Year: 2010

    B Sharp presents FOOL FOR LOVE by Sam Shepard in the Belvoir St Downstairs Theatre. For me, Edward Albee, David Mamet and Sam Shepard are the three outstanding, living, American writers. There are others, but the recent contemporary past seems to place them in high regard nationally and internationally. Sam Shepard, oddly, though, seems to be relatively under represented in professional production here in Australia, and, again, relatively, exists as a ‘cult’ figure in the ‘underworld’ of Australian performance history rather than as an artist of the first rank. FOOL FOR LOVE has never been represented in the…

      Bump Projects in association with the Sydney Roller Derby League, presents BLOODBATH at the Horden Pavillion. “BLOODBATH is a collaborative distributed artwork by Bump Projects in association with the Sydney Roller Derby League. BLOODBATH features five artists with recognised track works in new media, data visualisation, mediated performance and work with embodiment and violence. In the Horden Pavillion, Sydney, at an all girl flat track roller derby game, sensors on the helmets of players feed data to the five artworks, generating digital elaborations of the moves and collisions on track.” The five artists Linda Dement, Nancy Mauro-Flude,…

    Pearly Productions and Griffin Independent present THE PIGEONS by David Gieselmann at the SBW Stables Theatre. A German comedy seems to some of us an oxymoron. But one would have to be a moron not to have a few good laughs at THE PIGEONS by David Giselmann at the SBW Stables. This is the English language premiere. A short 65 minute character driven farce the translation by Maja Zade is truly hilarious. Farce is difficult. Verbal farce is even more difficult to sustain. But what Mr Giselmann has managed is to succinctly put nine characters in the same…

    Andrew Kay & Associates presents COMPLEXIONS Contemporary Ballet at the PARADE THEATRE,Kensington. Complexions Contemporary Ballet was co-founded in 1994 by dancer Desmond Richardson and choreographer Dwight Rhoden, former members of the Alvin Ailey Dance Company. Complexions is a New York based company. “The company’s foremost innovation is that dance should be about removing boundaries, not reinforcing them. Whether it be the limiting traditions of a single style, period, or culture, Complexions transcends them all, creating an open, continually evolving form of dance that reflects the movement of our world – and all its constituent cultures- as an interrelated…

      AUSTRALIAN CHAMBER ORCHESTRA present TOUR SIX: VIENNESE MASTERS at City Recital Hall, Angel Place, Sydney. The Australian Chamber Orchestra returning home after a two continent international tour, present a program of ‘chamber’ music with a small collection of eight musicians. Richard Tognetti (violin), Satu Vanska (violin), Christopher Moore (viola), Timo-Veikko Valve (Cello), Maxime Bibeau (double bass), and guests Craig Hill (clarinet), Darryl Poulsen (horn) and Jane Gower (bassoon). In variations of the musicians’ presence the works played were Schubert (arr.Graham Ross), Rondo Brilliante,D895 (Composed 1827; arranged for solo violin and septet 2010); Beethoven, Septet in E flat…

      CATHAY PLAYHOUSE present DE LING & EMPRESS DOWAGER CI XI by HE Ji-Ping at the Tom Mann Theatre, Surry Hills. The CATHAY PLAYHOUSE is a mostly non-professional theatre organisation (95%). I decided to write about my experience with this company because it represents a part of our community that does not have much exposure or encouragement outside its own cultural population. According to their mission statement as presented in the program notes, CATHAY PLAYHOUSE aims to present exceptional Mandarin drama as a way to promote Chinese culture as a part of Australia’s Multi-cultural society. More movingly its…