Melbourne Theatre Company Season 2015

Coral Drouyn ticks off the ‘must-see’ productions as the Melbourne Theatre Company launches its 2015 season.

Attending launches goes with the territory of being a reviewer. Whilst they are interesting they rarely excite enough to have one salivating. But MTC changed all that last night and I joined 2,000 other theatre-lovers in “oohing” and “aahing” and mumbling “I want to see that.”

In announcing his third season as Artistic Director, Brett Sheehy has stamped his signature on our State theatre company. The list of plays and the stars and directors is listed in full here, so let me tell you the things you had to be there to see - the passion of the actors and directors, the excitement of Sheehy himself, and the innovation that MTC started last year and intends to keep building on. MTC may be a state company, but its reputation is growing and it’s spreading its wings overseas. There is much talk in London of Eddie Perfect’s “The Beast”, and of “The Speechmaker” and “Rupert” – all plays by Australian playwrights, all developed and premiered by Melbourne Theatre Company itself.

And so to 2015 – under the banner “Live in Living Colour” and Sheehy’s dissertation that we are “driven as a species to gather around a campfire to tell stories.” The “campfire” will be lit in four theatres next year: The Sumner and The Lawler at Southbank, and the Playhouse and the Fairfax Studio at the Arts Centre. Those are facts – but it was hearing the actors and directors themselves tell THEIR stories that excited us.

Jane Turner is genuinely thrilled to be playing the lead in the Smash West End hit Jumpy by April de Angelis. She quipped how playing a middle class woman approaching 50 was going to be “a bit of a stretch” and wondered if they’d let her wear her “Kath Wig”. With Pamela Rabe directing Turner in a Smash hit play, you’d have to say that’s ‘TICK ONE’.

Tim Rogers brought his guitar and unique dress sense to centre stage for a song from What Rhymes With Cars and Girls, which has now been turned into a musical with Aidan Fennessy providing the book. Both took great pains to assure the audience that Tim will not, under any circumstances, be acting in this World Premiere. Whilst some of the older subscribers (and let’s face it, they are the MTC’s bread and butter) looked bemused by Rogers, this is one TICK for the UNDER 45s, and Rogers is an icon here.

Perhaps the most heartfelt speech of the night came from the great Colin Friels who will play Hamm in Samuel Beckett’s Masterpiece, Endgame. To hear Friels humbly talk about the reason why he (and every other actor) acts, was inspirational. He described such plays as being dogs’ work for an actor – “And I have tried to be a good dog. Whatever I’ve learned, I’ve learned from the audience. You are all that counts … to have a conversation with the audience is all that matters.” And with director Sam Strong having the play high up on his ‘Bucket List’ there is another  “TICK” in the box.

A new play, another World Premiere, is The Waiting Room by Kelly Trounson whose father Alan Trounson was instrumental in the success of Australia’s IVF programme (only the 3^rd IVF baby born in the world was Australian). She spoke with passion of this semi auto-biographical story and told of how she was in labour dictating changes to the script via her cell-phone.  Director and collaborator Naomi Edwards promises a play about NOW, but crossing all boundaries of past and future; impossible not to TICK this one.

There were more than a few gasps when Simon Phillips announced that his wife Carolyn Burns had adapted North by Northwest as a play with him directing and the blessing of Warner Bros. No word on who will play Cary Grant but, for me, isn’t it time we got Hugh Jackman back for a stage role? This can’t fail to get a HUGE TICK in the box.

Anyone who is a Simon Stephens (The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time) fan will want to see his gritty punk-rock drama Birdland, especially after hearing star Mark Leonard Winter talk with intensity from the play about the “Numbers” of fame…How many in the audience; how much you earn; how many hotel rooms you’ve trashed; how many women you’ve bedded... and “How do you keep your head when 100,000 people are looking to you for answers, when all you did was write a rock and roll song?” This is a must see for me, TICK.

