Presented by Andrew McKinnon and Phil Bathols in association with Adelaide Festival Centre. Festival Theatre. 23 May 2014
Out of the rubble and debris of wartime London rose the beauty of music. Dame Myra Hess was to alleviate the grim spirits through six years of chamber concerts - almost 1700 of them - most in London's National Gallery where only the empty picture frames remained on the walls.
Hess had intended to stop playing as a response to the war but, prompted by the suggestion of friends and what was intended as her last recital, she was to turn around and play the first of a series of wartime lunchtime concerts - with admission of one shilling.
They were a profound hit, and among the thousands who packed the Gallery's octagonal room over the years was the Queen Mother. Myra Hess was later to be made a Dame for this uplifting service to the British people.
Patricial Routledge, with an OBE and a CBE for services to the performing arts, embodies the spirit of Dame Myra in this gentle touring production.
Eighty-five years has not diminished the power and clarity of the
rich, lilting voice which has charmed audiences as Hetty Wainthrop and amused them as Hyacinth Bucket. Its plummy authority rings right through to the gods of the Festival Theatre.
The production is simple. The face of Myra Hess looks down from black and white photos projected onto the back of the stage.
Routledge makes her entrance exquisitely dressed in loose black embossed lace, a strand of pearls and sensible shoes. She sits and reads from a large folder a script written by Hess's great nephew Nigel Hess. It's a nicely unfettered narrative in the first person, modest, sometimes droll, always succinct and pleasantly phrased. Routledge delivers it with consummate ease.
Piers Lane at the grand piano brings the Hess concerts to life playing the music she performed - Schubert German Dances, some Brahms and Bach, Chopin, Beethoven and Scarlatti. They are delicate pieces, sweet and pretty, and he fingers them lightly.
He finishes up with Hess's own special arrangement of Bach's ‘Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring’.
It's all very smooth and professional. Two masters of their arts recreating the mastery of another. It makes for a soothing and civilized evening's entertainment.
Samela Harris
When: 23 to 24 May 2014
Where: Festival Theatre
Bookings: bass.net.au
The Metropolitan Musical Theatre Co. Arts Theatre. 9 May 2014
Move over, Todd McKenney! Step aside, Hugh Jackman! You'll need to, to make room for the latest, mid-Elvis-sized Peter Allen reincarnation, David Salter. More on him later, but let me tell you about this production. In a word - stunning.
In case you have been stranded Douglas Mawson-like in Antarctica for the last fifteen years - and were not one of the 1.2 million Australians who saw the original production in 1998-99, or the reprise in 2006 - The Boy From Oz musical is Nick Enright's love letter to one of Australia's greatest songwriters and entertainers, who passed away in 1992. Enright links Allen's country town upbringing, his childhood performances at the local pub, and his mother's unwavering support, with the swings and roundabouts of his concert and songwriting career. Allen's improbable encounter with Judy Garland in an Asian night club led to his marriage to Lisa Minnelli, which ended amicably after seven years in 1974, as his homosexuality came to the fore with the changing times. No, I'm not making this stuff up. Enright seamlessly weaves this narrative with Allen's songs and this is where David Salter comes in. But more on him later.
This is a high octane production that does not stop for a breath. While Leonie Osborn had to take over direction, the panache of original director Max Rayner and his casting choices remain side-by-side with Osborn's re-imaginings. It's a fast-paced dancing and singing extravaganza designed to exemplify the showmanship and hard work of Peter Allen. Carmel Vistoli's choreography has the hoofers working with springs on their feet while Jillian Gulliver's orchestra is absolutely first class. The costumes (Osborn and Vistoli) have the wow factor. ‘I Still Call Australia Home’ and the finale ‘I Go To Rio’ were big passionate numbers.
There was a lady on stage. Bronwen James's Judy Garland was absolutely magnificent in her imagineering of the aging and fragile star. Bravo! And the lady's progeny was also on stage. I did not see anything but Liza Minnelli in Selena Britz's impersonation. Everything was there - the brash voice, the killer vibrato, the gestures. Britz's feature song was an absolute show stopper. Bravo! Both of them inhabited the professionalism and sense of destiny we sensed in the originals. While never really in the same room on stage, these two were impeccably mother and daughter. Angus Smith, one of the best character actors on the scene, was called upon to generate a number of individuals with great skill.
