Reviews

Annie

Book by Thomas Meehan. Music by Charles Strouse. Lyrics by Martin Charnin. Produced by John Frost for Crossroads Live. Directed by Karen Johnson Mortimer. Princess Theatre Melbourne until November 2025.

For whatever reason, I didn’t get to review Annie’s Melbourne Opening. This was a blessing in disguise. Critics generally see a show in the midst of an invited audience of celebrities and/or prominent guests. Rarely do we experience a performance with Mums and Dads and kids, all excited theatre-goers; what a difference that makes.

The Play That Goes Wrong

Written by Henry Lewis, Jonathon Sayers and Henry Field. GMG Productions and Stoddart Entertainment Group. Original Direction: Mark Bell. Associate Director: Anna Marshall. Original Set Design: Nigel Hook. Original Lighting Design: Ric Mountjoy. Resident Lighting Design: Jason Bovaird. Original Costume Design: Roberto Surace. Original Music: Rob Falconer. Original Sound Design: Andy Johnson. Original Fighting and Movement: David Hearn. Resident Director: Nick Purdie. Athenaeum Theatre, Melbourne. September 3 – 28, 2025, and touring.

When a much-acclaimed farce lands in town…especially a multi award winning one with proven longevity in both The West End and on Broadway, it’s a scramble for reviewers to get to see it, even if a reviewer’s hat does somewhat deaden the hysteria.

The Anarchy (1138-53)

By Doppelgangster. Theatre Works and Doppelgangster. Theatre Works, St Kilda. September 3 – 13, 2025

An anticipated cataclysmic show by the experimental Doppelgangster Theatre company (the first of a trilogy), highlights the fifteen-year medieval civil war between England and Normandy known as Anarchy. The war instigated a breakdown of law-and-order; it provoked rampant chaos and pandemonium. This story is cleverly pivoted alongside the Sci- fi Anarchy video game (1990) with its multi - role player tropes that replicate war games of the old war.

First Date

By Austin Winsberg, Alan Zachary and Michael Weiner. Directed by Chloe Palliser. Theatre 2, Koorliny Arts Centre, Kwinana, WA. Aug 29 - Sep 6, 2025

First Date is an intimate musical cleverly staged in Koorliny’s smaller theatre as dinner theatre, taking us into the restaurant setting of the show. Nicely performed, it is an entertaining show that leaves its audience smiling.

Preparing Ground

By Marilyn Miller, Jasmin Sheppard and Katina Olsen. Cremorne Theatre, Queensland Performing Arts Centre (QPAC). Brisbane Festival. 5–7 September 2025

“What the world calls ‘climate change’ First Peoples call ‘colonisation’” is the watermark embedded in the dance, movement and music piece, Preparing Ground, produced by BlakDance, a 20-year-old national industry organisation for First Nation contemporary dance. This Queensland premiere for Brisbane Festival is the result of six years of collaboration with communities on country asking questions of land and belonging.

The Tempest

By William Shakespeare. Class Act Theatre. Directed by Stephen Lee. The Studio. Subiaco Arts Centre, WA. Sep 3-13, 2025

Class Act Theatre, established in 1994 as a Theatre in Education Company, before branching into mainstream shows, presents its final ever show. This production of The Tempest, directed by Stephen Lee, who has over 100 Shakespeare productions under his belt, is set in a Star Trek come Lost in Space Universe, where Prospero’s Cell is an “antique” Spaceship on a small, lonely planet called The Island.

Opera Double Bill: Cinderella and Gianni Schicchi

By Pauine Viardot and Giacomo Puccini. WAAPA Classical Voice Students. Directed by Emma Matthews AM. The Richard Gill Auditorium, WAAPA Edith Cowan University, Mt Lawley, WA. Aug 29 - Sep 4, 2025

This Double Bill of One Act Operas was performed by WAAPA’s Classical Voice Students, beautifully accompanied on piano by Musical Director Tommaso Pollio. Both directed by Emma Matthews, they were simply presented but packed great entertainment value.

The Last Word

Created and performed by Imogen Whittaker. The Hidden Theatre, Hobart. 6–7 September 2025

Imogen Whittaker is a woman with a piano. And a history of breakups she’d like to work through. And a sense of humour. If you’re on board already, you’ll probably enjoy The Last Word: a one-hour, one-woman comedy cabaret about the ends of relationships.

Back to Bilo

By Katherine Lyall-Watson, concept by Matt Scholten. Bille Brown Theatre, Queensland Theatre (QT). Brisbane Festival. 3–16 September 2025

If you think your vote doesn’t make a difference, you need to find out about the Nadesalingam family – and this world premiere of a new Australian play for Brisbane Festival at QT is a good place to start. This is a story whose ending was uncertain right up until just weeks before opening night. Priya and Nades separately fled war-torn Sri Lanka and painful pasts, risking their lives to come to Australia as refugees. They married in Queensland country town, Biloela, settled into the community, made friends, and started a family.

Other Desert Cities

By Robin Baitz. Presented by Heidelberg Theatre Company. Directed by Gaetano Santo. HTC, 36 Turnham Ave Rosanna, Melbourne. 5-20 September 2025

Robin Baitz’s writing is particularly recognisable for his ability to capture dysfunctional American family dynamics. Other Desert Cities is an intense example of his work and the way in which the personal is especially political in the US. The increasing role of politics in interpersonal relationships is particularly evident in this story. Brooke (Jen Bush) spends Christmas eve in her parents’ Palm Springs, California home. Lyman (Phil Lambert) and Polly (Lindy Yeates) are staunch Republicans with strong connections to Bush and Reaganite politics.

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