Pelican Productions. Arts Theatre. 13 Sep 2024
Can’t we be seventeen? croon high school sweethearts Veronica and J.D. It’s a reasonable question but considering that they’ve just murdered three people and are contemplating some other pretty macabre deeds, the idea of baking brownies and going bowling is a bit fanciful.
In this musical adaptation of the 1988 movie Heathers, the Americanisation is emphasised, and with that one seems able to remain a step removed from some of the truly appalling actions of the characters; sexism, misogyny and stereotypical gender role playing.
Heathers comes with some serious warnings - explicit language, graphic violence, suicide, sexual violence, fat shaming – and that’s just in the first act! Unfortunately, while it may not be the norm in Australian schools, there are scenes in this show that remind one all too sombrely of the school shootings, violence and student abuses that are occurring all too frequently in U.S. schools. There’s a salient lesson here, but fortunately, in terms of this production, the story is told with humour, albeit dark at times, and some of it is just laugh-aloud funny.
On a set depicting a brick wall (another brick in the…?) topped with an iron framed catwalk, the students of Westerburg High School arrive for the new term. Fresh faced, beautiful healthy bodies, excitement in the air… but it soon becomes clear that there is something noxious in the air, and this is exemplified by the entrance of the ruling clique, the Heathers - Heather Chandler, Heather Duke and Heather McNamara, played respectively by Taylor Schwartz, Emma Pool and Abi Sharp. These are vicious young women, bullies of the first order, and heavy-set Martha (Juliette Keir) is just one of the many to feel their wrath. Martha’s best friend Veronica (Lluka Wadey) is determined not to be a victim, so introduces the Heathers to her forging skill (hall passes, sick notes, whatever you need) and is soon inducted as the fourth group member.
Enter the enigmatic Jason Dean aka J.D (Alek Kudra), the Baudelaire reading newcomer, who beats up the jocks Kurt (Ewan Pugh) and Ram (Jack Keukenmeester) and Veronica’s heart is won. What follows is an all-singing, all-dancing fest of sex, death and destruction – just your average high school semester.
Director Georgia Broomhill has elicited a highly professional production from such a young cast. The original film / musical was set firmly in the ‘eighties. From the first scene, the singing and dancing skills were on fire and did not let up until the finale. Music Director Ben Francis has worked well with the more than 20 songs in this production; for the most part they’re standard music theatre, with the standouts being the aforementioned Seventeen, Candy Store, JD’s Freeze Your Brain and the emotive Lifeboat, beautifully delivered by Abi Sharp.
The highlight of this show is the dancing. Amongst the murders, mayhem, date rape, suicides and hauntings (the dead visit regularly), this cast is constantly on the move. Choreographer Shenayde Patterson has read this show brilliantly, and working with Ben Francis’s musical direction, has created a tour de force of movement and excitement. Just wonderful, from first to last.
Heathers has two casts: this night saw Class 2 on the stage and no doubt Class 1 is just as accomplished. While the subject matter can be difficult at times, the performances are to be lauded. Well done, Pelican.
Arna Eyers-White
When: 13 to 15 Sep
Where: Arts Theatre
Bookings: trybooking.com
CRAM Collective. The Howling Owl. 5 Sep 2024
Perth based playwrights Jeffrey Jay Fowler and Chris Isaacs created a thing in 2015, Fag/Stag which belted itself a bunch of Edinburgh Fringe awards, toured Perth, Melbourne and Adelaide Fringe to boot and had a production done in Rome.
It’s easily one of the most sharp, disarmingly satiric takes on toxic masculinity, straight and gay, ever written.
It has depths to it, in the hands of the right director and cast, which smack you in the face and have you laughing at the same time, even as your soul cringes at the dark undertones in the work. Director Connor Reidy’s production is very subtle, cleverly paced, poor theatre in the tiny Fringe scale Howling Owl downstairs venue.
