Reviews

You walk out of the rain and wind of summer and inside the Sydney Town Hall has been transformed into the playful world of the beach.

Dozens of actors are frolicking on a giant sandpit under the harsh glare of the sun. They are reading books, playing badminton, having a picnic, rubbing in suncream, drying themselves off, walking around and of course sunbaking. The bodies on display include children, middle age jelly tummies, taut teenagers and even one pet dog.

The ushers pushed the audience around the gallery of the Town Hall for sessions that last one hour.

Are you ready for a musical that is deliciously decadent and raucously raunchy? Well, boy! Have I got a show for you.

Truly a 21st Century theatre hybrid, part rock concert, part cabaret and with the occasional nod to traditional narrative, SIX is the Love Child of Tudor History and The Spice Girls. It’s Girl Power on steroids and the energy on stage makes the Energiser Bunny look positively lethargic.

The Wind in the Willows has returned for the summer, currently in its 37th year, staged in the splendidly scenic Royal Botanical Gardens, Melbourne. A delightful and entertaining family show, affordable and interactive, this uniquely Australian twist on the classic children’s book by Kenneth Grahame, first published in 1908, has its audiences, young and old, amused, delighted and in rollicking fits of laughter.

This is an extraordinary spectacle that is best described as a unique and awe-inspiring theatrical experience created by the renowned Russian-born, Paris-based performer, Slava Polunin. The approach to the artistry of clowning is deeply steeped in European traditions and is defined by a distinctive tragi-comic quality. The show draws on a variety of theatrical practices such as pantomime and theatre of the absurd. Most notably, the slow and sometimes heavy movements of the characters or their deadpan facial expressions allude to theatrical masters such as Samuel Beckett.