheater done the way it's meant to be done. I've always felt actors lack physical expertise and dancers lack acting expertise, so seeing these two elements beautifully melded together hit my heart hard. This experience was one that goes well beyond the minutes and seconds of the show itself.
* I know it’s not a Melbourne theatre moment, but I’m a sometimes rule-breaker and this was my favourite show of the year. (SM: Breaking rules is a rule here.)
** I like to think they subliminally knew that Andi Snelling chick just has to see this.
Purge (Brian Lobel, MICF): I loved the way something of significance in my life changed because of this show. Purge was totally out-of-the-box: part–game show, part–love story and part-lecture, which got my cry-laughing juices going (which you already know is a thing I love). It was a highly interactive theatrical experience in which Brian shared his story about how he had kept or deleted 1300 of his Facebook friends, based on strangers' decisions. During the show itself, I ended up on stage re-friend requesting an old friend who I had unfriended the year before after a bitter falling out. This personal moment for me became a personal moment for everyone in the audience that day. And I wasn't the only one who got up. I realised how extraordinary it was that a kooky comedy show had got me reflecting so soberly on my connection to the humans in my world.
What AS is looking forward to in 2017: Somehow managing to score a free ticket to The Book of Mormon!
SM: I love anyone who uses the word love even more than I do. Andi's Deja Vu at Melbourne Fringe was dance theatre at its best. It was emotionally dark and at times very weird; for most of it, I had no idea what it was about or what was going on – and that was the point. I loved being able to sit and watch a performer without having to assign any meaning that wasn't my own. It was like crawling around in emotion and not being able to tell which were hers and which were mine.
andisnelling.com
Mary Helen Sassman
actor
MHS's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I guess I can't name watching my four-year-old make his ballet debut in an excerpt from The Nutcracker as my faourite moment in a theatre in 2016? It's not what you think, it's just that I got to watch his face in the theatre after his item had ended as he fell deeply in love for the very first time. Awwwwww.
I have two legitimate favourite moments to share: One was to witness the harrowing transformation of Jane Montgomery Griffiths as a woman dying in Wit. She killed it. She crushed me. She is remarkable.
The other was Jess Thoms in Backstage in Biscuitland. I howled with laughter and crumbled with shame while she performed with vulnerability, with sheer resilience and at every step with consumate story telling skill. This was the piece I raved about in the school yard.
What MHS is looking forward to in 2017: La Mama turns 50!!! What does this mean? Well, a party of course. But also a book on the history of my favourite theatre (oh the stories, oh the pics!) And then a season curated by Liz Jones where she has invited loads of excellent people who have worked here to present a work for a few nights. The rest of this town might as well shut down for a time – it's going to be jam packed and so much fun!
Oh, Joan (The Rabble) at Theatre Works will surely be AMAZING (I'm not in it so I'm allowed to say that). In fact, I'd take out a subscription to the entire 2017 Theatreworks program if I could.
And my now five-year-old wants to sign up for jazz and acro next year and that might just trump 'em all.
SM: Mary Helen acts from a place so deep inside her that it feels like we're watching something secret. As for a moment: steak and glitter in Cain and Abel.
Genevieve Giuffre
actor
GG's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I loved Hissy fits menacing work I might blow up someday for FOLA. After a long winter of some pretty boring theatre in London, it was so nice to be beaten and tackled to the ground by a giant head banging Bratz doll (main man Nat Randall).
I can still see Mark Wilson's body contorting in front of a black curtain in Anti-Hamlet (what a great show!) The "SORRY" on fire in Blaque Showgirls after the sorry not sorry dance. Ben Grant's yogo and wigs nightmare in The Rug, and how Zoe Coombs Marr's Trigger Warning emerged like a phoenix out of a desolate tip of a year for independent funding and support.
What GG is looking forward to in 2017: The next generation taking over... but in the meantime, The Homosexuals or Faggots, Joan, Merciless Gods, The Book of Exodus 1 & 11 and of course the return season of Playing to Win.
SM: This is easy: every moment Genevieve was on stage in Lilith, the Jungle Girl. She captures the soul of broken people and makes their pain so hilarious that it hurts to keep watching because you're trying to laugh and cry at the same time.
part 1
part 2
part 3
part 4
part 5
part 6
part 7
part 8
2014
2013
2012
And we're reminded that La Mama turns 50 next year. Here's to spending a lot of time in Carlton next year.
