Belvoir, Sydney, August 29 WHEN Simon Stone is attracted to a text, anything can happen. In this he is reminiscent of Barrie Kosky, whose ferocious intelligence and unswerving commitment to a highly personal vision has given us some of the country’s most memorable and challenging theatre and opera. It’s impossible to leave a Kosky production…
The Australian Ballet launches a new look
The Australian Ballet’s 2014 season introduces a few surprises IT used to be chiselled in stone. Every mainstage season of the Australian Ballet in Melbourne would have 11 or 12 performances and in Sydney, in the smaller Joan Sutherland Theatre, there would be 20 or thereabouts. It didn’t matter if it was Swan Lake or…
iTMOi, Les Illuminations
Akram Khan Company, Drama Theatre, Sydney Opera House, August 28. Les Illuminations, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Dance Company and Katie Noonan, The Studio, Sydney Opera House, August 28 AKRAM Khan is a choreographer with a hugely inquiring and generous mind. The list of his collaborators is long, stellar and diverse. He’s not a man content…
The Baulkham Hills African Ladies Troupe, Seminar
The Baulkham Hills African Ladies Troupe, Belvoir Downstairs, August 27. Seminar, Ensemble Theatre, August 27 matinee. THE Baulkham Hills African Ladies Troupe has just got underway in front of a packed, albeit small, house. “If we keep this up they might move us upstairs,” quips one of the performers. Right on ladies! The performers have…
Jerusalem, Storm Boy
Jerusalem, New Theatre, Sydney, August 22. Storm Boy, Sydney Theatre Company and Barking Gecko Theatre Company, Wharf 1, Sydney. August 22 matinee. JERUSALEM’S Rooster Byron is a raucous, irredeemable rebuke to polite society. He offends in every possible way. Squatting on council land in a wood on the fringes of an English town, Rooster is…
‘A modern oriental fantasy’
Madama Butterfly on Sydney Harbour, 2014 IN April Michaela Boland, a senior arts reporter for The Australian, tweeted that NSW arts minister George Souris – he is also minister for tourism, major events, hospitality and racing – had confirmed Madama Butterfly as next year’s Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour. I don’t think he was supposed…
An indie theatre mini-festival
Delectable Shelter, The Reginald, Seymour Centre, August 13. Fireface, ATYP Under the Wharf, Sydney, August 14. Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, The Factory Floor, Marrickville, August 15 I HAD the interesting – and unique – experience this week of having an invitation to the theatre withdrawn. I was to have reviewed, for The Australian, visiting US…
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
Sydney Theatre, August 10 Have you not done tormenting me with your accursed time! It’s abominable! When! When! One day, is that not enough for you, one day he went dumb, one day I went blind, one day we’ll go deaf, one day we were born, one day we shall die, the same day, the…
Owen Wingrave, Sydney Chamber Opera
Carriageworks, Sydney, August 5 THE tyros at Sydney Chamber Opera nimbly and thrillingly tread where larger organisations fear to go, or at least traverse sparingly. Owen Wingrave is perfect SCO territory: it is 20th century repertoire, it’s an Australian stage premiere and it suits presentation by a small, tightly focused group of musicians. Another attraction,…
Elegance, Queensland Ballet
Queensland Performing Arts Centre, August 2 EMMA Lippa is one of Australian ballet’s hidden treasures. She developed her formidable skills as an accompanist at the Bolshoi Ballet then used her gifts for two decades at the Australian Ballet. Lippa has retired from the AB but not from the piano or from ballet, as Queensland Ballet…
deborah jones: FollowSpot 