Belvoir Season 2016

With the announcement of Belvoir’s 2016 Season, Eamon Flack becomes the third Artistic Director in Belvoir’s 30-year history.

‘I learnt my craft under Neil Armfield and began my mainstage directing career under Ralph Myers– it’s the best possible apprenticeshipyou could get for a job as fiendishly wonderful as this.’

Flack comes to the position with three key values central to his endeavour: theatricality, variety of life and faith in humanity.

‘Theatricality is what happens when great actors play great roles in great plays,’ says Flack. ‘It’s that rough magic we come to the theatre for – a strange and marvellous What was that? – a sudden, very playful but very real sense that humans are magnificent.’

Those ‘great actors in great roles in great plays’ during the 2016 season include Dan Spielman and Yael Stone in Stephen Sewell’s enduring political thriller The Blind Giant is Dancing, Colin Friels as Francis Hardy in Brian Friel’s Faith Healer, Leah Purcell as the titular drover’s wife in her own adaptation of the Henry Lawson short story, and of course Peter Carroll, resplendent in yellow cross garters as Malvolio in Flack’s production of Twelfth Night.

‘We must have variety of life,’ Flack continues. ‘All must be included, all must be spoken for, and spoken for brilliantly, with the full force of human impressiveness – spoken for theatrically.’

Belvoir declares that an ambition for inclusiveness drives many of their undertakings. There are shows designed to open awareness like The Tribe which takes a story of Arab-Australian migration from the backyards of Bankstown, to the backyards of Surry Hills, literally. The Events, starring Catherine McClements, will feature community choirs in each performance, while in Title and Deed the words of American playwright Will Eno offer the starting point for Indigenous artists Jada Alberts and Jimi Banito tell a uniquely Australian story of their own. Beyond what’s on stage there are programs like Unwaged Performances, and our Education program which delivers access opportunities for regional, outer-urban and inner-city school students, that foster inclusiveness in our audience as well.

Family is also a significant theme in the 2016 Season. There are shows about families, like The Great Fire by Kit Brookman and Back at the Dojo by Lally Katz. And shows for families, with special family performance times: Jasper Jones, an adaptation of the well-loved novel, and Matthew Whittet’s beguiling Girl Asleep, as well as Twelfth Night. And for the very small, the return of children’s show Ruby’s Wish.

‘There are angry plays, political plays, celebrations,’ says Flack. ‘There are splendid big acts of community, and solo feats of daring. There are comedies, romances, fables, epics, whodunnits. There are lonely tales, vast canvases, humble undertakings, foolhardy undertakings – look, they’re all foolhardy undertakings, it wouldn’t be Belvoir otherwise.’

Photo of Eamon Flack by Brett Boardman.

Jasper Jones

Based on the novel by Craig Silvey, adapted by Kate Mulvany

Director Anne-Louise Sarks

2 January - 7 February 2016

Upstairs Theatre

The backblocks of Western Australia. It’s summer, 1965. Overseas there’s war in Indochina, Civil Rights marches, the stirrings of women’s liberation – but at home Charlie Bucktin dreams of writing the Great Australian Novel.

Charlie’s 13 and smart. Perhaps too smart. But when blamed-for-everything Jasper Jones appears at his window one night, Charlie’s out of his depth. Jasper has stumbled upon a terrible crime in the scrub nearby, and he knows he’s the first suspect – that goes with the colour of his skin. He needs every ounce of Charlie’s bookish brain if the truth is to emerge before the town turns on Jasper.

As the boys negotiate the secrets of a small town, the winds of change blow... But how do teenage Australians solve the riddles of a changing world?

Helpmann-nominee Lasarus Ratuere (Kill the Messenger) returns to Belvoir in the title role, joined by Tom Conroy (Mother Courage and Her Children) as Charlie, and Matilda Ridgeway making her Belvoir debut.

Photo by Brett Boardman.