Andi Snelling
actor
 |
| Andi Snelling. Photo by Sarah Walker |
AS's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I'm the sort of person who uses the word "love" a lot. And I do mean it when I say it. I love colour co-ordination. I love satire. I love cry-laughing. And I really, really, really super love theatre. This year, I recall saying the word "love: in relation to something I’d seen on a stage in these ways:
Am I Right Ladies? (Luisa Omielan, MICF): I loved the dance party atmosphere Luisa created as you entered and exited her show. It made me feel like everyone in the audience had suddenly come together to be in the same feminist, fist-pumping gang. Like we instantly got every other stranger in the room. It was that simple and powerful.
Nelken (Tanztheater Wuppertal, Adelaide Festival*): I loved this show and the way I ended up there. Sometimes with theatre, you don’t go to it, it comes to you. I randomly wound up with a ticket to this show via a fortuitous conversation with someone I bumped into at the Adelaide Fringe Artists Bar. You know, one of those a-performer-I-met-once-at-a workshop type connections? He had accidentally gone on the wrong night to the show, but the ushers, for whatever reason**, hadn’t noticed his tickets were for the following night and they let him in and he somehow got seats. So on the real night that the tickets were valid for, I ended up going! I had second row seats so could literally smell the Nelken (carnations) – actually, they were fake, but I could definitely smell them, that’s how excited I was to be there. Apart from the show's historical significance, I feel like this was the first time I saw Tanztheater done the way it's meant to be done. I've always felt actors lack physical expertise and dancers lack acting expertise, so seeing these two elements beautifully melded together hit my heart hard. This experience was one that goes well beyond the minutes and seconds of the show itself.
* I know it’s not a Melbourne theatre moment, but I’m a sometimes rule-breaker and this was my favourite show of the year. (SM: Breaking rules is a rule here.)
** I like to think they subliminally knew that Andi Snelling chick just has to see this.
Purge (Brian Lobel, MICF): I loved the way something of significance in my life changed because of this show. Purge was totally out-of-the-box: part–game show, part–love story and part-lecture, which got my cry-laughing juices going (which you already know is a thing I love). It was a highly interactive theatrical experience in which Brian shared his story about how he had kept or deleted 1300 of his Facebook friends, based on strangers' decisions. During the show itself, I ended up on stage re-friend requesting an old friend who I had unfriended the year before after a bitter falling out. This personal moment for me became a personal moment for everyone in the audience that day. And I wasn't the only one who got up. I realised how extraordinary it was that a kooky comedy show had got me reflecting so soberly on my connection to the humans in my world.
What AS is looking forward to in 2017: Somehow managing to score a free ticket to The Book of Mormon!
SM: I love anyone who uses the word love even more than I do. Andi's Deja Vu at Melbourne Fringe was dance theatre at its best. It was emotionally dark and at times very weird; for most of it, I had no idea what it was about or what was going on – and that was the point. I loved being able to sit and watch a performer without having to assign any meaning that wasn't my own. It was like crawling around in emotion and not being able to tell which were hers and which were mine.
andisnelling.com
Mary Helen Sassman
actor
 |
| Mary Helen Sassman. Photo by Brett Boardman |
MHS's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I guess I can't name watching my four-year-old make his ballet debut in an excerpt from The Nutcracker as my faourite moment in a theatre in 2016? It's not what you think, it's just that I got to watch his face in the theatre after his item had ended as he fell deeply in love for the very first time. Awwwwww.
I have two legitimate favourite moments to share: One was to witness the harrowing transformation of Jane Montgomery Griffiths as a woman dying in Wit. She killed it. She crushed me. She is remarkable.
The other was Jess Thoms in Backstage in Biscuitland. I howled with laughter and crumbled with shame while she performed with vulnerability, with sheer resilience and at every step with consumate story telling skill. This was the piece I raved about in the school yard.
What MHS is looking forward to in 2017: La Mama turns 50!!! What does this mean? Well, a party of course. But also a book on the history of my favourite theatre (oh the stories, oh the pics!) And then a season curated by Liz Jones where she has invited loads of excellent people who have worked here to present a work for a few nights. The rest of this town might as well shut down for a time – it's going to be jam packed and so much fun!
Oh, Joan (The Rabble) at Theatre Works will surely be AMAZING (I'm not in it so I'm allowed to say that). In fact, I'd take out a subscription to the entire 2017 Theatreworks program if I could.
And my now five-year-old wants to sign up for jazz and acro next year and that might just trump 'em all.
SM: Mary Helen acts from a place so deep inside her that it feels like we're watching something secret. As for a moment: steak and glitter in Cain and Abel.
Genevieve Giuffre
actor
 |
| Genevieve Giuffre |
GG's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I loved Hissy fits menacing work I might blow up someday for FOLA. After a long winter of some pretty boring theatre in London, it was so nice to be beaten and tackled to the ground by a giant head banging Bratz doll (main man Nat Randall).