The effective minimalist take is accentuated by Aaron Herczeg’s standing floor lamp light with basic flood wash and Antoinette Jelk’s eerily in-the-moment sound scape of effects that take you by surprise with their ultra reality.
It all seems innocuously sitcom-hilarious in the early moments as Corgan (Henry Cooper) and Jimmy (Connor Pullinger) recount the moment they received an invite to their friend Tamara’s wedding. She’s Corgan’s ex-girlfriend, and great love of his life. She’s Jimmy’s only female crush as a gay teenager.
Three besties in their very late 20s. One getting married.
It’s the BFF boys who are stuck in arrested development as they stuff their lives up further in between playing Donkey Kong together and forever remaining on the one level.
They are not the nicest people. Really funny. Disarmingly engaging. But not nice.
Jimmy breaks up with a perfectly reasonable boyfriend as it seems to the audience. Corgan’s got an attitude about his sexy manliness. He’s wealthy, doesn’t have to work. Jimmy’s a struggling gig worker. Both are obsessed with Tinder or Grindr. Both are brilliant at misinterpreting the cues of their long lived friendship and the onset of Tamara’s wedding has pushed that up a notch or five.
There’s a lot going on beneath the comedic surface of two boys making bloody big mistakes in the lead up to Tamara’s big day.
Listening carefully, between the outrageous antics, sharp comic performances, and heady bromance gusto, one finds the beginnings of vulnerability awakening to an awareness of what’s really important.
Both lads find this process very hard. It is also very bloody funny; at times painfully so. But properly thought provoking.
You do think. You do reevaluate things.
That’s the achievement in Cooper and Pullinger’s smashing performances, ruled by exquisite comic timing, richly repulsive yet deeply engaging characterisations, and deft pacing by Director Reidy.
What does it mean to be male and love? Not what does it mean to be this or that.
David O’Brien
When: 3 to 7 Sep
Where: The Howling Owl
Bookings: Closed
Brink Productions. Adelaide Festival Centre. Space Theatre. Preview. 3 Jul 2024
Living alone by the beach. Living for the surf. Sounds so idyllic. Trouble free.
Living with yourself by the beach as escape. Refuge from the ‘real’ world. From what’s in your head and a trail of life disasters. Not so pristine or utopian.
Chris Pitman’s many surf adventures brought him into contact with such recluses. Exposed him to the symbiotic connection with the sea they had in place of human society. He wrote Shore Break.
Shore Break is a brazen, raw, harsh, broken glass savage yet intensely poetic text. The story of one such shore breaker, under Director Chelsea Griffith’s deft pacing of the text, allows Pitman’s solo character to seemingly become three individual’s stories in one.
Griffith’s production is a straight-up, bare-bones affair in every respect. Susan Grey Gardener’s lighting is unchanging, sea and sun yellow. The set is nothing more than a square straw mat, a surfboard, deck chair, yellow coke crate with tradie jacket draped over it, and a surfboard leg rope. There is nowhere to hide. No stage tricks.
How is a shore breaker made?
Pitman offers one who starts being bit of a character. A great wit with no head for school. One who rebuffs praise. Lived a semi happy working class family life with a dad who took him to the beach. Once there it really begins.
At each struggle, cruising the channel of a huge wave offers redemption. Deep diving to the sea floor offers escape. While real world life gets worse. The shore is fast becoming the home nowhere else is.
This character’s life tales are told backwards in a manner offering a dual sense of deep regret for a life’s horrors spiralling out of control and of the growing hope the shore constantly offers.
This reverse-life structure is key to Pitman and Director Griffiths ability to segment this shore breaker’s life in a manner which makes each segment seem an autonomous life moment of another individual.
This also pushes Pitman as an actor to the height of his game. He finds nuance, subtle and brazen, in giving life to an accidental misfit’s moments, recognising life is at that too-late point in relationships, in social interaction, in mythical surf ‘work’ life.
Pain is as deep and sharp as regret is soft in soulful acceptance.
There is only the shore.