David Salter has gone from strength to strength with Chorus Line in 2012, the cheeky Hispanic in Altar Boyz last year, and now Peter Allen. You needed a real sweetheart for this role - someone who connects with an audience, can hold a rapport, and shows them the razzle-dazzle. Who can bang away at the 88s singing into the mike, and then next second shimmy that shiny shirt dancing across the stage. Who can look crestfallen at the demise of his mother-in-law and then his lover, and show you Peter Allen's love of life and conquer his larger-than-life personality. Here David Salter does it all. Bravo!
There are two other performers of worthy note. Post-toddler/pre-adolescent Joshua Spiniello was inspirational as the young Tenterfield progeny Peter Allen (you may see Ned Baulderstone on another night). Only ten, he already has seven years’ experience and I'm sure we'll see more of him. And last, but sadly not least, is the robotic piano, slithering across the stage like a giant sea slug, intent on nudging the actors out of the spotlight.
Well, there you have it. Bravo to the Met!
David Grybowski
When: 8 to 17 May
Where: The Arts Theatre
Bookings: bass.net.au
University of Adelaide Theatre Guild. Little Theatre. 7 May 2014
William Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet is in my view his most poetic work. The yearning of the young lovers has defined the teenage condition ever since - all the way to West Side Story and beyond - and is dramatically and tragically heightened by the blood feud between the families.
First-shot-at-it set designer Paul Rodda's Verona was manifested with gritty white rendering and a twilight skyline. Actor Paul Rodda's parsimonious prologue put the play in peril - he did not foreshadow the comically animated and skillfully executed bonhomie and hotheadedness he wowed the crowd with as Mercutio. Costume designer Sharon Malujlo assisted director Megan Dansie in shaping a somewhat medieval look with a budget.
It was clear from the opening confrontation between the Montagues and the Capulets that we had a cast with a wide range of experience. Then one is stunned by the reality of the swordplay - not once but twice again in the production. Complex thrusting with very real looking foils was choreographed by Scott Curness, Jaye Gordon, Mark Holgate and Andrew Kenner.
Although already at the ripe old age of nineteen, Abby Hampton embodied the innocent naivety of the not-quite fourteen Juliet. In her opening scene, she impresses the audience with her listening - an obedient Juliet yet we see her struggling with this talk of marriage between her mother and her nurse. Hampton conveys an unusual acting quality of having her character appear to self-reflect on every line and situation, adding an extra dimension of veracity. A stunning performance. Akkshey Caplash makes an impetuous, sulking and in-action Romeo but misses out on some of the subtleties. For me, he did not always match Juliet's emotional quotient. Together, however, they obtained an evocative chemistry, yet still, director Megan Dansie could have asked for more.
The cast elders steadied the production. Cate Rogers issued her usual nuanced and studied performance as the doting nurse with a touch of dotage. Steve Marvanek's father raging at a daughter's disobedience and ungratefulness took me aback when he nearly backhanded our heroine. Nary was there a friar cooking up intrigue like Gary George, with his gut-busting energy and focus.
Motiv Brand Design's Botoxed kissing-lips motif on the program cover and flyers also evokes the hearts of R & J in their final slumber. It is very fetching, and ought to turn some heads into the theatre.
At the Q & A after the show I attended, the cast was clearly in awe of director Megan Dansie's ability to get the show on the road, and to get the play clearly understood and accessible to today's texting adolescents. While some things have changed since Shakespeare's time, some things haven't, but were never said more beautifully.
David Grybowski
When: 3 to 17 May
Where: Little Theatre
Bookings: trybooking.com
NOTE: Barefoot Editor, P. Rodda appears in this production and this review remains entirely unedited from the original version written by D. Grybowski.
State Theatre Company of SA. The Dunstan Playhouse. 6 May 2014
After the applause, it's time for pondering.
Lally Katz presents us with a play about a very lovely friendship - not just between neighbours but between old and young and across cultural gaps.
In Neighbourhood Watch, a feisty old Hungarian widow called Ana reaches out of her solitude to befriend a young neighbour called Cathy. Cathy's an aspiring actress who shares a house with a geeky friend. Louise McCarthy's design for the neighbourhood creates strangely bland and very tall box houses which, with cunning geometrics, can seem as thin as a guard house or as broad as a unit front as they turn. With the aid of stage hands, they turn frequently. One of them opens up to illustrate the interior of Ana's house.
There is an abstract sense of street. It is quite spacious and cold. Lonely. One neighbour runs around delivering flyers. Delivery boys come and go. Wheelie bins go in and out. Ana's dog barks from an invisible back yard. Thus is suburban life delivered.