I can still see Mark Wilson's body contorting in front of a black curtain in Anti-Hamlet (what a great show!) The "SORRY" on fire in Blaque Showgirls after the sorry not sorry dance. Ben Grant's yogo and wigs nightmare in The Rug, and how Zoe Coombs Marr's Trigger Warning emerged like a phoenix out of a desolate tip of a year for independent funding and support.
What GG is looking forward to in 2017: The next generation taking over... but in the meantime, The Homosexuals or Faggots, Joan, Merciless Gods, The Book of Exodus 1 & 11 and of course the return season of Playing to Win.
SM: This is easy: every moment Genevieve was on stage in Lilith, the Jungle Girl. She captures the soul of broken people and makes their pain so hilarious that it hurts to keep watching because you're trying to laugh and cry at the same time.
part 2
part 3
part 4
part 5
part 6
part 7
part 8
2014
2013
2012
06 December 2016
What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 4
Today's moments are from three men whose theatre voices are bold, challenging and totally their own: Daniel Lammin, Stephen Nicolazzo and David Finnigan. We're going to see a lot more of their work of in the years to come
Daniel Lammin
director, writer, obsessive collector
DL's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: No piece of theatre this year hit me with as much force as Picnic at Hanging Rock. The book is my favourite Australian book and the film is my favourite Australian film, both having had an enormous impact on me growing up. I also love the work that Matt Lutton, Tom Wright, Zoë Atkinson and Paul Jackson have done together in the past, so consequently my expectations were enormous. The result though exceeded my expectations beyond my wildest dreams. The production captured the concerns of Lindsay’s story, the sexual repression of young women and the Australian landscape’s rejection of us as an invading force, and crafted it into an impressive work of art in its own right, pulsing from Matt’s rigorous direction, Zoë and Paul’s remarkable design, the cast’s tremendous performances and Tom’s diabolical, awe-inspiring text.
It also understood the most misunderstood aspect of the story, that at its heart it is a work of horror, one that crawls under your skin and festers there for the rest of your life.
Watching Picnic was one of the most exhilarating experiences I've ever had in the theatre, both because of what was happening on the stage and what was happening in the audience, a mass of people battered and thrown by the uncompromising force of what they were seeing, jumping and screaming and gasping in unison. The teenager sitting next to me literally jumped out of his chair at a moment of sublime theatrical horror, and sat on the edge of his seat for the rest of the night. It was a perfectly executed theatrical event, one that shows tremendous respect for its source material but with the imagination and rigour to be a great work of art on its own. It left me breathless, exhilarated, disturbed, in awe and in tears, and like the book and film before it, left an enormous and life-changing impact on me and my work as a theatre maker. I confidently rank it as one of the best pieces of theatre I’ve ever seen.
What DL is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: Unsurprisingly, I’m incredibly excited to see how the same team approach The Elephant Man. It’s a beautiful story but a theatrically complicated one, and if they apply the same rigour to this one that they applied to Picnic, it could be something really special. I also can’t wait to catch CULL during the Comedy Festival (I missed it during the Fringe and regretted it enormously), and to see what She Said Theatre does next – their work is just getting better and better, and continues to be some of the most important being made.
SM: Daniel wrote and directed Awakening for MUST (performed at Trades Hall). It was an adaption of Spring Awakening by Frank Wedekind (not the musical also based on it) and was one of the most moving and gut-punching pieces of theatre I saw this year. Another MUST show that nowhere near enough people saw. I really hope that someone gives this show another season because it's heartbreaking to think that it won't be seen again – with the same cast please.
Brilliant update: Awakenings has been picked up by the super-wonderful fortyfivedownstairs, so put 10–21 May in your diary now. Book here.
And while you're there, look at the at what else is coming there next year. What a season!
Stephen Nicolazzo
director, Little Ones Theatre; likes Madonna
SN's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Hands down, my favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016 were: Cain and Abel (The Rabble ), Gonzo (St Martin’s/Malthouse) and Terror Australis (Leah Shelton at Melbourne Fringe). These works were brave, beautiful, and furious. They were focussed on the craft of visual story telling and the presentation of complex political perspectives in cheeky, adventurous and moving ways.
All were born from Australia’s most courageous female artists: Emma Valente, Kate Davis, Clare Watson and the divine Leah Shelton, and all were a formally adventurous master class in contemporary theatre practice. Finally, each of these works had exquisite craft on display, which to me is an integral part of theatre making. They didn’t bend the rules simply to provoke. They bent them to explore craft and courage.
This is what I want in my theatre. My personal moment of 2016 was getting to tour Dangerous Liaisons for the last time. It has been two years since Dangerous opened at MTC Neon, and it has grown substantially since then, blossomed into a work that I am extremely proud of. It is so rare to develop a work after its initial presentation and in the case of this one, it has been such a unique gift to refine, reassess, and nuance. So very grateful to all of the festivals and presenters who took a risk on our huge mother fucker of a show and to the audiences across the country who have fallen in love with it.