I recently reviewed Ariel Dorfman’s Purgattorio, which was sensational – so I’m putting a mass of TICKS beside his most famous play Death and The Maiden, which will star the wonderful Susie Porter and also run in the STC’s season. Most importantly it is directed by the ferociously passionate Letitia Caceres – herself the child of South American political exile. Another TICK…if it wasn’t so exciting the ticking process would be wearing thin.

Nadine Garner talked of being “terrified” to tackle Conor McPherson’s lyrical Irish play The Weir. Director Sam Strong explained that he took an “Irish Bar Approach” to casting; which didn’t mean drinking so much Guinness he forgot who he had cast, but rather calling on regulars, those comfortable with telling stories to each other. It fitted perfectly with Sheehy’s analogy of camp-fire storytelling, and certainly should be on everyone’s TICK list.

Pinter – you either love him or hate him, there is no middle ground. I love him so it’s a HUGE TICK for me to know that we get to see the terrific Alison Bell in Betrayal – Pinter’s relationship play told backwards. Director Geordie Brookman brings this production from The State Theatre Company of South Australia.

Ash Flanders, a charismatic performer who is beyond gender, will bring us Buyer and Cellar by Jonathan Tollins, another Australian premiere which took Broadway by storm. To have a play inspired by Babs Streisand – who really DOES have a Mall of shops in her basement to house all her collections (no I’m not making this up) is a delicious concept, but to hear the star read from Streisand’s OWN book on decorating, with every nasal nuance, was hysterical. TTRIPLE TICKS…one for the production and one each for Streisand’s and Flanders’ noses.

Then, opening on November 11^th, Remembrance Day, comes Steve Vizzard’s and Paul Grabowsky’s comedy with song commemorating the 100^th anniversary of Gallipoli Last Man Standing, which, as Vizzard explained, blurs the lines between history, memory and myth and features the great Peter Carroll as Clarry, the only living veteran, who takes on the stodgy “Bull of Khabul” who is chosen to produce the commemorative proceedings. This promises to be a treat and it would be unpatriotic not to TICK.

And for the family there is the enchanting The Boy At The Edge Of Everything. Written by the astonishing Finegan Kruckemeyer, a Tasmanian playwright who has had 71 plays produced and is still in his twenties, the play has already had major productions overseas. Director Peter Houghton explains that at Finegan’s age he was still trying to clean his room….unsuccessfully! He talked of the ability of the comedy writer to reduce everything to minimalism in the quest for the punchline…a sort of dramatic Haiku, and whetted our appetite at the prospect of a float tank being made to double as a space ship. The play is part Odyssey, part friendship fantasy and ALL comedy. Surely a must see with a THOUSAND TICKS.

And then there’s NEON…and Women Directors, and the Ambassadors programme, and an endowment to make theatre more accessible to students, and indigenous scholarships …the list is breath-taking, and there is still so much more to disclose at the beginning of 2015.

2013 saw MTC have its biggest box-office takings EVER, and you have to believe that this amazing programme will see them exponentially soar in 2015. It’s going to be a very exciting year.

Images above: North By Northwest and Brett Sheehy.

The Productions

Jumpy

By April De Angelis


Southbank Theatre, The Sumner

31 January – 14 March


Opening Night: 5 February 2015

Australian Premiere

Jane Turner revisits motherhood in Jumpy, a hilarious West End hit by April De Angelis about frazzled hopes and parental anxiety. Turner plays Hilary, a modern woman coming to terms with middle age and the reality that, eventually, every liberal and fair-minded parent finds themselves at the head of a dictatorship. Directed by Pamela Rabe.

 

What Rhymes with Cars and Girls


Music and lyrics by Tim Rogers, words by Aidan Fennessy.

Arts Centre Melbourne, Fairfax Studio

13 February – 28 March

Opening Night:
19 February 2015

World Premiere

The achingly lyrical songs from Tim Rogers’ debut solo album, What Rhymes with Cars and Girls, and words by award-winning playwright Aidan Fennessy are woven together to create a tale of love across the class divide in contemporary Australia.

