Year: 2019

Le Gateau Chocolat, is a Cabaret performer from the UK. He first performed as part of the Sydney Festival in 2011. ICONS, is his new show celebrating musical heroes that have shaped his life, using his personal autobiography to catalogue the heroes and songs chosen. ‘It is a mix of pop, opera and rock with renditions (sometimes just snipped quotes) from musical legends including Whitney, Bowie, Pavarotti, Madonna and Meatloaf.’ Le Gateau Choclat is sumptuous in size and presents as a beautiful, bearded baritone gay ‘drag queen’ of Nigerian origins. He uses his own rich and expressive voice, nicely and…

LOVE AND ANGER, is back after a one night stint in the Griffin Bach Festival last April. Betty Grumble, a subversive burlesque artist from the fringe of Sydney theatre activism is, spectacularly, back. With the 1967 text, THE SCUM MANIFESTO, by Valerie Solanas – a radical feminist work – in her hands and quoted from, serving as a reference to give this work, well spine, Betty uses her body in a ‘ in-yer-face’ reveal to parody, satirise, mens’ historic objectification of women and to re-claim the sexual normality of the female. She is fearless (courageous) in the method of her…

BRETT AND WENDY – A Love Story Bound By Art, is a performance piece Created by Director, Designer Kim Carpenter, the Artistic Director of The Theatre of Image, which is celebrating its 30th Anniversary year. Says, Mr Carpenter in his program notes: “I created this script like a collage, gathering material from interviews, conversations, books, observations and personal experiences and curated them into a form as ‘I can see’”. The work attempts to explore the biographical journey of artist Brett Whitely from that of the boy, to the teenager, the student, the man, the family man, the world traveller, the…

Moogahlin Performing Arts presents a World Premiere of THE WEEKEND, by Henrietta Baird, in Bay 20, at Carriageworks, as part of the Sydney Festival. 18-23 January. THE WEEKEND is a monologue/play by Henrietta Baird, first developed at Yellamundie Festival in 2017. It began as a 10 page text and has now developed into a 65 minute monologue. It is performed by Shakira Clanton, Directed immaculately by Liza-Mare Syron, supported by a marvellous and subtle continuous Score by Nick Wales and Rhyan Clapham, in a Set Design by Kevin O’Brien, of a three panelled ‘circus mirror’ of warping exaggeration, surrounded in…

THE CHAT, is a very interesting work. JR Brennan has worked as a parole officer in Sydney’s Long Bay Correctional Centre, and as an artist, created a series of performance workshops with Performance maker and choreographer Ashley Dyers for ex-offenders in the Melbourne area. THE CHAT we are informed in the program note, has been “created in collaboration with participants from these workshops and leading criminologists, is a work that fundamentally challenges our notions of criminal identity and asks the audience to play judge.” This work has been in an evolving process since 2014 and has been performed in Melbourne…

Sydney Festival present, PAUL CAPSIS with Jethro Woodward & The Fitzroy Youth Orchestra, in the Magic Mirrors Spiegeltent, Festival Gardens (Hyde Park). 17th and 18th January. When one witnesses the talent of Paul Capsis live on stage, it puts much else into perspective. This is the Best Show that I have seen at this Festival and it is the force that is Mr Capsis that makes it so – he is unique, special. He not only has the skills, he has ‘IT’. Paul Capsis is a GREAT artist. Every gesture, from his ‘mad’ costuming, to his excessive wig, and in…