What SN is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: The Theatre Works 2017 season. CAN.NOT.WAIT.
SM: I'll see any theatre Stephen makes, but I missed the return of Dangerous Ls and I missed the Madonna night that he programmed for Melbourne Fringe – but I loved lying in bed and watching the pics and videos of it on Twitter.
If you want to support Little Ones Theatre's Midsumma show, donate here.
David Finnigan
playwright
DF's favourite moment in Melbourne theatre in 2016: This might not be the moment, but I found myself really, really sinking into Nat Randall's The Second Woman performance at Next Wave. I went along intending to stay for a few minutes, found myself there for an hour or two at least. It was weirdly satisfying, so many dimensions to it, but it was sitting afterwards with Jane Howard while she unpacked it for me, that was the real lightbulb moment. I dug that. Maybe that's the combination: good artwork, good analysis, good chats with good humans. That's all you need.
What DF is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: I'm looking forward to the major companies retreating further out of touch, the existing funding structures coming apart at the seams and the whole system continuing its histrionic slow-motion collapse, so we can hurry up and see what weird alternatives emerge out of the edges.
SM: I loved seeing Kill Climate Deniers at the Melbourne Fringe, but my moment was reading the play. I was sitting in a cafe in Avalon on Sydney's north coast (which is exactly like the awesome web series Avalon Now, made by real estate site) eating a huge salad with purple cabbage, kale and every super food – while listening to a woman ask why they didn't have a quinoa salad (nuts weren't good enough protein for her) – then being recommended a chocolate cake that was pretty much melted dark chocolate and dates. It was like I was living in the world of Kill Climate Deniers; I WAS in the world of Kill Climate Deniers – and willingly being part of it.
(PS: I love being sent new scripts to read.)
part 1
part 2
part 3
2014
2013
2012
Daniel Lammin
director, writer, obsessive collector
 |
| Daniel Lammin's 30th birthday present-to-self selfie |
DL's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: No piece of theatre this year hit me with as much force as Picnic at Hanging Rock. The book is my favourite Australian book and the film is my favourite Australian film, both having had an enormous impact on me growing up. I also love the work that Matt Lutton, Tom Wright, Zoë Atkinson and Paul Jackson have done together in the past, so consequently my expectations were enormous. The result though exceeded my expectations beyond my wildest dreams. The production captured the concerns of Lindsay’s story, the sexual repression of young women and the Australian landscape’s rejection of us as an invading force, and crafted it into an impressive work of art in its own right, pulsing from Matt’s rigorous direction, Zoë and Paul’s remarkable design, the cast’s tremendous performances and Tom’s diabolical, awe-inspiring text.
It also understood the most misunderstood aspect of the story, that at its heart it is a work of horror, one that crawls under your skin and festers there for the rest of your life.
Watching Picnic was one of the most exhilarating experiences I've ever had in the theatre, both because of what was happening on the stage and what was happening in the audience, a mass of people battered and thrown by the uncompromising force of what they were seeing, jumping and screaming and gasping in unison. The teenager sitting next to me literally jumped out of his chair at a moment of sublime theatrical horror, and sat on the edge of his seat for the rest of the night. It was a perfectly executed theatrical event, one that shows tremendous respect for its source material but with the imagination and rigour to be a great work of art on its own. It left me breathless, exhilarated, disturbed, in awe and in tears, and like the book and film before it, left an enormous and life-changing impact on me and my work as a theatre maker. I confidently rank it as one of the best pieces of theatre I’ve ever seen.
What DL is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: Unsurprisingly, I’m incredibly excited to see how the same team approach The Elephant Man. It’s a beautiful story but a theatrically complicated one, and if they apply the same rigour to this one that they applied to Picnic, it could be something really special. I also can’t wait to catch CULL during the Comedy Festival (I missed it during the Fringe and regretted it enormously), and to see what She Said Theatre does next – their work is just getting better and better, and continues to be some of the most important being made.
SM: Daniel wrote and directed Awakening for MUST (performed at Trades Hall). It was an adaption of Spring Awakening by Frank Wedekind (not the musical also based on it) and was one of the most moving and gut-punching pieces of theatre I saw this year. Another MUST show that nowhere near enough people saw. I really hope that someone gives this show another season because it's heartbreaking to think that it won't be seen again – with the same cast please.
Brilliant update: Awakenings has been picked up by the super-wonderful fortyfivedownstairs, so put 10–21 May in your diary now. Book here.
And while you're there, look at the at what else is coming there next year. What a season!
