About last week(s) … June 6-19

A recent holiday took me entirely away from all daily cares and the internet. There was no email, no Twitter, no Facebook, nothing. I heartily recommend it. Now back to Sydney theatre … Sydney Theatre Company’s magnificent production of All My Sons, directed with piercing clarity by Kip Williams, unfolds with dreadful inexorability and finality….

Sydney Theatre Awards 2015

AT the Sydney Theatre Awards no one need ever fear a journalist asking them “who are you wearing” or indeed have any need of a stylist. There is no red carpet at the Paddington RSL, there are no TV cameras. The proceedings could be described as low-key, or even a little bit daggy if you…

In which I fail to stop my list at 10

THIS year I saw more than 200 performances and, over the past week or so, have written about the people, plays, operas, dance works and musicals that spoke to me most strongly. Now I cull the list to 14 – just because that’s how it turned out – and a supplementary, the last being something…

A baker’s dozen: 2014 theatre in review

OF the more than 200 shows I saw last year, about a third were plays. Dance, opera, musical theatre and cabaret make up the rest. Unfortunately symphonic and chamber music featured very lightly. Can’t do everything, which is why my theatre viewing in Sydney had many gaps, although I don’t believe I missed anything that…

Eight Gigabytes of Hardcore Pornography

By Declan Greene. Griffin Theatre and Perth Theatre Company, Stables Theatre, Sydney, May 7. THE title of Declan Greene’s new play is misleading in one respect because it is not at all about pornography. But in its expression – so caressing in cadence and so ugly in import – the name brilliantly captures the bleak…

The Bull, the Moon and the Coronet of Stars

Merrigong Theatre Company, Wollongong, April 23 FOR a little piece – two-hander, 75 minutes, minimal set, few props – The Bull, the Moon and the Coronet of Stars gets a lot done. Like those traveller’s towels that mop up the lord knows how many times their weight in water, Van Badham’s new play has a…

February wrap

A quick look at what February brought in the theatre in Sydney, and beyond … AT this year’s Perth International Arts Festival I was able to see, in one evening, the festival’s biggest and smallest pieces of theatre – The Threepenny Opera from the Berliner Ensemble, weighing in at about three hours and filling His…