The Motherf**ker with the Hat, Darlinghurst Theatre Company and Workhorse Theatre Company, September 23 Children of the Sun, Sydney Theatre Company, September 24 (matinee) The Last Confession, Chichester Festival Theatre production, Theatre Royal, Sydney, September 24 (evening) Wicked, Capitol Theatre, Sydney, September 25 LET’S start with Wicked. It’s not quite The Lion King, which last…
David McAllister in conversation
THE Australian Ballet has designated 2015 its Year of Beauty, driving the point home with sumptuous imagery. Not since 2009 has the AB’s promotional material had such a romantic feel. The program, announced on September 16, culminates in a new production of Sleeping Beauty, to be staged by AB artistic director David McAllister, and begins…
Love, death, politics …
Kryptonite, Sydney Theatre Company, September 16; Unholy Ghosts, Griffin Theatre Company, September 17; LoveBites, White Horse Productions with Hayes Theatre Co, September 18. ON the face of it Kryptonite, Unholy Ghosts and LoveBites have nothing in common except taking place in a theatre, but seeing the three on consecutive evenings made me think of them as a…
Tharp, Ratmansky, Robbins
American Ballet Theatre, Lyric Theatre, Brisbane, September 5 and 6. TWYLA Tharp was never one to make things easy for dancers or viewers. It would take many more than the two shows I saw in Brisbane to absorb even a fraction of the beauties and complexities of Bach Partita, but it took only one performance…
Odette to the power of four
Queensland Performing Arts Centre, Brisbane. August 28, September 3 (matinee), September 3 (evening), September 4. THE first act of Kevin McKenzie’s Swan Lake ends as evening falls. Prince Siegfried has hurried away from his birthday party with no ceremony, disquieted by the realisation his carefree days are numbered. Because he is about to become king…
You saw it here first
American Ballet Theatre, Lyric Theatre, Brisbane, September 3 IT’S always a big deal when a dancer makes her debut as Odette-Odile in Swan Lake. It’s a bigger deal when that dancer is Misty Copeland, the first African-American in American Ballet Theatre’s 75-year history to be cast as Odette. It shouldn’t be so, but it is….
Heart untouched; soul unshaken
Lyric Theatre, Queensland Performing Arts Centre, Brisbane, August 28. KEVIN McKenzie’s version of Swan Lake for American Ballet Theatre is a medieval fairy tale of transformation. A woman is turned into a swan. An evil lake-dwelling sorcerer becomes a devastatingly attractive nobleman in the blink of an eye. Two lovers die by drowning but moments…
The persistence of memory
Drama Theatre, Sydney Opera House, August 27 HOFESH Shechter’s Sun has toured extensively since its world premiere at the Melbourne Festival about 10 months ago. It’s now briefly in Sydney for five performances only. I had quite a few reservations on first seeing Sun – my initial review is below – and some remain, but…
Inaccessible glamour
Choreographed by Narelle Benjamin. Performance Space, Sydney, August 22. HIDING in Plain Sight is like a remote beauty, a super-something with abundant personal assets who glides through the world as if not quite of it – cool, guarded, cocooned, separate. Lesser mortals may look but not touch. They may admire, but not presume to approach….
‘She makes you laugh then makes you cry’
Hayes Theatre Co, August 20 IT’S little wonder so many former child stars go off piste spectacularly, particularly those who started very young. Right from the get-go they learned that to be a success they would have to know how to please. To please Mommy, who took her to all those dance lessons. To please…
deborah jones: FollowSpot 