Stephen Nicolazzo
director, Little Ones Theatre; likes Madonna
 |
| Stephen Nicolazzo |
SN's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Hands down, my favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016 were: Cain and Abel (The Rabble ), Gonzo (St Martin’s/Malthouse) and Terror Australis (Leah Shelton at Melbourne Fringe). These works were brave, beautiful, and furious. They were focussed on the craft of visual story telling and the presentation of complex political perspectives in cheeky, adventurous and moving ways.
All were born from Australia’s most courageous female artists: Emma Valente, Kate Davis, Clare Watson and the divine Leah Shelton, and all were a formally adventurous master class in contemporary theatre practice. Finally, each of these works had exquisite craft on display, which to me is an integral part of theatre making. They didn’t bend the rules simply to provoke. They bent them to explore craft and courage.
This is what I want in my theatre. My personal moment of 2016 was getting to tour Dangerous Liaisons for the last time. It has been two years since Dangerous opened at MTC Neon, and it has grown substantially since then, blossomed into a work that I am extremely proud of. It is so rare to develop a work after its initial presentation and in the case of this one, it has been such a unique gift to refine, reassess, and nuance. So very grateful to all of the festivals and presenters who took a risk on our huge mother fucker of a show and to the audiences across the country who have fallen in love with it.
What SN is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: The Theatre Works 2017 season. CAN.NOT.WAIT.
SM: I'll see any theatre Stephen makes, but I missed the return of Dangerous Ls and I missed the Madonna night that he programmed for Melbourne Fringe – but I loved lying in bed and watching the pics and videos of it on Twitter.
If you want to support Little Ones Theatre's Midsumma show, donate here.
David Finnigan
playwright
 |
| Georgie McAusley and David Finnigan. Photo by Sarah Walker |
DF's favourite moment in Melbourne theatre in 2016: This might not be the moment, but I found myself really, really sinking into Nat Randall's The Second Woman performance at Next Wave. I went along intending to stay for a few minutes, found myself there for an hour or two at least. It was weirdly satisfying, so many dimensions to it, but it was sitting afterwards with Jane Howard while she unpacked it for me, that was the real lightbulb moment. I dug that. Maybe that's the combination: good artwork, good analysis, good chats with good humans. That's all you need.
What DF is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: I'm looking forward to the major companies retreating further out of touch, the existing funding structures coming apart at the seams and the whole system continuing its histrionic slow-motion collapse, so we can hurry up and see what weird alternatives emerge out of the edges.
SM: I loved seeing Kill Climate Deniers at the Melbourne Fringe, but my moment was reading the play. I was sitting in a cafe in Avalon on Sydney's north coast (which is exactly like the awesome web series Avalon Now, made by real estate site) eating a huge salad with purple cabbage, kale and every super food – while listening to a woman ask why they didn't have a quinoa salad (nuts weren't good enough protein for her) – then being recommended a chocolate cake that was pretty much melted dark chocolate and dates. It was like I was living in the world of Kill Climate Deniers; I WAS in the world of Kill Climate Deniers – and willingly being part of it.
(PS: I love being sent new scripts to read.)
part 1
part 2
part 3
2014
2013
2012
06 May 2016
More Orchid
The Orchid and The Crow
Salvador Dinosaur and Theatre Works
4 May 2016
Theatre Works
to 15 May
theatreworks.org.au
orchidandcrow.com
The Orchid and The Crow was my favourite cabaret show of 2015.
2015 review.
Since then, it's toured to festivals around the UK, Canada and back home in Australia. It was nominated for a pile of awards and won a few. The original season also won a Melbourne Green Room Award for writing.
The wonderful people at Theatre Works have brought it back to Melbourne for a two-week season. It's really hard for a successful indie show to get another run, so make the most of this. And make sure that it's a huge success so that producers and venues will keep supporting amazing indie theatre.
At 29, Daniel Tobias was diagnosed with testicular cancer; it was bad – and even as he's singing and joking about it all 10+ years later, the genuine concern for his life remains. This show is about his wonderful family and about finding/losing/accepting/questioning faith, belief, culture and gods.
There's the big G god who has a thing for foreskins – yes, it is a weird thing to do to a baby – and the lesser gods and survivors like Lance Armstrong, who beat cancer and won a lot of Tour de Frances. Lance was still a god when Daniel read his book before he had his testicle removed and had chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Looking at what the big G does to non-believers, does it even matter that Lance's lancing of himself was eventually revealed?
The show's slicker after touring and found its structure and its bigger story, but it hasn't lost any of the honesty or personal truth that makes it so compelling.
It's might also be my favourite cabaret show of 2016.
