Category: Robert Cousins

STOP GIRL, is a new Australian play, by a Wakley-award winning journalist for the Australian Broadcast Corporation (ABC), Sally Sara. It is her first play and it tackles the story of Suzie who is a journalist working in the world conflict hot spots of Afghanistan, Iraq etc. Suzie could be a doppelgänger of the writer. On a Set by Robert Cousins, that is virtually an open space with ‘symbolic’ objects that serve the utilitarian requirements of the action of the 90-minute play without interval, has on the back wall a large screen that facilitates video support for showing images of…

Photo by Patrick Boland Daniel Schlusser Ensemble presents, THEY DIVIDED THE SKY, a novel by Christa Wolf, adapted for the stage by Daniel Schlusser, in the Downstairs Belvoir St Theatre. 13 – 30 June. THEY DIVIDED THE SKY, is a new Australian play, based on an East German book (1963), by novelist Christa Wolf, adapted for the stage by Daniel Schlusser, as an exploration by the Daniel Schlusser Ensemble from Melbourne. This Ensemble has been working since 2009 and has developed a particular formula to investigate for the theatre. Mr Schlusser in interview has talked of the ‘protective’ nature that…

  Photo by Brett Boardman The Sydney Theatre Company (STC) and Commonwealth Bank present, A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM, by William Shakespeare, in the Drama Theatre, at the Sydney Opera House. 16 September-22 October. How many productions of A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM has one seen? Enough to have benchmarks of merit. From Peter Brook’s 1970’s version through to the recent Tim Supple, multi-lingual one, presented in the Sydney Theatre a few years ago. To the Benjamin Britten opera take, to the many, many university, drama school, high school goes-at-it.  The film and television recordings of it. Enough to have almost intimate…

Photo by by Brett Boardman Belvoir and State Theatre Company of South Australia present MORTIDO, by Angela Betzien, in the Upstairs Theatre, Belvoir St, Surry Hills, 11 November – 17 December. MORTIDO, by Angela Betzien, is a new Australian play co-commissioned by Belvoir and Playwriting Australia and presented as a co-production by the State Theatre of South Australian and Belvoir. MORTIDO begins with a storytelling by Detective Grubbe, of a Mexican fable about a Madre – a mother, The Boy – her son, and an Old German. Of murder. Of drugs – cocaine. Of a magic potion of cinnamon, garlic, banana,…

Photo by Heidrun Lohr Belvoir presents, MOTHER COURAGE AND HER CHILDREN, by Bertolt Brecht. Translation, by Michael Gow. In the Upstairs Theare at Belvoir St Theatre, Surry Hills. 6 June – 26 July. Bertolt Brecht was born in 1898 in Bavaria. He was 16 when the First World War, led by Germany, engulfed Europe for the next 4 years. He watched and then experienced the fatal reparation demands on defeated Germany, from the Paris Peace Conference, in 1919, that the victors made, primarily represented, led, by the American President Woodrow Wilson (who also dreamt of the founding of a League…

Photo by Ellis Parrinder Belvoir presents MISS JULIE by Simon Stone after August Strindberg in the Upstairs Theatre at Belvoir, Surry Hills. This is the third production of MISS JULIE that I have seen in Sydney this year. The first, an adaptation of the 1888, August Strindberg play, by Cristabel Sved and Kate Box at the Darlinghurst Theatre in October last year. The other, in March this year, using the ‘classic’ 1964, Michael Meyer translation of the play. Interestingly, I am aware (and read, two of them) of three other recent, high profile versions of this text, internationally. MIES JULIE, adapted…