Reviews

Little Women is one of the most perfectly constructed musicals based on a famous book. The musical’s construct is such that it manages to squeeze the key incidents from the book into a two hour musical, with enough songs to cover and explain events in a way that is precise and at times quite blindingly theatrical.

The book of the musical encapsulates a wonderful sense of community and family. With so many young characters it has achieved a degree of cult status in the school and youth theatre markets.

Accomplished community theatre director Michelle Swann made her Williamstown Little Theatre directorial debut these last weeks with the heavily accoladed Tom Stoppard play of bourgeois adultery, The Real Thing.

The play seems to be revived every 10-15 years for a new generation of theatre goers testing whether its acid bath of love and marriage marinated in old pop songs still resonates with audiences.

In this adaptation of Shakespeare’s ‘Scottish play’ (familiarity with the original is not strictly necessary), Lady Macbeth (Bojana Novakovic) is the protagonist: the tale is told from her point of view.  As in Shakespeare’s play, she urges, challenges, and emotionally blackmails Macbeth to murder King Duncan (Jim Daly).

Flights’ Australian debut comes some four years after its premiere in Ennis, in the Republic of Ireland. Ennis does not even have its own airport, but the protagonists meet in a semi derelict shack-cum-clubhouse called “Pointers” which does imply that there are options for leaving, even if no-one ever does. The oft-mentioned road is a road that goes nowhere.