Salvador Dinosaur and Theatre Works
4 May 2016
Theatre Works
to 15 May
theatreworks.org.au
orchidandcrow.com
 |
| Daniel Tobias |
The Orchid and The Crow was my favourite cabaret show of 2015.
2015 review.
Since then, it's toured to festivals around the UK, Canada and back home in Australia. It was nominated for a pile of awards and won a few. The original season also won a Melbourne Green Room Award for writing.
The wonderful people at Theatre Works have brought it back to Melbourne for a two-week season. It's really hard for a successful indie show to get another run, so make the most of this. And make sure that it's a huge success so that producers and venues will keep supporting amazing indie theatre.
At 29, Daniel Tobias was diagnosed with testicular cancer; it was bad – and even as he's singing and joking about it all 10+ years later, the genuine concern for his life remains. This show is about his wonderful family and about finding/losing/accepting/questioning faith, belief, culture and gods.
There's the big G god who has a thing for foreskins – yes, it is a weird thing to do to a baby – and the lesser gods and survivors like Lance Armstrong, who beat cancer and won a lot of Tour de Frances. Lance was still a god when Daniel read his book before he had his testicle removed and had chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Looking at what the big G does to non-believers, does it even matter that Lance's lancing of himself was eventually revealed?
The show's slicker after touring and found its structure and its bigger story, but it hasn't lost any of the honesty or personal truth that makes it so compelling.
It's might also be my favourite cabaret show of 2016.
26 March 2016
MICF: Penny Arcade
Penny Arcade: Longing Lasts Longer
Theatre Works, London Artists Project, Soho Theatre
24 March 2014
The Famous Spiegeltent at Arts Centre Melbourne
to 3 April
comedyfestival.com.au
Penny said on Twitter that she's convinced I'd have given her five stars if she'd shown me her vagina.
Or three.
My review is at The Age/SMH
Theatre Works, London Artists Project, Soho Theatre
24 March 2014
The Famous Spiegeltent at Arts Centre Melbourne
to 3 April
comedyfestival.com.au
 |
| Penny Arcade |
Or three.
My review is at The Age/SMH
15 March 2016
FOLA: Blind
Festival of Live Art
Blind
Duda Paiva Co, Black Hole Theatre, Theatre Works
9 March
Theatre Works
to 19 March
theatreworks.org.au
FOLA is over but this extraordinarily beautiful Blind is still on at Theatre Works until the weekend.
My review is at The Age/SMH.
Blind
Duda Paiva Co, Black Hole Theatre, Theatre Works
9 March
Theatre Works
to 19 March
theatreworks.org.au
 |
| Duda Paiva. Photo by Patrick Argirakis |
My review is at The Age/SMH.
10 November 2015
Last chance: Dracula
Dracula
Little Ones Theatre
30 October 2015
Theatre Works
to 14 November
Theatreworks.org.au
Little Ones Theatre
30 October 2015
Theatre Works
to 14 November
Theatreworks.org.au
 |
| Dracula. Amanda McGregor, Kevin Kiernan Molloy, Alexandra Aldrich. Photo by Sarah Walker |
This gloriously sexy Dracula shows a much better way to do glittery vampires and it finishes this weekend at Theatre Works.
For the Melbourne Festival, Theatre Works welcomed an almost textless The Bacchae cast with women. Now Little Ones Theatre have created Bram Stoker's Dracula as a live silent movie and cast it with women.
This is Stoker’s story told with a black glitter and blood-red aesthetic that reflects, questions and wildly defies any assumptions of gender, sexuality and queer politics.Little Ones Theatre have one of the most unique voices in Melbourne theatre.
Director Stephen Nicolazzo embraces high-camp without the condescending tone or gender insult that camp laughs often come from. Inspired by the 1980s but seen through today’s eyes, their worlds are visually arresting, sexually free and always unforgettable.
If you want to experience original texts, read them. Then come to the theatre to see them through someone else's eyes.
For the Melbourne Festival, Theatre Works welcomed an almost textless The Bacchae cast with women. Now Little Ones Theatre have created Bram Stoker's Dracula as a live silent movie and cast it with women.
This is Stoker’s story told with a black glitter and blood-red aesthetic that reflects, questions and wildly defies any assumptions of gender, sexuality and queer politics.Little Ones Theatre have one of the most unique voices in Melbourne theatre.
Director Stephen Nicolazzo embraces high-camp without the condescending tone or gender insult that camp laughs often come from. Inspired by the 1980s but seen through today’s eyes, their worlds are visually arresting, sexually free and always unforgettable.
