News

With a new parody on everyone’s favourite lovers, Mr Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett, opening this week in Brisbane, Coral Drouyn looks at our penchant for “Taking the P**s”.

Some may call it the Tall Poppy Syndrome, but really it’s more than that. Take an icon…a film, a play, a book, and create a parody of it, send it up mercilessly with all the tropes and cliches you can find, and serve it to a hungry audience with all the aplomb of a French chef.

Seen by three million, streamed by over 350 million and with fans all around the world, singer-songwriter Anaïs Mitchell’s West End and Broadway musical Hadestown will make its Australian premiere at Theatre Royal Sydney in February 2025.

Presented by Opera Australia and JONES Theatrical Group, Hadestown won eight Tony Awards when it opened on Broadway in 2019, including Best Score and Best Director and is still playing to packed houses five years later.

Chicago was the last big musical on Anthony Warlow’s bucket-list. Now on a national tour playing Billy Flynn, the 62-year-old has revealed that he thought his opportunity to play the star lawyer had passed. David Spicer reports, in association with the podcast ‘Stages with Peter Eyers’.

Image: Running Woman. Photographer: Anne Colliard.

Luzia, Cirque du Soleil’s 38th extravaganza under the Big Top, is touring Australia this year. Jonathan Cox spoke to Helena Merten and Nelson Smyles, two Aussies living their dreams performing with the troupe.