The real life, however, comes in the form of Miriam Margolyes as Ana. She is Ana. In one tremendous and utterly committed performance she becomes this peculiar little old lady with a terrible past and a tenacious spirit. She is a difficult, bossy, needy old chook.
Katz has Ana impose her history upon her new friend so that Cathy embodies Ana's past in memory scenes. These, too, feel as if they are drawn as sketches onstage. They are outlines of narrative which are pieces slowly forming a whole.
The construction of the play is in every way unconventional.
It's heart, however, is as old as time. It reaches out for human understanding. It notes the immense importance of care in the community and the value of learning about others. Strangers are mysteries and easy to ignore. But everyone has a story. Everyone has emotional needs. Sometimes, these can match up magically. So they do for Ana and Cathy.
And as expressed through Miriam Margolyes, it is a passage which not only tickles the funny bone but also makes the heart ache.
Margolyes in floppy floral frock and sensible shoes, kidnaps the eye for every moment she is onstage. Eleanor Stankiewicz towers beside her, clad in bright pop colours. She is strident as visual contrast. She is beautiful as an actress, blessed with an exceptional voice. She cooly underplays the role of Cathy giving the impression of a little girl lost.
Eugenia Fragos assumes an almost caricatured appearance of advanced years in portraying the hobbling old Serbian neighbour from Ana's last neighbourhood. Doggedly, this old survivor offers her friendship, undeterred by Ana's almost brutal shuns. Her plight brings tears to the eye.
Effectively, Nic English plays the mysterious boyfriend, Martin while Carmel Johnson is solid and sensible as Christine next door. Newcomer James Smith is touching as Cathy's smitten housemate.
Somewhere in this production, directed by Julian Meyrick, there is an undefinable tension. Or, is it a sense of detachment? After the applause has died down, one is left contemplating what it was that seems odd. It's a puzzle.
Not so, however, is the divine Miss Margolyes. A consummate performance. From a memory play, she leaves an imprint never to be forgotten.
Samela Harris
When: 6 to 24 May
Where: Dunstan Playhouse
Bookings: bass.net.au
By George Orwell. Shake and Stir. The Q Theatre. 2 May 2014
It’s been 65 years since George Orwell’s vision of a nightmarish communist future was put to paper; lucky for us it was never realised in the Western world, but you’d be forgiven for thinking back in 1959 that the scenario was a frighteningly real possibility. However, for countries like North Korea it is sadly a reality, where the enduring story of 1984 seems to have served as an inspiration rather than a warning.
This is Shake and Stir’s second Orwell production at The Q Theatre, the last being a brilliant adaptation of Animal Farm in 2013. One important difference between the two is that for 1984, the company chose not to have an interval in order to preserve the level of intensity that would build up during the hour and forty minutes – an effective decision, and something that should be done much more often with shows of this kind.
A feature of this version of 1984, besides the blinding spotlights harassing the audience in the lead up to the show, was the seamless and innovative insertion of media into the production. The well-timed pre-recorded material was used to great effect in creating the relentless surveillance of the people of Oceania, as well as the beautiful dream sequences of protagonist Winston Smith (Bryan Probets). It also served to heighten the emotion of Winston to the nth degree by providing synchronised close ups of his torment as he was systemically broken by the deceitful O’Brien (David Whitney).
The cast were nothing short of phenomenal, seemingly leaping straight from the pages of the book and materialising onto the stage at Queanbeyan. Hands down, as in the book, it was Probets and Whitney going head to head in the heartbreaking ‘re-education’ scenes towards the end of the play that proved most stirring.
However, the chemistry between the superb Nelle Lee as Julia and Probets as Winston was also noteworthy for its authenticity, as the bold young woman brought the nostalgic, world-worn ‘thought criminal’ back to life for that brief but achingly precious time. Ross Balbuziente and Nick Skubij as supporting characters brought great versatility to their roles and just the right amount of comic relief in otherwise sombre moments.
The costume and non-media elements of the set design were appropriately bleak, replicating the wretched life of a comrade, apart from a charming hidden room (that was literally hidden within the set) that would become the oasis for Julia and Winston during their last days of relative freedom.
Shake and Stir certainly lived up to its name that evening, leaving one feeling slightly rattled and shell-shocked. If anything, it was a good reminder to appreciate the pleasures and privileges of a liberal society and to take note of what we have to lose.
Deborah Hawke
When: Closed
Where: The Q Theatre - Canberra
Bookings: Closed