If you want to experience original texts, read them. Then come to the theatre to see them through someone else's eyes.
 |
| Catherine Davies, Brigid Gallacher. Photo by Sarah Walker |
 |
| Alexandra Aldrich. Photo by Sarah Walker |
 |
| Dracula. Alexandra Aldrich, Janine Watson, Morgan Maguire, Kevin Kiernan Molloy. Photo by Sarah Walker |
 |
| Dracula. Little Ones Theatre. Kevin Kiernan Molloy. Photo by Sarah Walker |
 |
| Dracula. Little Ones Theatre. Amanda McGregor, Zoe Boesen. Photo by Sarah Walker |
17 October 2015
MELBOURNE FESTIVAL: The Bacchae
The Bacchae
St Martins, Fraught Outfit, Melbourne Festival, Theatre Works
14 October 2015
Theatre Works
to 24 October 2015
www.festival.melbourne
I didn't take my eyes off the stage and am still trying to fully understand the astonishingly beautiful, often disturbing and totally unapologetic adaption of The Bacchae created by Adena Jacobs, Aaron Orzech and a cast of teenage women from St Martin's youth theatre.
Euripides's The Bacchae is about the god Dionysus coming to Thebes disguised as a human and generally wreaking havoc with the women of the city who head to the hills and get up to all sorts of drunken, sensual and violent mischief. An angry, and pervy, king dresses as a woman, heads are torn off and most of the action can only be described because it's too much for moral and sensitive audiences.
If you know the Euripides play, it's all on the stage, even though it's told through live music and dream-cum-nightmare visions with a blow up pool, an inflatable Luna Park smile and blood the colour of gold. There's only a page of the text, and after Dionysus's birth from Zeus's thigh, it's told from the women's point of view. The whole story is re-imagined with young women as all the characters. Dionysus – the god so often envisioned with a huge cock and women at his feet – is a teenage girl who slept in and doesn't have time to straighten her hair.
Let that sink in: young women are the gods and rulers. Not only are they the possessed and riotous mob, they are the people who cause and punish the violence and chaos. And when they become drunk and out of control, they become young men – with long fluffy phallus. If you're a young man who wonders how young women see you, please see this.
The night I went, there was a school group in the audience. They were silent, in a can't-stop-watching way. Do I even need to say more about the power of this production?
If you don't know the play – and why should you?; embrace every re-telling as a new story – it's a world where young women are the storytellers, the exploiters and the exploited.
It lets us see how they see themselves compared to how they think the world sees them. We meet them as their unique selves wearing denim and t-shirts but they become faceless, oiled bodies in identical bikinis. It's uncomfortable to make the connections between the identifiable teenagers talking about Vegemite toast to the unidentifiable objectified bodies. Which is what makes it so brilliant.
Yesterday I was driving along Warrigal Road and stopped at the North Road intersection. There's a place called Kittens Car Wash where young women in bikinis wash cars. A blow up sex doll holds balloons at the entrance. It's a busy intersection in the semi-industrial suburbs and thousands and thousands of cars stop and see young women in bikinis washing cars.
This is why we need to see young women in our theatres saying how this isn't the world they want to live in. The Bacchae shows us what they think we see when we look at them. They see the objectification, the reduction to sexual pleasure giver (not takers) and a world where they might have to wash cars in a bikini to pay their rent, uni fees or childcare.
And they're saying no.
This is also on AussieTheatre.com.
St Martins, Fraught Outfit, Melbourne Festival, Theatre Works
14 October 2015
Theatre Works
to 24 October 2015
www.festival.melbourne
 |
| The Bacchae. Melbourne Festival. Photo by Pia Johnson |
I didn't take my eyes off the stage and am still trying to fully understand the astonishingly beautiful, often disturbing and totally unapologetic adaption of The Bacchae created by Adena Jacobs, Aaron Orzech and a cast of teenage women from St Martin's youth theatre.
Euripides's The Bacchae is about the god Dionysus coming to Thebes disguised as a human and generally wreaking havoc with the women of the city who head to the hills and get up to all sorts of drunken, sensual and violent mischief. An angry, and pervy, king dresses as a woman, heads are torn off and most of the action can only be described because it's too much for moral and sensitive audiences.
If you know the Euripides play, it's all on the stage, even though it's told through live music and dream-cum-nightmare visions with a blow up pool, an inflatable Luna Park smile and blood the colour of gold. There's only a page of the text, and after Dionysus's birth from Zeus's thigh, it's told from the women's point of view. The whole story is re-imagined with young women as all the characters. Dionysus – the god so often envisioned with a huge cock and women at his feet – is a teenage girl who slept in and doesn't have time to straighten her hair.
Let that sink in: young women are the gods and rulers. Not only are they the possessed and riotous mob, they are the people who cause and punish the violence and chaos. And when they become drunk and out of control, they become young men – with long fluffy phallus. If you're a young man who wonders how young women see you, please see this.
