Month: May 2009

    Photo: Shane Warne The Musical – Eddie Perfect TOKEN EVENTS presents SHANE WARNE THE MUSICAL at the ENMORE THEATRE, Sydney. Conception for this Musical began, says Eddie Perfect in his program introduction, in 2006. How time has moved and shaken the “world”. In Sydney, after the recent, persistent NRL scandals, the swimming court cases and much else in many sports, even the Olympics, the hero worshipping of our sporting stars is a little, maybe, politically incorrect. In May, 2009, a musical celebration of the life of Shane Warne might be a little bit “icky”. Well, this was what…

  Photo: Beyond The Neck – Anita Hegh   B SHARP and BAMBINA BORRACHA productions present BEYOND THE NECK by Tom Holloway at the Belvoir St Downstairs Theatre. Last year the Griffin presented Tom Holloway’s DON’T SAY THE WORDS and I believed that this was a very exciting new writer for the Australian audience. This play BEYOND THE NECK confirms that impression. Mr Holloway is a Tasmanian and was 17 when the terrible shootings by Martin Bryant at Port Arthur happened. Ten years after the event in September, 2007 this play was presented in both Hobart and Launceston to great…

  Photo: The Call – Josh McConville   A GRIFFIN THEATRE COMPANY Sydney Premiere: THE CALL by Patricia Cornelius at the SBW Stables Theatre, Sydney. THE CALL by Patricia Cornelius, first produced by the Melbourne Workers Theatre and FULL TILT at the Fairfax Studio, Victorian Arts Centre, Melbourne in late 2007, concerns principally the story of four young people, uninspired by their education who are “disgorged” into a series of jobs in their local community, that are available and maybe, for some, soul destroying: in a battery hen farm (chicken pluckers); an mdf board factory; a meat rendering plant. In…

Picture: Sasha Rozhdestvensky Sydney Symphony; 2009 Season, Great Classics. RUSSIAN TRIBUTE. At the Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House. Music is not my field of expertise, however it is part of my theatre going diary. Hence… This program called RUSSIAN TRIBUTE has the Violin Concerto No 1 in A minor, Op.99 by Dmitri Shostakovich (my favourite composer {at this time}) followed by Pictures at an Exhibition by Modest Mussorgsky, orchestrated by Vladimir Ashkenazy. The violin soloist is Russian: Sasha Rozhdestvensky and the conductor is Russian: Vladimir Ashkenazy. Russians playing and interpreting Russian. Blissful expectations. And so it was. I bought my…

  De Quincey Co present GHOST QUARTERS – THE FIRST DREAM OF THE OPIUM CONFESSIONS at Track 12, CARRIAGEWORKS. On Friday night venturing into the Carriageworks enclave was a very daunting but thriving experience. The huge foyer of the Carriage works was abuzz with an indoor evening market. On top of that, all the possible performing spaces were in use, including the foyer: a series of local “popular music” performers. It was both disconcerting to have to deal with the excited crowds and yet happifying to be in the Carriageworks space so alive. Wending one’s way, to be on time,…

  HARLOS PRODUCTIONS present HAMLET at the Bondi Pavilion. HAMLET directed by David Ritchie for Harlos Productions has a small company of 8 actors playing, in a well edited text, a number of responsibilities. There are two scheduled actors to play Hamlet; Angela Bauer and Damien Ryan. This is a very lucid and slow unwinding of the text. It’s energy is gently expositional and ideal for students studying the play. I attended a performance of Damien Ryan as Hamlet. The performance is intelligent and clear. Re-assuring. There is great personable charm but it is a little too “held”, controlled, and…