With musical direction by Tim Rogers, What Rhymes with Cars and Girls is an urban romance, a balm for the hardest of hearts and solace for anyone who has ever been in love.

 

Endgame

By Samuel Beckett

Southbank Theatre, The Sumner

21 March – 25 April

Opening Night: 26 March 2015

Twenty-five years since MTC last performed one of Samuel Beckett’s great modernist masterpieces, Associate Artistic Director Sam Strong directs Colin Friels in Endgame. Colin Friels plays the blind man who cannot stand. He is joined by Luke Mullins (Waiting for Godot) as the servant who cannot sit and Julie Forsyth (Private Lives) as the mother who lives in a bin, on a set designed by acclaimed visual artist Callum Morton (Other Desert Cities).

 

The Waiting Room

By Kylie Trounson

Arts Centre Melbourne, Fairfax Studio

15 May – 27 June

Opening Night: 21 May 2015

First performed as part of Melbourne Theatre Company’s 2014 Cybec Electric play readings, and now receiving its world premiere on the mainstage, The Waiting Room by Kylie Trounson grapples with the nature of conception, the science of creation and what it feels like not to conceive at all. An Australian tale that celebrates the development of IVF in Melbourne from a uniquely personal perspective and examines humanity’s drive to leave its own imprint.

Aaron Pederson (MTC’s King Lear, Mystery Road, Jack Irish) plays pioneering Australian ‘Father of IVF’ Emeritus Professor Alan Trounson and Belinda McClory (The Doctor Blake Mysteries, The Matrix) a woman going through IVF, both in the 1970s and today, in a multi-layered play created in collaboration with director Naomi Edwards, who makes her MTC mainstage debut with this production.

 

North by Northwest

Adapted for the stage by Carolyn Burns

Arts Centre Melbourne, Playhouse


1 June – 4 July

Opening Night: 4 June 2015

World Premiere

Melbourne Theatre Company, in collaboration with Kay + McLean Productions and Warner Bros. Theater Ventures, presents a stunning stage adaptation of the Alfred Hitchcock film North by Northwest, adapted by Carolyn Burns and directed by Simon Phillips.

Declared ‘the Hitchcock picture to end all Hitchcock pictures’ by its screenwriter Ernest Lehman, the 1959 American spy thriller was an instant classic. Now, using 21st century stage technology, Hitchcock’s supreme suspense caper is brought to life, with every twist, every thrill, each pass of the crop-duster, and the thrilling climax on Mount Rushmore writ large on stage.

 

Birdland

By Simon Stephens

Southbank Theatre, The Sumner

6 June – 11 July

Opening Night: 11 June 2015

From the mercilessly cool pen of British playwright Simon Stephens comes Birdland, a piercing satire about celebrity obsession directed by MTC Associate Director Leticia Cáceres. Mark Leonard Winter makes his Mtc debut in this slyly witty character study of an imploding rock star which opens at 8pm Thursday 11 June 2015 at Southbank Theatre, The Sumner.

Director Leticia Cáceres said, ‘Birdland charts the unravelling of a man who seemingly has it all, taking us behind the glitter and glamour of rock & roll to reveal a victim of his own fortune. Simon Stephens does this with great wit and deft writing, resulting in one of the most innovative new plays to come out of London in the past twelve months. Our damaged idol will be played by the mesmerising Mark Leonard Winter, whose work I’ve admired for a long time and am thrilled to be collaborating with for this production.’

 

Death and the Maiden

By Ariel Dorfman

Southbank Theatre, The Sumner

18 July – 22 August

Opening Night: 23 July 2015

Some plays maintain their relevance because some horrors never go away. Ariel Dorfman’s stunning world-wide hit Death and the Maiden is one such work. Argentinian-born MTC Associate Director Leticia Cáceres brings an acute historical awareness to this new co-production with Sydney Theatre Company which stars Susie Porter and Eugene Gilfedder.

