Queensland Theatre Company
Written by Tom Wright
Directed by Wesley Enoch
Designed by Stephen Curtis
Cast: George Bostock, Luke Carroll, Shaka Cook, Trevor Jamieson, Kirk Page, Guy Simon, Colin Smith, Eliah Watego and Tibian Wyles
Heath Ledger Theatre
Until 7 March
Late in Tom Wright’s Black Diggers, a returned WWI serviceman begins bleeding under the arm, and a piece of shrapnel, buried in his body for decades – a “bit of left-over war” – comes to the surface.
It’s an apt metaphor for the work done by this magnificent piece of storytelling.
Something like 800 indigenous Australian men sidestepped regulations that barred them – as non-European non-citizens – from enlisting in the 1st AIF. They fought at Gallipoli, in Palestine and on the Western Front, and gained respect and comradeship in the trenches, where mud and blood covers all colours of skin, and killing and dying come alike to all races.
For many, though, their homecoming was appalling, their service largely ignored by a country unprepared to afford them the dignity and opportunities of being an Australian, let alone one of its returning heroes.
Handspring Puppet Company
Conceived and directed by William Kentridge
Written by Jane Taylor
Puppets and sets designed by Adrian Kohler
Cast: Dawid Minnaar and Busi Zokufa
Puppeteers: Gabriel Marchand, Mandiseli Maseti and Mongi Mthombeni
Heath Ledger Theatre
24 – 28 February
Ubu and the Truth Commission was an important marker in both South Africa’s theatre and its wider history.
It was a cry of outrage at the ease with which many of the perpetrators of the worst crimes of Apartheid were allowed to use edited versions of the truth and smooth, practiced contrition to sidestep the consequences of their vile activities.
It reminded us that generals fight from behind; that, more often than not, the hand that signs the paper escapes the manacles that ultimately shackle those of the instruments of its policies.
The difficulty in approaching Ubu now, almost two decades later, is that its historical context theatrically, Alfred Jarry’s nineteenth century proto-absurdist Ubu plays, honed by their surrealist and Brechtian successors, now blurs its actual historical context, making it hard to know exactly what we are watching, and to what purpose.
Created by Davy and Kristin McGuire
Performed by John Cording
CIA Studios
Until March 7
Two of PIAF’s biggest hits tell of a man and a girl searching for each other. One attracted a huge audience, the other sold out instantly after a frenzied demand for tickets.
The main difference between The Giants and The Paper Architect is the little matter of their characters’ scale – 11m tall on the one hand, 8cm on the other.
And, like Circa’s Paul O’Keeffe, spinning a cigarette paper propeller on his finger last week, The Paper Architect shows that the very best things in a festival can come in its tiniest packages.
Link here to the complete review in The West Australian.
Written and performed by Hannah Jane Walker and Chris Thorpe
STC Rehearsal Room
Until February 28
Whether you’re amazed by the sea of pedestrians glued to their tiny screens as they walk down a street in Hong Kong, or find yourself fuming at an intersection in Perth as the person in the car ahead of you texts away, oblivious to the green light they’re wasting, there’s no escaping the mobile phone.
It’s hard to believe that they took hold only twenty years or so ago, and that smart phones have been with us for less than a decade, such is their impact on our lives.
In their I Wish I Was Lonely, the British writers and performers Hannah Jane Walker and Chris Thorpe ask us to contemplate that impact, and the way our human interactions have been channeled and changed by them.
Link here to the complete review in The West Australian
Circa
Created and directed by Yaron Lifschitz
Lighting designer Jason Organ
Performed by Robbie Curtis, Rowan Heydon-White, Bridie Hooper, Kathryn O’Keeffe, Paul O’Keeffe, Skip Walker-Milne and Billie Wilson-Coffey
(★★★★)
Regal Theatre
Until January 21
As the primary colours combine to produce the whole palette, everything a circus acrobat does is made up of combinations of Catch, Hold, Lift, Balance and Spin; Beyond is a pure expression of those elements.
We quickly learn that gender is there to be inverted. Beyond’s strong man is a woman, and its men are putty in her hands.
There’s beauty too. Hooper takes to the air on straps as Amanda Palmer sings Radiohead’s Fake Plastic Trees; Billie Wilson-Coffey climbs the tissu to Camille O’Sullivan’s lovely take on The Ship Song.
Paul O’Keeffe provides the highlight of the show. He folds a cigarette paper into a tiny shape and spins it on the tip of his finger like a miniscule propeller. Spectacle and span dissolve into a moment of infinitesimal wonder.
It’s an ensemble full of circus stars, and a gasp-eliciting night of circus art.
Link here to the complete review in The West Australian
by Samuel Beckett
Royal Court Theatre
Directed by Walter Asmus
Designed by Alex Eales
Lighting designer James Farncombe
Sound designer David McSeveney
Performed by Lisa Dwan
STC Studio
Until February 20
(★★★★½)
Not I, Footfalls, Rockaby consists of three short pieces performed by the Irish actor, Lisa Dwan. It is exemplary theatre art, and an intense sensory experience.
Not for everyone, perhaps. Certainly not for the woman behind me who celebrated its conclusion with a hissed “Thank God for that” (she had been whispering, not always quietly, to her companion throughout, mind you, and needs to take a good, hard look at herself).
Not I, Footfalls, Rockaby is a dark diamond in the heart of our festival season. Its stillness and silence are eloquent among the bells and whistles.
Link here to the complete review in The West Australian
Barking Gecko and Opera Australia
Book by John Marsden and Shaun Tan
Adapted and directed by John Sheedy
Composed by Kate Miller-Heidke
Libretto by Lally Katz
Musical director and arranger Iain Grandage
Designed by Gabriela Tylesova
Lighting designer Trent Suidgeest
Sound designer Michael Waters
Performed by Kate Miller-Heidke, Hollie Andrew, Jessica Hitchcock, Lisa Maza, Marcus Corowa, David Leha, Kanen Breen, Nicholas Jones, Christopher Hillier, Simon Meadow and Robert Mitchell
Music by Iain Grandage, Callum G’Froerer, Kier Nuttall, Veronique Serrett and Dan Witton
Heath Ledger Theatre
Until February 16
(★ ★ ★ ½)
We’ve recently seen major stage treatments of the pivotal event in the history of our continent, the collision of its indigenous inhabitants with European colonisers. Now we have The Rabbits.
In the book upon which it is based, John Marsden and Shaun Tan parallel the overrunning of native animals by introduced species with the inexorable spread of colonising humans across the continent.
Perth’s Barking Gecko and Opera Australia are a natural combination to bring The Rabbits to the stage, and the result is very largely successful.
For all of us, the terrible story buried before and beneath our entitled lives needs telling and retelling, and The Rabbits, despite some flaws, is a significant contributor to that process.
Link here to the complete review in The West Australian
