Reviews

Hannah Gadsby - Woof!

Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Playhouse, Arts Centre, 100 St Kilda Rd, Southbank, Melbourne. 28 March - 20 April 2024.

Hannah Gadsby deals with anxiety in an amusing and endearing manner in this show. Gadsby’s acquaintance with this emotion is legendary and they demonstrate that comedy is a powerful weapon against it. Gadsby has a whole range of new worries that plague their vibrant and sharp mind. This show has a very stream of consciousness style, expressing a very calm and often bemused outlook to current global and personal woes.

Cloud Nine

By Caryl Churchill. Theatre Guild Student Society (TGSS). Little Theatre, Adelaide. April 3-6th 2024.

Cloud Nine is a play by Caryl Churchill who is arguably the most successful and best-known socialist-feminist playwright to have emerged from Second Wave feminism. Premiering in 1979, it deals with almost every contentious, debated or regretted issue in human existence, and thus, is complex and challenging for any company to perform. Set in two acts, the first is set in colonial times. The second act is firmly in 1980. It is about relationships between women and men, men and men, women and women.

Blackbird

By David Harrower. Solus Productions. Holden Street Theatres, SA. April 2nd – 13th, 2024

Scottish playwright David Harrower’s traumatic tale Blackbird premiered at the Edinburgh International Festival in 2005, before moving onto London’s West End in 2006. A story of forbidden love and obsession; it poses more questions than it answers, which makes it all the more compelling.

Grease the Musical

Book, Music and Lyrics by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey, John Frost for Crossroads Live. Directed by Luke Joslin. Capitol Theatre Sydney. Opening Night: Tuesday April 2, 2024

Producer John Frost worked on the first Australian production of Grease in 1972 tearing tickets for patrons – it was a darker version of what is staged now and surprisingly closed with a few months.

Years later he had his arm twisted to bring Grease back, but with Guy Pearce in the lead role of Danny it became a hit, spurring him to revive it no fewer than eight times.

Every Single Thing In My Whole Entire Life

Written & performed by Zoë Coombs Marr. Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Melbourne Town Hall, Powder Room. 28 March – 21 April 2024

Worried about memory lapses – triggered significantly when she could not remember the word ‘Alzheimer’s’ – Zoë Coombs Marr decided to track her entire life.  That is, from ‘Before Me’ all the way though to ‘After Me’.  She kicked off with a Miro board (knowing acknowledgement and chuckles from the audience) and used the Rudolph Steiner system of seven-year periods for the stages of her life.  Colour coded.  This chart is projected on a big video screen.  (Unfortunately, anyone more than ten rows back can&rsq

Cool & Smart & Friend

Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Trades Hall, The Meeting Room. 31st March – 7th April 2024

Improvised theatre is a hit and miss affair and anyone heading off to an improvised show needs to be prepared for both heady heights of verbal and physical gymnastics and drear silences and stuck narratives. Therein lies its charm.

Greg Larsen – Revolting

Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Rydges Two. March 28 – April 21, 2024

Greg Larsen dressed in a suit and tie; he could easily be mistaken for a sleazy and or cheesy salesman. He begins his show with talk about the ancients and the oracles, he continues his fantasies of other centuries while claiming his era has no place for him.  Then he takes us on a journey back to his youth, a period in his life that led to his wisdom that paved his hard-earned way into comedy.

Lou Wall – The Bisexual’s Lament

Written & performed by Lou Wall. Melbourne International Comedy Festival. ACMI Gandel Lab; Trades Hall Solidarity Hall. 28 March – 21 April 2024

Lou Wall had a great 2023 – professionally.  Television, Edinburgh Fringe, praise, endorsement.  Everything on the up and up.  Privately, 2023 was sh*t.  A drawn-out break-up.  Tear-stained sad, angry, frustrated – and the bisexual thing…  Her Mum suggested she make a list of everything that had got her down, or bugged her, or devastated her.  It was a very long list.  The theory – and Lou Wall’s hope – was that ‘tragedy plus time equals comedy.’  Maybe.  (Actually, yes, as the show proves.)&n

Geraldine Quinn - The Passion of Saint Nicholas

Melbourne International Comedy Festival. The Tower, Malthouse Theatre, 113 Sturt Street Southbank, Victoria. 28 March – 7 April 2024.

Geraldine Quinn is a name associated with very vibrant cabaret which is enhanced by her song writing and her incredibly powerful vocals. However, this show is particularly special. Quinn shares some of her darkest moments of grief as she tells the story of losing her brother to brain cancer. This seems unlikely material for comedy, but she pays beautiful tribute to his life and his remarkable character via an array of hysterical childhood memories.

Akmal: Red Flags

Melbourne International Comedy Festival. The Athenaeum Theatre. March 27 – April 21, 2024

Akmal is here for the Melbourne Comedy Festival and loaded with hilarious jokes; he is a stalwart favourite in this annual event. The performance I attended was on Good Friday, and he gathered a crowded house who were there to be entertained by this contrary and controversial comedian on this Christian holy day.

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