Reviews

The Play That Goes Wrong is silly, ridiculous fun. A cross between Noises Off and Fawlty Towers, it trades on familiar theatrical tropes where an amateur theatre company put on a play and everything that could go wrong does – missed lines, forgotten props, doors that won’t open, dead bodies who move, pratfalls, and the set falling down in spectacular fashion, all in the name of a laugh.

The Geelong Lyric Theatre Society (GLTS) production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat rockets along. Fifty minutes in, the lights announce intermission – catching me by surprise.

For those who aren’t up to date with their Bible stories or their Andrew Lloyd Webber, Joseph retells the story of the son of Jacob from Genesis 37- 50.

In 1967, Webber and Tim Rice wrote Joseph for a school’s end-of-term concert, accounting for the shortness of the musical and the way the whole story is told through song.

Founded in New York in 2006, Shen Yun is a performance extravaganza featuring classical Chinese as well as ethnic and folk dance, with a full orchestra which blends Chinese and Western traditions.

While David Williamson’s Let the Sunshine doesn’t have nearly as much bite in terms of social satire as in many of his earlier plays, Adelaide company Galleon Theatre Group’s strong casting and magic touch with edgy comedy ensures an enjoyable production of the play.

Documentary film-maker and left-leaning Toby has career embarrassments to contend with and has escaped Sydney for Noosa with wife Ros. He hasn’t found satisfaction there, either, because the place has changed and now contains exactly the sort of people he detests.