The Tribe

Adapted by Michael Mohammed Ahmad & Janice Muller,  based on the novel by
 Michael Mohammed Ahmad

Director Janice Muller

Composer Oonagh Sherrard

19 January – 7 February 2016

Backyards in Surry Hills Meet at Belvoir St Theatre

Urban Theatre Projects’ The Tribe moves from the streets of Sydney’s west to an assortment of Surry Hills backyards.

Performed by Hazem Shammas (Mother Courage and Her Children, Scorched), this is a story of belonging, told by Bani as a small boy finding his way in a young country by recounting tales of an old country – and at the heart of it all, his love for his grandmother. She’s the core presence in Bani’s life, carrying all the truths of ‘The Tribe’ – a small Muslim sect who fled to Australia from Lebanon. Hazem’s Bani is like a visionary child channelling a Bedouin storyteller – all amongst the Hills Hoists, paling fences, frangipani and jasmine of the Sydney yard.

In this production, Michael Mohammed Ahmad’s novella becomes an open invitation – to listen to an Arab-Australian story from our backyard, in our backyards.

Belvoir is looking for people with backyards that can fit around 50 people, within roughly 1km of Belvoir St Theatre, who would like to host performances of The Tribe.

Photo by Catherine Cranston.

The Blind Giant is Dancing

By Stephen Sewell

Director Eamon Flack

13 February – 20 March 2016

Upstairs Theatre

Brutality in the workplace, rage in the streets, seething in the home. The vulnerability of political parties when they’ve forgotten why they’re there. The intellectual torpor of modern Australia. How power corrupts.

Stephen Sewell’s play is an angry and tender depiction of an idealist who becomes so embroiled in a party power struggle that he loses sight of what’s at stake. When it premiered in 1983, The Blind Giant is Dancing felt like a sharp slap in the face. And in an age of
ICAC, Union credit cards, speculative housing bubbles, vapid leadership representing a

Artistic Director Eamon Flack begins his tenure directing a company including Yael Stone (Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, As You Like It), returning to the Belvoir stage after international success in the Orange is the New Black. Dan Spielman (The Code, ABC1) will make his Belvoir debut alongside Ivan Donato
(A Christmas Carol), Russell Kiefel (The Business) and Geoff Morrell (Ruben Guthrie).

The Great Fire

By Kit Brookman

Director Eamon Flack

Lighting Designer Damien Cooper

2 April – 8 May 2016

Upstairs Theatre

Many years ago, in the 1970s, in pursuit of a good life and a sustainable future, Judith
and Patrick built a house in the Adelaide Hills. They raised the kids here. As time wore on, bit by bit, the family drifted both from the house and the dream it was born from. Now it’s Christmas, the first grandchild is on the way and all three generations have gathered again. In the tinderbox heat of summer, Judith is at a crossroads: can the life they pursued in the first place come good again?

Kit Brookman (Small and Tired) is building a reputation for crafting plays that gently but thoroughly examine the intricacies of how families really interact behind closed doors. In this play he lets loose on the epic canvas of this multi-generational dynasty.

The Great Fire cast includes Peter Carroll (Seventeen), Sandy Gore (Small and Tired), Shelly Lauman (As You Like It), Geoff Morrell (Ruben Guthrie) and Genevieve Picot (Small Poppies).

The Events

By David Greig

Director Clare Watson

A co-production with Malthouse Theatre and State Theatre Company of South Australia in association with Sydney Festival

12 May - 12 June 2016

Upstairs Theatre

For this Australian premiere production, Catherine McClements returns to the Belvoir stage, joined by a host of Sydney’s community choirs in a fusion of theatre and music.

Scottish playwright David Greig is best known in Australia for Midsumma (A Play with Songs), which toured nationally in 2012. For The Events he turns to darker matters but with a similar focus on music.

Claire is a minister and the director of a choir that meets regularly in a local hall. It’s made up of all sorts: the lonely, outsiders, strangers – and the privileged, the comfortable. In short, she has built a community. But when a disaffected young man enters the hall and opens fire with a semi-automatic, this community – and the ideals that formed it – are blown apart.