The night I went, there was a school group in the audience. They were silent, in a can't-stop-watching way. Do I even need to say more about the power of this production?
If you don't know the play – and why should you?; embrace every re-telling as a new story – it's a world where young women are the storytellers, the exploiters and the exploited.
It lets us see how they see themselves compared to how they think the world sees them. We meet them as their unique selves wearing denim and t-shirts but they become faceless, oiled bodies in identical bikinis. It's uncomfortable to make the connections between the identifiable teenagers talking about Vegemite toast to the unidentifiable objectified bodies. Which is what makes it so brilliant.
Yesterday I was driving along Warrigal Road and stopped at the North Road intersection. There's a place called Kittens Car Wash where young women in bikinis wash cars. A blow up sex doll holds balloons at the entrance. It's a busy intersection in the semi-industrial suburbs and thousands and thousands of cars stop and see young women in bikinis washing cars.
This is why we need to see young women in our theatres saying how this isn't the world they want to live in. The Bacchae shows us what they think we see when we look at them. They see the objectification, the reduction to sexual pleasure giver (not takers) and a world where they might have to wash cars in a bikini to pay their rent, uni fees or childcare.
And they're saying no.
This is also on AussieTheatre.com.
05 July 2015
Review: Saltwater & Letters Home
Saltwater
Letters Home
Theatre Works
2 July 2015
Theatre Works
to 12 July
 |
| Joe Lui, Jamie Lewis |
Saltwater and Letters Home is a double bill of solo shows by 20-something artists who were born and brought up in Singapore and now live in Australia. Jamie Lewis and Joe Lui share their stories of parents and childhood to explore what they think of when asked about "home".
Jamie Lewis's Saltwater can only welcome enough people to fit around a large dining table. The back of the Theatre Works space has become her living room, with hand-washing bowls hanging from the ceiling, a small kitchen in the corner and the round table where we sit, talk and eat.
The first task is trimming bean sprouts and the group – mostly strangers – almost immediately start talking about cooking as our all-in or clean-bench styles become obvious.
Jamie encourages conversation, but it isn't long until she's telling us about her mother, cooking and family dinners. Jamie was brought up in Singapore and moved to Melbourne when she fell in love with and married an Australian.
She talks about Christmas dinners and the Eurasian Devil's Curry that every family expects in Singapore (think Christmas leftovers Malaysian–Chinese style ) and wonders about her mother told her that marriage is hard work. Her story, of the first time she hosted a family Christmas in Australia, continues as she serves us her vegetarian version of the curry – which is delicious – and a dessert of Wife Cake.
It's a loving reflection on the mother–daughter relationship and cross-cultural relationships and its informality lets the audience become family for an hour as differences and awkwardness disappear.
Its style of cooking and serving food while telling a story is similar to Barking Spider's recent One Suitcase, Four Stories (about being Italian and living in Northcote) and Dokboki Box (about living in South Korea) at last year's Next Wave festival. The experience was delightful but it left us with more questions than answers about Jamie and could benefit from a re-focus on the story and the conflict or question that's being explored.
The second show is Letters Home by Perth-based Joe Lui. With bookshelves, plastic curtains and a changing projection onto an artists canvas, its theatre setting is his dream world. There's also some cooking, but it's a more intimate work as Joe reveals his demons and questions if he will ever see his parents again.
His upbringing wasn't as loving as Jamie's. When he went to Perth to go to university (he'd earned money as a host on a children's tv show), he knew he had two years of unavoidable National Service or three years in gaol on his return. He didn't get on his flight back to Singapore.
Letters Home is a series of letters that his parents may never see about how he became his true self in Australia and why he left his childhood and upbringing as far away as he could. He begins by adding pre-made stock (!) to a traditional steam boat dish and apologises to his parents for the overly emotional and earnestly angry first letter he did send them – is there anyone who shouldn't apologise letters we wrote in our early 20s – when he didn't return home.
Joe isn't his birth name and the story about why he chose it is brilliant. His parents probably wouldn't call him Joe and may not even recognise the man with long hair who wears a red Asian dressing coat over his blacks; has the logo of his company, Renegade Productions, tattooed on his chest; and is thrilled to have broken at least every sexual taboo he grew up with. And he's certain that they wouldn't be proud of the success and respect he has in Perth's independent and professional thearte world
Their voice is silent and the noise of that silence raises as many questions as it answers.
Sure, it could also benefit from a less-attached dramaturgical tighten that focuses on story, but it's a strong and powerful piece that leaves the audience feeling like they know Joe Lui as a friend and are more than happy to be a part of his extended new family of friends in Australia.
This was on AussieTheatre.com.
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