Reviews

Since taking the helm of Queensland Ballet, Artistic Director Li Cunxin has taken the company from strength to strength, and this production proves how far they have come during his brief tenure.

Here’s a school holiday entertainment for the children of ‘arty’ families. Inside a carpet-strewn tent apparently made from blankets and sheets, Matriark Art Theatre’s talented collective of performers and artists explore dreams and myths.

Artistically, the 60-minute show under director Scott Parker is quite brilliant. But this is no conventional kids’ adventure, no panto: the 6-and-over target audience must connect the disparate events and images as they may.

The considerable talents and professional expertise of Paul Watson as Director and Designer of this impressive production are inherent to its success. Rent is a marvellous musical, loosely based on La Boheme, but it is quite difficult to stage successfully; though not for Watson, who has now completed his third, very different (but equally successful), version of the show.

Staging an off-Broadway musical revue rather than the mid-year musical variety shows of recent years marks a fresh experiment by Canberra Rep and first-time director Jordan Kelly. This year, with no musical-variety show appearing in its programme, Rep has produced Showtune, an off-Broadway revue of the songs of consistent Broadway hit-maker Jerry Herman, a collocation of songs from eight of Herman’s shows.