Category: Basil Hogios

Red Line presents THE WHALE, by Samuel D. Hunter, at the Old Fitz Theatre, Cathedral St Wooloomooloo. 4 Feb – 4 March. THE WHALE, written by American writer, Samuel D. Hunter in 2012, has all of the ingredients of a classically constructed play – it ticks all (most) of the boxes of ‘good’, audience-friendly playwriting, tried and still true. A realist environment we all know; characters (we might nearly know) with complicated back stories; enough contemporary issues that we can, relatively, associate with: morbid obesity, religious tyranny and its corroding influence, sexual taboos, gay (bi-sexual) family, adolescent angst; and a…

  Critical Stages and Michael Sieders present SONGS FOR THE FALLEN by Sheridan Harbridge in the Reginald Theatre, Seymour Centre. SONGS FOR THE FALLEN is a new work written by Sheridan Harbridge for herself and two other actors, Ben Gerrard, Garth Holcombe and a composer/live musical performer Basil Hogios. This presentation is the beginning of a tour for Critical Stages and Michael Sieders, mounted after a successful first outing at the Old Fitzroy, last year. Harbridge describes SONGS FOR THE FALLEN as “part vaudeville, part punk opera, part MTV-does- Baroque”, a pastiche, using the life history of an actual historical…

  Arts Radar in association with atyp Under the Wharf present TOOTH OF CRIME by Sam Shepard at atyp Theatre, Pier 4, Hickson Road, Sydney. TOOTH OF CRIME at atyp is the third Sam Shepard play we have seen in Sydney in the last year. FOOL FOR LOVE, Downstairs Belvoir and TRUE WEST for the Sydney Theatre Company being the other two. Sam Shepard: “First off let me tell you that I don’t want to be a playwright, I want to be a rock and roll star. I want that understood right off. I got into writing plays because I…

TRAPTURE presented by Sands through the Hourglass in association with Tamarama Rock Surfers Theatre at the Old Fitzroy Theatre. TRAPTURE, says the blurb, is bleeding theatre into performance art. Oh, yeah. “Outrageous and visceral”! – mmm? For who? A woman (Sarah Enright) dressed in slinky full length dress and gag greets each of us as we enter the Old Fitz theatre space. The walls are draped in plastic, the seats are covered in plastic. There is an air of fun (and potential danger?) Above the stage there is a technical arsenal of sound gear, being treated by Basil Hogios, live,…

Sydney Theatre Company and Griffin Theatre Company present CONCUSSION by Ross Mueller at Wharf 2 Theatre, Sydney.   CONCUSSION IS A VERY GOOD PLAY. It seemed to me to be a play about the World Concussed. We are shown six characters, some of them functioning in areas of social responsibility that were once (and maybe still are) Pillars of the Community: Doctor, Police Officer (detective), and then two more modern “pillars”: marketing consultants, a spin doctor and, sadly, a young representative of the future, “a male potential dropout.” This is a play where people have been given, in our present…

“Write what you know.” In almost every biography one has read about the great literary figures this “write what you know” is a constant mantra of advice. This is what Mr Murphy has gone on to do so well. Beginning with TROY’S HOUSE a “story of a group of teenagers at the end of their schooling”. STRANGERS IN BETWEEN about a young boy fleeing his home and attempting to discover who he might be in the alien world of a big city: Sydney’s King Cross, and confronting his relationship with his family through the demands of his brother. HOLDING THE…