Reviews

LOVE SONGS FOR SIR LES

BEST EVER ADELAIDE CABARET FESTIVAL CLOSES WHILE 2016 LOOKS PERFECT

On the night Barry Humphries announced Ali McGregor and Eddie Perfect as joint Artistic Directors of next year’s Adelaide Cabaret Festival, the wonderful Ali McGregor herself was the first among gloriously glamorous chanteuses to risk performing with Australia’s most outrageous knight, Sir Les Patterson, in Love Songs for Sir Les. The hilarious world premiere closed the 2015 Cabaret Festival with a raucous, F-word-peppered bang.

Casanova

By Russell T. Davies, adapted for the stage by by Mark Kilmurry. Canberra Repertory. Directed by Jarrad West. Theatre 3, Acton. 18 June – 4 July 2015

This stage adaption of a television romp treats the story of Casanova with a complexity — rapidly alternating among the moving, the romantic, and slapstick — that must be an enormous challenge to director and actors, apparently obtaining from Davies’s television series its approach of embedding sexual farce in an essentially romantic tale. 

Oliver!

Book, Music and Lyrics by Lionel Bart. Ballina Players (NSW). Players Theatre. Director: Clem Halpin. June 11th to July 4th, 2015

Playing to full houses, Ballina Players has another hit on their hands with Clem Halpin’s production of Oliver.

Using the limitations of the stage area to advantage, Clem’s clever set took the audience back to the London of Victorian England with all its unsavoury characters plus a smattering of gentile folk thrown in for good measure.

Guys And Dolls

Music and Lyrics by Frank Loesser/ Book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows/ Directed by Peter Roberts. Windmill Theatre Company (Vic). Drum Theatre Dandenong. June 19 – 28, 2015.

Theatre is constantly changing, and yet remaining the same with musicals we know and love. For people living in the outer suburbs, amateur theatre is imperative to keep theatre alive; and when the company is the award winning Windmill (their 2013 award winning production of The Phantom Of The Opera is still talked about) then you know that theatre is in good hands. It doesn’t hurt either that they have access to Dandenong’s Drum Theatre as their performance venue. It’s a beautiful theatre, well equipped and comfortable.

The Glen Miller Orchestra

Adelaide Cabaret Festival 2015. Dunstan Playhouse. June 19, 2015

The Adelaide Cabaret Festival revisited the grand era of Swing as The Glenn Miller Orchestra celebrated its 78th anniversary and brought the timeless hits of the War years to town.

Glenn Miller’s theme song Moonlight Serenade was recorded in the spring of 1939 and featured his trademark clarinet lead sax section. Glenn Miller also added a fourth trumpet and fourth trombone that year, with his genius resulting in an orchestra with a unique sound that stood out amongst the hundreds of bands playing during the Swing era.

Painted from Memory

Starring Michael Falzon and Bobby Fox. Directed by Jonathan Biggins. Hayes Theatre, Sydney. June 18-20, 2015

Cabaret is all the rage right now. As Barry Humphries’ Adelaide Cabaret Festival draws to a close and Melbourne’s version ramps up, Sydney’s Hayes Theatre, which has proved the power of small-scale musicals, has been holding its own season. Michael Falzon and Bobby Fox, best known for starring in the musicals We Will Rock You and Jersey Boys, are once again performing their concert version of the 1998 Elvis Costello-Burt Bacharach album Painted from Memory.

Eddie Perfect: Songs From The Middle

Adelaide Cabaret Festival. Dunstan Playhouse. June 18 – 20, 2015

Eddie Perfect has gone back to Mentone to revisit his childhood and with it he has discovered a cabaret show dedicated to the town he could not get out of quick enough as a youth. Perfect has that down to earth quality with a touch of class. His compositions carry sincerity and humour, which is very Australian. Looking dapper in his suit and tie, his wayward hair gives you solace that the larrikin still lives within.

Trevor Ashley: I’m Every Woman

Adelaide Cabaret Festival. Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre. 18-20 June, 2015.

Trevor Ashley's particular brand of drag performance (and his tastelessly over-ripe vocal style) will probably seem like pure pleasure to many, and to be sure, his comic banter begins the show on a thrillingly confident and ingratiating note. His enthusiasm here is infectious, and he knows that bawdy jokes, well delivered, can feel thoroughly liberating to an audience

Jane Eyre

By Charlotte Bronte, Adapted by Polly Teale. Hobart Repertory Theatre Society. Playhouse Theatre, Hobart. Director: Ingrid Ganley.19 June – 4 July 2015.

An invitation to see Jane Eyre, presented by Hobart Repertory Theatre Society at the Playhouse Theatre, Hobart, came with the suggestion to “read (or re-read) the novel before you see this stunning stage adaptation”.

Dedications

By Anthony Harkin. Starring John O’Hara. Hayes Theatre Co as part of Cabaret Season 2015. June 9 & 10, 2015

Just met somebody? Out of love, or in the best relationship of your life? Well thankfully, in the name of the father, the love struck son and the divorce culprit, The Love God is here to help. 

Anthony Harkin’s cabaret Dedications strings together multiple love stories and heartaches via Richard Mercer’s radio program Love Song Dedications. Six characters who find themselves in and out of love call in and request a song to be shared to the nation as a means to share their story. 

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