Theatre: Is This Thing On? (★★★★)

By Zoe Coombs Marr
Directed by Zoe Pepper
Featuring Nicola Bartlett, Daisy Coyle, Andrea Gibbs, Samantha Maclean and Giulia Petrocchi
Blue Room Theatre
Until October 8

Andrea Gibbs (pic: Daniel James Grant)

Shakespeare famously identified seven ages of man in As You Like It, and the Sydney writer and comedian Zoe Coombs Marr has performed a similar dissection on the trajectory of the stand-up comic here.
The play’s mechanics are audacious, and skilfully managed by its director Zoe Pepper; five actors all play a comedian, Brianna (named, she claims, after the Fleetwood Mac song – it’s a running gag), from her first tentative stand at 16 (Daisy Coyle) to all-but-redundancy at 60 (Nicola Bartlett). Along the way we see her juggling bar work, uni studies and her fledgling act at 22 (Samantha Maclean), dealing with adult life at 27 (Giulia Petrocchi) and, fully fledged, struggling with it all at 35 (Andrea Gibbs).
Since her auspicious arrival as a dramatic actor in 2014, Gibbs has delivered an unbroken string of notable performances. None more so than this; her Brianna is genuinely horrible and achingly sympathetic. It’s a remarkable characterisation.
We may laugh with this person – Is This Thing On? has plenty of gags for that – but this unusual and effective play admonishes us not to laugh at her. 

Read the complete review in The West Australian

Theatre: The Mars Project (★★★★)

Written and directed by Will O’Mahony

Lighting designed by Chris Donnelly
Performed by Luke Fewster, Andrea Gibbs, Felicity McKay, Will O’Mahony and Steve Turner
The Blue Room
Until May 7

Andrea Gibbs (pic Cameron Etchells)

It’s only eight months since Will O’Mahony’s The Mars Project was staged by WAAPA’s 3rd year Acting students.
I questioned whether it could be successfully produced except under the auspices of an institution like WAAPA. O’Mahony has achieved it triumphantly.
The project of the title is a scheme to send four “colonists” on a one-way (and inevitably fatal) mission to the red planet.
Wren (Felicity McKay) joins 200,000 applicants for the project, and as her application survives cull after cull, down to the last 50, her ambition for fame and ruthlessness grows to a tragic intensity.
None of this matters to her autistic twin brother Sam (Luke Fewster), in his closed, compulsive world. Wren, like Earth to the silent Mars, was born with him but has chosen her own path.
It’s powerful, painful material, performed by an outstanding cast. Once again Andrea Gibbs shows that she’s as fine a dramatic actor as she is a comedian and improviser, in a performance that sits squarely in the human heart of this remarkable play. 

Read the complete review in The West Australian

Theatre: Jesus No Ordinary Life (★★½)

Written and directed by Damon Lockwood
Featuring Andrea Gibbs, Brendan Hanson, Nick Pages-Oliver, Sean Walsh, Shane Adamczak and Talei Howell-Price
Designed by Cherie Hewson
Blue Room Theatre
Until July 4

The release of Monty Python’s Life of Brian in 1979 drew howls of outrage and demonstrations outside cinemas from religious groups accusing it of blasphemy and worse.
I doubt that we’ll be seeing earnest people with crucifixes and placards picketing the Blue Room season of Damon Lockwood’s Jesus: No Ordinary Life (even though it’s much more scurrilous than Brian ever was).
Which is a pity, because it would be a diverting way to start a night at the theatre – and it means I’ll have to do the complaining for them.
It’s not that this Jesus offends my wafer-thin religious sensitivities; I just struggle to see what it achieves. 
Towards the end, Lockwood has a character say: “Reviewers, make of this what you will.” That, I’m afraid, is leading with your chin.

Go to the complete review in The West Australian 

Theatre: Eight Gigabytes of Hardcore Pornography

Andrea Gibbs (pic Brett Boardman)

Perth Theatre Company and Griffin Theatre Company
Written by Declan Greene
Composer Rachael Dease
Directed by Lee Lewis
Designer Marg Horwell
Lighting designer Matthew Marshall
Starring Andrea Gibbs and Steve Rodgers
STC Studio until July 12

The title of Declan Greene’s Eight Gigabytes of Hardcore Pornography doesn’t tell its story, though it’s not irrelevant to it. What it is about is truth, happiness, and how bitter and elusive they can be.
The play is set in 14 vignettes, each introduced simply by the announcement of the number – co-incidentally an almost identical device to that employed recently in Tyler Jacob Jones’s impressive F*@k Decaf. Like it, Greene’s play flows seamlessly across these divides, often without even stopping for breath, giving his story an impressive momentum throughout the 80-odd minutes it takes to tell.

Link here to the complete review in The West Australian 

Comedy: Perth International Comedy Festival #3

Hannah Gadsby, Brendon Burns, Bonnie Davies, Andrea Gibbs and Neil Hamburger
The Jack High Room, Mt Lawley Bowling Club
PICF runs until May 20

What do you do when your show runs over? Take it, and the audience, outside! 
Brendon Burns at the Mt Lawley Bowlng Club on Friday night  (pic: Jenna Boston) 

The rampaging Perth International Comedy Festival has created two performance areas, the Jack High Room and the Laughter Locker, at the Mt Lawley Bowling Club, with its bar and lounge between. Unlike the much larger festival venue at the nearby Astor Theatre, you get the chance to hang out, have a few (un-Perthly cheap) drinks and meet the performers.

Link here to the complete review in The West Australian