Reviews

Giantess

Cassie Workman. MELT Festival. Brisbane Powerhouse. 4 – 6 July 2019

After a journey to Brisbane’s Powerhouse catching post-work-commute conversations about spreadsheets and kitchen renovations, Cassie Workman’s performance in Giantess is like a lifeline to a fresh stratosphere. More multi-layered than mere mash-up, Giantess is a finely honed performance piece. Like all excellent comedy, it has an underlying sorrow that nails life truths that we can all relate to.

The Boxties: A net of souls. Songs of dislocation and common ground

Presented by QPAC. Directed by Steph McCaw. Cremorne Theatre, QPAC, South Bank, June 27 – 29, 2019

Do we succumb to all fears or do we tell stories of the ‘kindness, courage and kinship’ amongst people who stood up against forces that sought to grind them down?

This is the question Ben Burrows leaves with the audience after more than an hour of insatiable music-making by a Brisbane ensemble whose collective voice strikes at the heart and the head.

Twigs That Never Took

Written & performed by Donna de Palma. Directed by Carmel Hyland. La Mama Courthouse, Carlton VIC. 3 – 7 July 2019

A woman, ‘Bianca’, in a wedding dress, talks about her life from flower girl to First Communion to her own first and then second weddings…  Bianca loves weddings, loves the euphoria of them, the ceremony, the music.  It’s afterwards, when real life resumes, that is the problem.

Anna Bolena

By Donizetti. Opera Australia. Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House. July 2 – 26, 2019.

Gaetano Donizetti’s operatic interpretation of Henry VIII’s scheming ‘removal’ of his second wife, Anne Boleyn, in order to marry his third queen, Jane Seymour, presents the disreputable English king in a scandalous drama. In the recently renovated Joan Sutherland Theatre, past and present meet in an explosion of digitally enhanced sets, sumptuous costumes and formidable voices.

Once

Book by Edna Walsh. Music and Lyrics by Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova. Based on the film by John Carney. Darlinghurst Theatre Company. Directed by Richard Carroll. Eternity Playhouse. June 26 – July 21, 2019.

Melbourne beat Sydney to the punch to present this Tony Award winning musical by four years, but Harbour city patrons got the better deal in being able to see it up close and personal in the Eternity Playhouse.  

The venue – with a narrow wide stage and no backstage space is not always an easy space to present intimate drama.

Once, a big hearted juicy musical, feels like it is home at the Darlinghurst Theatre. Such was the resonance of being so close to the action that patrons found it hard to imagine seeing it inside a larger venue.

What’s Love Got to Do With It?

Written & performed by ‘Nefertiti La Negra’ (Mark Brown II). Melbourne Cabaret Festival. Chapel off Chapel. 28 – 29 June 2019

As we take our seats Tina Turner is on the PA, belting out the song with the same title as this show – and I wonder, ‘Is that setting the bar a little high?’  Then Nefertiti LaNegra appears – a tall, very well-built man – in ‘outrageous’ drag queen attire – a cascade of crimped, honey-blonde hair, dramatic silver, black and green eye shadow, heavy jewellery, white cloak with fur collar over a sparkly fabric cutaway frock exposing midriff and a lot of leg – and a nicely trimmed goatee beard.  The ensemble says, or tries

Much Ado About Nothing

By William Shakespeare (The Shakesbeer Sessions). Presented by Bar’d Works. The King Of Tonga, 164A Tennyson Street, Elwood. 7 - 30 June, 2019 (various locations).

The opportunity to experience Shakespeare in a pub setting is truly rare. Bar’d works, highlights the bawdy and raucous nature of the Shakespeare’s work in order to recreate the atmosphere of the original performances. The show is adapted for a contemporary context, however, the same fundamental principles of a direct and interactive approach are applied. The result is a refreshing and energetic take on this canonical text.

One Heart, One Voice

By Maggie Wilde West and Jackson Griggs. Voiceworks. Directed by Maggie Wilde West with Musical Direction by Jackson Griggs. Subiaco Arts Centre, WA. June 28-29, 2019

Vocal Ensemble Voiceworks presented the world premiere of this locally written musical. A warm hearted story, it features three choirs, a plethora of new actors, performers of all abilities and a wonderful sense of community.

The Book of Mormon

Book, Music and Lyrics by Trey Parker, Robert Lopez and Matt Stone. Presented by Anne Garefino, Scott Rudin, Important Musicals, John Frost, Roger Berlind, Scott M. Delman, Jean Doumanian, Roy Furman, Stephanie P. McClelland, Kevin Morris, Jon B. Platt, Sonia Friedman Productions and Executive Producer Stuart Thompson. Adelaide Festival Theatre. June 26-August 18, 2019

“And God said ‘Let there be light’” (Genesis 1:3). And of course, there was light: fantastic stage lighting in fact, together with mirror balls and tap dancing, in the hilariously irreverent, eagerly anticipated and blatantly irreligious fable unfolding now in Adelaide’s experience of The Book of Mormon.

What a hoot it is! And exactly what one might expect from its creators, the brilliantly satirical and wacky South Park writers Trey Parker, Robert Lopez and Matt Stone.

100 Reasons For War

By Tom Holloway. Directed by Ella Hetherington. The Actors Hub, East Perth, WA. June 27-29, 2019

100 Reasons For War, presented by the Actors’ Hub, was a Gap 2 production, featuring students of the Actors Hub.

The play was originally commissioned to mark the 100th anniversary of Australia’s involvement in World War I, and examines the myriad of reasons that societies find themselves in terrible and tragic conflicts. Written as an open script, the playwright does not allocate lines to characters, nor set a number of participants, a locale or time - leaving all to each production to determine.

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