Reviews

With the final sequence of Darren Vizer’s autobiographical one-man show about growing up gay, the material suddenly becomes powerful, complex and disturbing.

Prior to this sequence, the show is truthful, sometimes painful, sometimes poignant, but also rather familiar and lacking in detail.  Mr Vizer, a trained dancer and choreographer, interpolates brief dance sequences, but if the intention is to illuminate the text, the import of these seems vague. 

I'm not going to lie. The storyline depicted in Disney's The Little Mermaid (modified from the original Hans Christian Anderson fairytale) has always made me itch. Mermaid falls in love, literally at first sight with a human of the male persuasion, purely and utterly because he's hot. He in turn falls in love with her voice, hearing it for the first time as he regains consciousness from almost drowning. She then forfeits that voice for the chance of becoming human long enough to win his heart.

Somewhat reimagined and stripped even further back than its very basic original by director Helen Dallimore, with new, darker atmospheric arrangements for keyboard and guitar from musical directors Hayden Barltrop and Glenn Moorhouse, against a simple setting of translucent drapes and astro-turf by Hugh O’Connor, the world’s longest running musical remains true to its minimalist roots in its current makeover at Sydney’s Hayes Theatre, a good match for the show’s original intimate New York home.

Direct from London’s West End, this absolutely delightful musical adaptation of Judith Kerr’s children’s classic is just as magical on-stage as it is on the written page. The story of a tiger who comes to tea and eats all the food and drinks all the drinks including the water from the tap has been given a whimsical make-over by director/writer David Wood in a production that uses the traditional pantomime devices of audience participation, sing-a-long, and the classic “he’s behind you” gag.