Year: 2017

1.THE LOVE WITCH. THE LOVE WITCH is a 2016 film, Written and Directed by Anna Biller. The story is of a woman betrayed by her husband, who murders him, and then embarks on a career as a seducer of men using witchcraft in her pursuit of the ONE. It is filmed as a horror-thriller, without much horror or thrill. It also sets out to create a filmic homage to the mode of the 1960’s studio output, with elaborate set and costume and a colour palette of period technicolour. It is filmed in Eureka, California and has the Hitchcock THE BIRDS,…

THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY, is a new play from Lachlan Philpott. It had its premiere season in Belfast in 2013 and played last year in Melbourne. Written in a kind of open verse style with a duo of actors narrating as a Greek Chorus (Thomas Campbell, Niki Owen) and interacting as minor characters, four other actors embody the major characters to tell the story of Harry Crawford in the working class suburbs of Sydney in the early years of the last century. In virtual poverty, Annie Birkett (Jane Phegan) cares for a house for her son, Harry (Jonas Thomson), and…

Photo by John Marmaras Red Line Productions and the sponsorship of Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras presents, THE JUDAS KISS, by David Hare, at the Old Fitz Theatre, Cathedral St, Woolloomooloo, 15 February -11 March. THE JUDAS KISS, is a play by David Hare, written in 1998. Neil Armfield Directed it for Belvoir St Theatre, a few years ago, and Directed it again in 2013 in London to acclaim, apparently, making a claim for the play’s reputation that it had failed to establish in its first outing. The First Act of the play occurs on the 5th of April, 1895,…

  THE MYSTERY OF LOVE AND SEX, by Bathsheba Doran – a Darlinghurst Theatre Company Production, at the Eternity Theatre, Burton St, Darlinghurst. 10 February – 12 March. THE MYSTERY OF LOVE AND SEX, is an American play, the second of a trilogy of plays by Bathsheba Doran published under the title, THE MARRIAGE PLAYS. The first play is KIN; the third, PARENT’S EVENING. THE MYSTERY OF LOVE AND SEX, presents a modern ‘nuclear’ family: Howard (Nicholas Papademetriou), a successful crime fiction novelist who happens to be Jewish; his wife, Lucinda (Deborah Galanos) who once was Catholic (Christian); their daughter,…

Photo by Robert Catto Stories Like These in association with bAKEHOUSE Theatre Company presents BLINK, by Phil Porter, at the Kings Cross Theatre (KXT), Kings Cross Hotel, 9 February – 4 March. BLINK, is a British play by Phil Porter first appearing in 2014. Sophie (Charlotte Hazzard) brought up by her single parent, father, on his death, inherits several apartments. She had lost her job on the grounds that she lacked ‘visibility’ in the office. The inheritance was a relieved happenstance for her. Jonah (James Raggatt) was brought up on a religious commune in Northern England, and is rather ‘unworldly’. On…

Sydney Symphony Orchestra, presents, MUSIC UNDER THE MOON. A Lantern Festival Celebration, featuring Tan Dun, in the Concert Hall, at the Sydney Opera House, 11 February, 2017. Tan Dun is a contemporary Chinese orhestral music composer and conductor. He is most familiar to audiences because of his award winning music for the films CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON and HERO. This concert which is part of the Chinese New Year Festival marks the fifth visit of this musician to Sydney. His other compositions range from Concert to Opera. He uses traditions from Chinese music and Western composers, including the use of…