Reviews

Trail to Oregon is a Starkids production, one of a series of parody musicals, with somewhat of a cult following. This production features a cast that are mostly veterans of several Starkids shows, and the Opening Night audience included many established fans.

Based on the video game The Oregon Trail, Trail to Oregon has multiple opportunities for audience involvement including selecting the characters’ name and voting for which character is to shuffle off their mortal coil, meaning that the cast need to learn multiple endings to the show.

From the first shocking punch of sound and movement there is not a moment that is not filled with a triumph of coordinated expression. The nine drummers use the diverse possibilities of their kits to create everything from thunder to a fairy tinkle of sound. Each drummer has a moment to highlight their skills and the ensemble is fully coordinated so at times it is as if a single drum is creating a theatre full of sound.

I am certainly not a Bollywood novice, but I must confess to knowing little or nothing about the history of Bollywood in Australia, so Brand Bollywood Downunder was a revelation!

Anupam Sharma’s Brand Bollywood Downunder is a feature documentary about the ‘Bollywoodisation’ and globalisation of Indian cinema through its 89-year-old love affair with Australia.

Opening in London in 1996, this first play by Shelagh Stephenson was awarded the prestigious Olivier Award for Best Comedy. Linking memory, bereavement and richly funny family relationships and events, it is given a full-on comedy production here by director Rachel Chant.

Set in a seaside Yorkshire house, expected to soon end up under water, an all-female family gather to deal with the death of their once sprightly mother from Alzheimer’s disease at 75. It’s Winter and blowing a gale, and the metaphor of water runs right through the play.