Winner of the 1992 Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Play, psychological thriller Death and the Maiden was on stage at MTC in 1993. Twenty years on, writing about its 2011 West End revival, Ariel Dorfman said, ‘It happened yesterday but it could well be today...I can’t help but ask if 20 years from now I will be writing this phrase all over again: this story happened yesterday, but it could well be today’

 

The Weir

By Conor McPherson

Arts Centre Melbourne, Fairfax Studio
14 August – 26 September

Opening Night:
 20 August 2015

Nadine Garner stars in the multi-award winning play The Weir, Conor McPherson’s beautifully crafted story about loss and the consolations of connection. Directed by MTC Associate Artistic Director Sam Strong, this play brings together the great Irish tradition of bar room tales and the theatrical power of storytelling.

Greg Stone (Glengarry Glen Ross) and Peter Kowitz (Australia Day) join Nadine Garner (Private Lives) in this modern ghost story that instantly became a classic.

 

Betrayal

By Harold Pinter

Southbank Theatre, The Sumner

26 August – 3 October


Opening Night:
29 August 2015

Alison Bell finds herself at the centre of a love triangle in Betrayal, Harold Pinter’s most arresting relationship drama. Created by the State Theatre Company of South Australia and directed by its Artistic Director Geordie Brookman, Betrayal opens at 8pm Saturday 29 August 2015 at Southbank Theatre, The Sumner after seasons in Adelaide and Canberra.

Hailed for its economical writing and backward travelling plot, Betrayal is inspired by Pinter’s real-life affair with a British TV presenter and the reaction of her husband. Regarded as one of Pinter’s major works, this is MTC’s third outing of this play, following its premiere in 1980 and again in 2001.

 

Buyer and Cellar

By Jonathan Tolins

Arts Centre Melbourne, Fairfax Studio

30 October – 12 December

Opening night:
 5 November 2015

Australian Premiere

A cult hit in New York that went on to enjoy a sell-out US tour, Buyer and Cellar is a shopaholic’s delight and an adoring fan letter to Barbra Streisand. Directed by Gary Abrahams, Green Room Award-winner Ash Flanders takes on Jonathan Tolins’ funny one-man extravaganza.

Director Gary Abrahams said, ‘I am thrilled at the chance to work with the supremely talented Ash Flanders on this hilarious and witty multi-character one- man play. Jonathan tolins’ razor sharp script is perfectly tailored to Flanders’ comic stylings. I laugh out loud every time I read it and I laugh even louder when I imagine Ash performing it. It’s demented, wicked, fabulous fun. A wonderful ode to celebrity and the rampant narcissism it requires to become one.’

 

The Last Man Standing

By Steve Vizard, 
music by Paul Grabowsky

Southbank Theatre, The Sumner

6 November – 12 December

Opening night:
 11 November 2015

World Premiere

In this memorial year of Gallipoli comes a comedy with song from Steve Vizard and Paul Grabowsky. The Last Man Standing will fittingly have its world premiere on Remembrance Day on Wednesday 11 November 2015 at Southbank Theatre, The Sumner.

Steve Vizard and Paul Grabowsky, who first worked together on their multi-award- winning 1990s prime time TV show Fast Forward, team up with former MTC Artistic Director Roger Hodgman to put elder statesman and Helpmann Award-winning actor Peter Carroll through his paces in a riotous new ensemble piece.

 

School Holiday Add On

The Boy at the Edge of Everything

By Finegan Kruckemeyer

Southbank Theatre, The Lawler

23 September – 9 October

Opening night: 24 September 2015

Australian Premiere

The Boy at the Edge of Everything, a family treat by Tasmanian writer Finegan Kruckemeyer, directed by Peter Houghton, brings a universe of sly observation and wry jokes together in an extra-terrestrial adventure for ages eight and up.

Commissioned by New York’s trusty Sidekick theater company and presented as a play-in-progress at New Visions New Voices at the Kennedy Center,
 The Boy at the Edge of Everything had its World Premiere in March 2014 as a co-production with the Seattle children’s theater, playing to rave reviews and followed by a string of US performances.

mtc.com.au