Reviews

Baskerville – A Sherlock Holmes Mystery

By Ken Ludwig. Spotlight’s Basement Theatre, Benowa, Gold Coast. Co-Directors: Kaela Gray and Katie Grace. April 27th – May 13th, 2018

This production was a mixture of revue, pantomime and slapstick comedy. 

Originally written for a cast of five: Sherlock Holmes, Dr Watson and 43 other characters to be played by 3 people, the co-directors have augmented the cast to 9 very active performers.

In keeping with the various aforementioned genre, minimum props and scenery were used together with a plethora of wigs, costumes, (somewhat dubious) accents and a certain amount of cross-dressing to transport the audience around the Devonshire Moors.

A Little Night Music

Music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim. Book by Hugh Wheeler. The Gilbert & Sullivan Society of South Australia. Arts Theatre, Adelaide. 26th April – 5th May, 2018

Composer and Lyricist Stephen Sondheim’s enchanting musical A Little Night Music was first performed in 1973 and although many feminists would balk at some of its lyrical content, it has lost none of its charm. With a book by Hugh Wheeler, and inspired by the Ingmar Bergman film Smiles of a Summer Night, it is easy to see why it continues to be performed the world over.

Carmen, Live or Dead

By Craig Harwood. Music by iOTA. Oriel Entertainment, Progeny Pictures and Orange Sky Creative. Directed by Shaun Rennie. Hayes Theatre, Sydney. April 29 - May 13, 2018

There’s often a moment in the first minutes of an unknown show that you fear it’s not going to be good. When it’s unconventional, the fear is even greater. Will I be stuck here for the next hour-and-a-half for a show that I really won’t enjoy?

Mr Bailey’s Minder

By Debra Oswald. Melville Theatre, WA. Directed by Vanessa Jensen. 26 Apr - 12 May, 2018

Mr Bailey is a cantankerous, unlikeable alcoholic, who also happens to be a great artist and an Australian living treasure. Only one of his many children is willing to help him, and then only at arm’s length. She hires Therese, a girl with a checkered background, to be Leo Bailey’s live-in minder.

Born Yesterday

By Garson Kanin. Independent Theatre. Goodwood Theatre. April 27 to May 5, 2018

Whilst the stage play and later film, Born Yesterday, were written and set in post war America in 1946, Independent Theatre’s latest production reminds us how up to date the concept of questionable political and business partnerships remains. In the era of the “Me Too” campaign the misogyny and mobster-style brutality of the story is also poignant and highly relevant.

After Miss Julie

By Patrick Marber, based on Miss Julie by August Strindberg. Act 1 Theatre, Strathpine, Qld. Director: Lilian Harrington. 20 April – 5 May, 2018

The electoral euphoria of Britain’s historic Labour landslide in July 1945 following Germany’s Second World War surrender on May 8th is the background for Patrick Marber’s After Miss Julie, an English reworking of Strindberg’s 1889 classic. Originally written for BBC television in 1995, the story relocates the Swedish setting of Strindberg’s original to a country house outside London, with the central character the daughter of a Labour peer who clearly loathes the lower-classes he represents.

Burning Rose

Directed by Ellis Pearson. The Actors Hub Studios, East Perth, WA. 10-14 April, 2018

Thirteen appears to be a fortunate number for The Actors’ Hub’s Gap II students. The thirteen students in the program form a tight ensemble and work organically as a team to present this engaging devised work. 

Burning Rose, developed under the leadership of director Ellis Pearson, is an anthology of two stories, From the Ashes and beauty. Half the cohort presents each story, while the remaining students provide well-developed musical accompaniment on drums and other percussion, guitar and vuvuzela.

Still Point Turning: The Catherine McGregor Story

By Priscilla Jackman. Based on interviews with Catherine McGregor. Sydney Theatre Company. Wharf 1 Theatre. April 21 to May 26, 2018.

If you pitched this story as a piece of fiction it might be rejected as not plausible. The incongruity of a heterosexual man with a very healthy sex life, who works and excels in the most masculine of fields – the army, cricket commentary, and political speech writing – yet is being torn apart by acute gender dysphoria.

Piccadilly Olde Time Music Hall

Conceived and Directed by Kate Peters. Top Hat Productions. Gold Coast Little Theatre, Southport. April 27th – May 6th, 2018

The Olde Time Music Hall was a popular form of British entertainment of yesteryear, originating around the middle of the 19th century and lasting well into the 20th century. 

It featured many of the popular songs of the day, like “The Pheasant Plucker”, performed by the well-loved entertainers of the period, interspersed with the witty patter from the convivial Master of Ceremonies, Mr Martin Jennings. 

Personal

By Jodee Mundy. Jodee Mundy Collaborations. Arts House – North Melbourne. April 24 to 29, 2018 (and touring - see end of review)

Personal by Jodee Mundy is an acute insight into some of the strains and joys of being a ‘CODA’ – a hearing child born to a deaf adult / parents / into a deaf family.

As a short but intense 60 minutes of theatre, it frames, elucidates and distills this experience on a very personal, yet totally relatable to level, for a mixed audience of deaf and hearing.  This rewarding, compelling work brings deaf and hearing a little closer together both literally and through its delicate and sharp insights - crisply and clearly presented.

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