Reviews

High Performance Packing Tape

Presented by Branch Nebula. Adelaide Festival 2021. AC Arts. Mar 4 – 14, 2021

High Performance Packing Tape starts with a massive bang. A lone performer lying prone on the floor strenuously expends all his breath to inflate a large balloon until the inevitable happens. It’s uncomfortable to watch, and immediately places the audience outside its comfort zone, as do many of the sequences that follow.

By using everyday items to create a performance, Branch Nebula have set out to challenge the audience’s notion of what theatre, dance and performance is, and can be.

Medea

By Simon Stone. Internationaal Theater Amsterdam / Adelaide Festival 2021 (Australian exclusive). Live streamed at Her Majesty’s Theatre. Mar 4, 2021

After lengthy queueing outside on a crowded pavement, patrons were invited to enjoy the live from Europe livestream of Medea, on a large cinema screen. A complex and ambitious live streaming undertaking, an audience in Mount Gambier was also simultaneously able to enjoy the experience, opening some of the best of the Festival up to both  country and city patrons.  Fortunately, audience members in all parts of Her Majesty’s had a clear view of this English sub-titled Netherland production, with both sound and visual quality being excellent.

The Best, The Fairest, The First

By Adèle Shelley, Clare Mendes, & Mazz Ryan. Melbourne Writers’ Theatre in association with Gasworks Arts Park, Albert Park, Melbourne. 3 – 6 March, 2021.

This play details and celebrates the wonderful and clearly little-known history of several women sporting figures. The play is structured in three parts and looks at women who were pioneers in three sports: swimming, cricket and running. All of the stories are told from a very personal perspective and highlight the obstacles that women face not only historically but also in contemporary society. The performance is also graced by the presence of Calisthenics Soloist, Nuj B, and local running legend Monica Wong.

One Day He Changed (and the next he was gone)

Written by Sophia Simmons. Presented by SAYarts. Adelaide Fringe 2021. Rumpus. Mar 3 – 7, 2021

Through the haze, a dozen conversations riff from one person to another, a comment or question from one prompting a response from another. It’s a strong opening, well written and tightly performed, framing a production collectively created by the members of SAYarts and pulled together by Sophia Simmons.

Katyn

Written, directed & performed by Jim Daly, with Carolyn Bock. La Mama Courthouse, Carlton. 2 – 7 March 2021

Katyn, says writer-director-performer Jim Daly, ‘proceeds from a response born in shock at the meaningless grotesque of the Katyn massacre’.  What he has made of his response is a play that is often opaque yet astonishing in its intensity, its physicality and its rage.

Elektra/Orestes

By Jada Alberts and Anne-Louise Sarks. Presented by The Hive Collective and Metro Arts. New Benner Theatre, Brisbane. 3 to 13 March 2021

Independent theatre company The Hive Collective follow up their first 2021 production, a Greek myth mash-up, with another take on ancient Greek history – this time it is the turn of infamous siblings Elektra and Orestes – children of murdered hero of the Trojan war, King Agamemnon – to tell their tragic tale, with a modern twist. This play is a warning of the spiral of events that can be somehow predestine some family histories to repeat down the generations – especially when betrayal, revenge and murder are involved!

Too Much

Adelaide Fringe 2021. The Lark, Gluttony. Feb 27 - Mar 7, 2021

Too silly, too sexual, too loud – Angela Faith has been told she is ‘too much’ of a lot of things, and she brings them all to the ‘stadium’ stage of Gluttony in a late-night, adults-only show. Her energy is infectious from the moment she rides through the audience; she feeds off our energy to power her through this hour of stand-up, with occasional music, dance, and no-prisoners commentary on who really is ‘too much’.

Black Brass

By Mararo Wangai. Performing Lines / Perth Festival. Directed by Matt Edgerton. Studio Underground, State Theatre Centre of WA. Mar 4-7, 2021

Black Brass is a beautifully told story presented by Performing Lines, for Perth Festival. Based on over twenty hours of interviews with people from various African countries who have come to call Australia home, this story of an African immigrant on the evening before an interview which may lead to his citizenship, is supported by songs in Swahili, Lingala and French.

Whistleblower

By Tim Watts and Wyatt Nixon-Lloyd. The Last Great Hunt / Perth Festival. Directed by Tim Watts, Wyatt Nixon-Lloyd and Arielle Gray. Heath Ledger Theatre, State Theatre Centre of WA. Feb 27-Mar 7, 2021

Whistleblower is a unique piece of theatre, where the leading actor has no idea of the script and what is going to happen. The Last Great Hunt has created a ground-breaking work that blends an epic Escape Room, with a theatrical version of a Choose Your Own Adventure book, and The Truman Show.

Managing Carmen

By David Williamson. Directed by Siobhan Vincent. Garrick Theatre, Meadow St, Guildford, WA. Feb 25 – Mar 13, 2021

Garrick Theatre’s Managing Carmen is a well-presented incarnation of this modern Australian play, playing to Covid capacity audiences, and being very well received.

Garrick’s handkerchief sized stage is very well used in this rather episodic show, with Jake Newby’s set design consisting of well-chosen furnishings that serve multiple locales. Each location is established by excellent projections by Stuart Ridgeway, which include split screens and film. Jake Newby also provided lighting design. 

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