David O’Brien
When: 3 to 8 Sep
Where: Space Theatre
Bookings: ticketek.com.au
State Opera South Australia. Her Majesty’s Theatre. 29 Aug 2024
State Opera South Australia has a hit on its hands with this sparkling production of Mozart’s Così fan Tutte (which translates as So do they all) As the ebullient opening night audience was filing back into the auditorium of Her Majesty’s Theatre after the interval, one patron was overheard to say, “I’d forgotten how much fun this opera can be!”, and he was absolutely spot on. In the wrong hands, Così can be anything but fun and instead become wearying, but director Patrick Nolan, conductor Dane Lam, designers Elizabeth Gadsby and Bernie Tan-Hayes, together with the excellent cast (more on them later) all collaborate superbly to elevate the work to an entirely new level.
This is one of State Opera South Australia’s best productions in years and it eclipses the recent production of Candide.
The success of Così fan Tutte turns on the skills of the principal cast of six. Not just singing skills, but also acting skills. The two are needed in at least equal measure, and if the ability of the principals to create believable (albeit exaggerated) characters is not highly polished, then it all comes tumbling down and the nearly three hours playing time really puts the comfort of the theatre’s seats to the test! The principals in this production – Sky Ingram (as Fiordiligi), Anna Dowsley (Dorabella), Adrian Strooper (Ferrando), Nicholas Lester (Guglielmo), Christopher Hillier (Don Alfonso) and Jessica Dean (Despina) – all come up trumps. They do! All of them!
Così fan Tutte is a comedic opera and centres around around two military officers, Ferrando and Guglielmo, who boast long and hard about the virtues of their fiancées, sisters Dorabella and Fiordiligi. The boys’ friend, Don Alfonso, doubts the two girls would remain faithful to the boys given the right circumstances, and he makes a bet they will ‘stray’ like all other women. The bet is accepted, and so commences the unfolding of an elaborate set of circumstances, misinterpretations, masquerades, and intended and unintended seduction! Although the fundamental premise smacks of misogyny, the boys don’t emerge from the mess smelling of roses!
The original libretto sets the play in Naples at a time well in the past, but Nolan places this production in the here and now. Unlike many attempts to ‘update’ operas, this one really works. Even the language used in the surtitles is just a little bit hip, especially in Act 1, and the audience lap it up. The spice, humour, and inherent naughtiness of the whole opera is amplified. One can easily imagine that Mozart, who, from all accounts had a very earthy sense of humour and a bit of a ‘potty mouth’, would heartily approve of the surtitles!
The action takes place in various locations and the set, which evokes the look and feel of an upmarket mediterranean beach resort decorated in the style of a lush classical Italian villa, is adapted to all locales. Tan-Hayes’ excellent lighting makes it more convincing. In Act 2, the set is impressively deconstructed and reduced to a stark setting with all the stage lights and scaffolding in plain view on both flanks. This is initially puzzling (and perhaps a bit tawdry) – it stands in stark contrast to the colour and opulence of Act 1 – but as the space becomes increasingly cluttered and chaotic with various items, it gradually makes sense, as the disorder and turmoil that the sisters and their lovers have unleashed on themselves takes a firm grip on their lives. At the end of the opera, with its ‘they all live happily ever after’ ending despite all the shenanigans, the set partially re-constructs itself and becomes a metaphor for a return to normality, of sorts!
But it’s not all froth and bubble. Lurking not too far beneath the surface of all the frivolity, there are serious themes being explored, and some arias need to be sung with that in mind. For example, the highlight aria is Fiordiligi’s Come scoglio (I am like a rock), and Ingram sings it with great authority. One easily believes that Fiordiligi is tempted to be unfaithful to Guglielmo but ultimately, she is rock solid in her constancy, and the music mirrors these polar opposites, with lots of challenging leaps. The way the aria is staged is also illuminating!