The Events is set in the wake of this massacre as a dialogue unfolds between Claire and a young man. She is unpacking the Pandora’s box of herself – her rage, her fears, and ultimately some hope. The young man is something else: the voice of the alienated, an enemy within, a lost generation. He plays many roles, but in an era of Port Arthur and Martin Place they all ask the same big question: How do we live together knowing it can all come apart in a moment?

The Events will also play in a hall in Western Sydney in January, for six special performances as part of Sydney Festival 2016.

Photo by Brett Boardman

Hannah Gadsby – Dogmatic

Writer & Performer Hannah Gadsby

A Token Events production

20-22 May 2016

Upstairs Theatre

Hannah Gadsby will take audiences on a journey through her unusual brain. Her droll delivery, wordplay and self-deprecating observations have drawn critical acclaim and a swag of awards. A regular on our TV screens, Gadsby is at her absolute best when she is playing herself, so much so she was cast in ABC TV’s hit comedy series Please Like Me where she stars as the character Hannah. She is not really acting.

In Dogmatic, Gadsby will be attempting to explain her thought processes and the woeful life choices that have led her to where she is today.

Photo by Alan Moyle.

Back At The Dojo

By Lally Katz

Director Chris Kohn

Set & Costume Designer Mel Page

Lighting Designer Richard Vabre

Sound Designer Jethro Woodward

A co-production with Stuck Pigs Squealing

18 June – 17 July 2016

Upstairs Theatre

From the writer of Neighbourhood Watch and The Cat comes a modern romance about wanderlust, love and karate. Lally Katzhas spent the past decade turning her life into a series of plays. This time it’s her parents’ turn.

After nearly losing his mind in the abandon of 1960s America, young Danny (who happens to share a name with Lally’s father) finds his way again with the help of an enigmatic sensei. At a New Jersey karate dojo, he and other mislaid souls make their way back into the world, and Danny bumps into a woman called Lois. Meanwhile, in present-day Australia, Danny’s long-lost grandson has decided to become Patti Smith...

Inspired by the true events that brought Dan and Lois Katztogether, Back at the Dojo features a glorious and varied parade of characters, two real-life karate masters, and Luke Mullins (Angels in America, The Glass Menagerie) in a role written specially for him.

Twelfth Night

By William Shakespeare

Director Eamon Flack

23 July – 4 September 2016

Upstairs Theatre

Twins are washed up after a shipwreck on the shores of a strange land, each unaware of the other’s fate. They’re in llyria, which is strangely like our world: the repressed and the debauched are at constant war, the desires of men and women seem eternally thwarted. But this is a dreamland too – where music is the food of love, and nobody is quite what they seem. Girls are boys, boys are girls, puritans are lusting suitors, drunkards are moralists, and fools, of course, are wise. Eventually brother and sister find each other again – that’s hardly a spoiler – but what will they see and hear in the meantime?

There’s more to Shakespeare’s great play than muddled identity and exuberant celebration – it’s a mature story of melancholia amid the mayhem, of what is lost along the way even when life’s journey is a barrel of laughs.

After his A Midsummer Night’s Dream in 2010 and As You Like It in 2011, Eamon Flackturns his enthusiasm for Shakespearean comedy to Twelfth Night, withPeter Carroll as the killjoy Malvolio and Nikki Shiels as Viola.

Photo by Brett Boardman.

The Drover’s Wife

By Leah Purcell

Director Leticia Cáceres

17 September – 16 October 2016

Upstairs Theatre

Henry Lawson’s story of the Drover’s Wife paints her stoic silhouette against an unforgiving landscape. Alone with her children and her dog she stares down the serpent; it’s the frontier myth captured in just a few pages that vividly illustrates the hand-to-mouth existence of a drover’s family.