There are of course numerous other solo arias and ensembles, and the principals are all very, very good. Anna Dowsley is superb as the flirtier Dorabella, with a touch of The Taming of the Shrew in her characterisation. Totally enjoyable acting and singing. Nick Lester and Adrian Strooper borrow some gaits from Monty Python’s Ministry of Silly Walks, and draw a fine line between farce and comedy, but with seriously good vocals. Christopher Hillier exudes cynicism, but in a most beguiling manner, and sings up a storm with his warmly rounded tenor voice. Jessica Dean is almost a scene stealer as Despina (and a host of other characters), and she most definitely has the acting chops to meet Patrick Nolan’s vision. This is possibly her finest role with State Opera.
It would be remiss not to point out that Adrian Strooper stood in at short notice in place of Kyle Stegall who became indisposed. Strooper came down from Cairns (!) and fitted in superbly. Indeed, one would not even know that he was brand new to the cast unless one was told. He has sung the role of Ferrando elsewhere in famous opera houses, and so knows the role inside out, but it is still a tall order to ‘fit in’ with almost no rehearsal and be expected to act in the required style, be in the right place at the right time on stage, as well as sing superbly. One cannot sing his praises too much. The only obvious sign of his freshness to the production was a little misstep in the curtain call, which was greeted by much laughter and smiles from his fellow cast members and the audience.
Dane Lam was busy in the orchestra pit. Not only did he vigorously conduct, but he also played the fortepiano at times. His direction of the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra was excellent. The orchestra is important in opera, but it’s not the principal focus, and in lighter operas such as Così, the right balance between orchestra and on-stage vocalists is crucial. Lam preserves the essential playfulness of Mozart’s score and produced gravitas when required. Importantly, the vocalists are never ‘washed out’ and are not treated as unthinking slaves to the baton. Wonderful control.
This production of Così fan Tutte is a winner. It has everything: colour, superb costumes and sets, great humour and drama, wonderful music, great acting, and even greater singing. Just wonderful. Do see it.
Kym Clayton
When: 29 Aug to 7 Sep
Where: Her Majesty’s Theatre
Bookings: ticketek.com.au
Goodwood Theatres. 23 Aug 2024
Danielle Lim is Malaysian Australian and/or Australian Malaysian. This is the dilemma the young theatre maker asks in her solo show which, after a successful season on the Fringe, was revived for one night only at the Goodwood Theatre.
Needless to say, it drew a full house.
Lim performed in front of a backdrop of two white sheets stretched to make a double projection screen. Thereupon were video projections of her two worlds, Malaysia and Australia - or, to be precise, Ipoh and Adelaide.
Lim’s family brought her here as a child. From speaking several Asian languages, she soon discovered that English was the way to get on at school. School unlocked her new world, and she represented it with a padlock, one of a series of items she had placed in the auditorium to be discovered by audience members. Each one she reclaimed, expounding upon their significance as landmark symbols in her life. Her old Sim card was another. It depicted old friends and the much-needed discarding of a boyfriend.
She took the audience from Chinese family domestica in Ipoh through cultural journeys in Australia, ever with the question of the identity of our cross cultural Asian young. She demonstrated how, gradually and often sadly, the years loosen the ties and Australian self-perception moves in.
Lim has carved a successful career in the arts, one which enables exactly this nature of valuable cultural sharing. Many young Asian Aussies do not have such an outlet but their stories doubtless are in many ways aligned and it is valuable that their Australian contemporaries can take this understanding onboard. To that end, this Flinders Drama Centre graduate and OzAsia participant has been supported by Helpmann Academy, Carclew, the City of Adelaide and the Fringe. She’s also involved with ActNow Theatre.
Here, she showed her cred and, interacting with a recorded inner-voice, gave deeper dimensions to her entertainment, alleviating it from the fate of being yet another monologue.
It was a lovely clear-headed, generous-spirited presentation from a very promising young multi-disciplinary theatre maker. Her tomorrows will be bright.
Samela Harris
When: 23 Aug
Where: Goodwood Theatres
Bookings: Closed