In Leah Purcell’s new play the old story gets a fresh rewrite. Once again the Drover’s Wife is confronted by a threat in her yard, but now it’s a man. He’s bleeding, he’s got secrets, and he’s black. She knows there’s a fugitive wanted for killing whites, and the district is thick with troopers, but something’s holding the Drover’s Wife back from turning this fella in...

In 2014 Purcell won The Balnaves Foundation Indigenous Playwright’s Award. Her prize was a commission to write this play.

A taut thriller of our pioneering past, with a black sting to the tail, The Drover’s Wife reaches from our nation’s infancy into our complicated present, with Purcell playing the Wife.

Photo by Brett Boardman

Ruby’s Wish

By Holly Austin, Adriano Cappelletta
& Jo Turner

Concept Holly Austin

A MAKEbeLIVE production

21 September - 9 October 2016

Downstairs Theatre

Director Jo Turner

Set & Costume Designer Pip Runciman

Confined to a hospital bed for much of her childhood, little Ruby has had to grow up far too fast, and confront too much. But when she is visited by Dot, a tongue-tied clown doctor, she finds a way to use her greatest asset: her imagination.

MAKEbeLIVE’s puppets, magic and beatbox return for another season.

Recommended for ages 6+ Special family performance times.

Photographer: Brett Boardman

Title and Deed

By Will Eno

13 October - 6 November 2016

Downstairs Theatre

Director Jada Alberts

(A Monologue for a Slightly Foreign Man)

We all come from blood and saltwater and a screaming mother begging us to leave.

The Slightly Foreign Man is called The Traveller. He tells us from the outset he is ‘not from here’; his eccentric world is our world too – but seen through the eyes of someone who looks in from the outside.

Is he a migrant? Refugee? A prophet from the wilderness to remind us who we are? Or is he from somewhere even further away?

Jimi Bani won acclaim for his portrayal of Eddie Mabo in the telemovie Mabo. Jada Alberts makes her debut as a director.

Faith Healer

By Brian Friels

22 October – 27 November 2016

Upstairs Theatre

Director Judy Davis

With Colin Friels

Last Century. The lovelorn, the malformed and the sick flock to a gifted rogue billed The Fantastic Francis Hardy: Faith Healer. Frank drifts the back roads of Britain with his embittered wife and his tired-of- life manager, hoping to find their way home. He might be just another shyster, more showman than shaman. But the trouble is, sometimes Fantastic Francis does actually bring the healing touch.

First performed in 1979, Faith Healer is by Tony, Olivier and Critics Circle award winning Irish playwright Brian Friels.

On one level about artifice and social responsibility, Faith Healer is also the story of what it means for a damaged family to be healed, and what it means to be truly saved.

Colin Friels plays Frank. Judy Davis directs for the first time at Belvoir.

Photo by Bret Boardman

Girl Asleep

By Matthew Whittet

A Windmill Theatre production

2 – 24 December 2016

Upstairs Theatre

Director Rosemary Myers

Set & Costume Designer Jonathon Oxlade

Lighting Designer Richard Vabre

Original Soundtrack Luke Smiles –
motion laboratories

Movement Consultant Gabrielle Nankivell

Caught in the headlights of her 15th birthday, Greta wishes she could be anywhere else. And strangely enough ‘anywhere else’ is exactly where she finds herself – a peculiar Through-the-Looking-Glass existence that transforms the weird hypocrisy of the adult world into something absurdly beautiful. The bitchy twins who make school a misery, her almost too-romantic imaginary boyfriend, her hyperventilating parents... they all crop up in her tour of her own subconscious. But eventually, even a girl asleep has to wake up.

Part fable and part lipstick-smeared vigilante escapade, this is a girl’s own adventure. Heroism and gender implode in a gaudy and gawky rite-of-passage story like you’ve never seen. Or have chosen to forget.

Belvoir St Theatre

25 Belvoir St, Surry Hills

Box Office: 02 9699 3444

Subscription hotline: 02 8396 6290

belvoir.com.au

 

Click here to read about other 2016 Seasons.