OzAsia Festival. The Space. Adelaide Festival Centre. 27 Oct 2021
Wayang Kulit is an ancient tradition of Indonesian shadow puppetry usually telling the beloved sagas of the Ramayana or Mahabharata. They are usually performed with beautiful, intricate leather shadow puppets held on sticks and the plays are usually rather long.
This new variation on the theme of Indonesian shadow puppetry certainly does feel long.
It is a cross cultural phenomenon, a “contemporary Asian-Australian” production with images devised by celebrated artist Jumaadi and music by Michael Toisuta. It features silhouette cutouts illuminated via projectors onto double screens in the theatre; quite straightforward. Beside the screens, a group of musicians with a wild wealth of assorted instruments plays live onstage.
The show opens with an introduction sung perhaps pedanda-style by a dignified elderly Indonesian gentleman who then joins the band and features on classical Indonesian percussive instruments. There in the band is a female singer who is also an exquisite violinist and a snappy twister of a ratchet rattle. She occasionally translates Bahasa Indonesia snippets in song form. Two guitar-playing multi-instrumentalists are with her, focused and intense. Much of the music is earnest and meditative and interestingly cross-cultural. One becomes fascinated by the daunting array of assorted instruments.
The performers are both Australian and Indonesian. The name, Perahu-Perahu, means “boats” and the story idea is to represent boat voyages between Australia and Indonesia over the very many years. It does, grimly, depict refugee boats and their drowned passengers. But, with very little in the way of written explanation, the audience is left to decipher what the hour of assorted enactments represents. There are charming village folk at work and people climbing over mountains. One thread depicts the Dutch invasion of Indonesia and the subsequent struggles of the dreaded “Da Da” colonialism. Another seems to be about the importation of mangoes and durian. The scene of fruit harvesting is charming. There is a sudden streak of politics with the portrayal of Australian cattle whose fate will be ill-treatment at the hands of Indonesian slaughterers. The show ends with lots of exuberantly celebratory music; “Opah Opah” cry the musicians and it is, of all things, a pineapple wedding. Strange, indeed.
It is a perplexing show. Is it cultural usurpation or is it brave new art? It sends one off to ponder the point. Jumaadi’s art, briefly shown onscreen at the opening of the show, is bright, lively, idiosyncratic, and highly appealing. There is a strong sense of his delightful designs in the Perahu-Perahu cutouts but, of course, they are shadow and rarely coloured. They also are highly reiterative. And, the storyline feels muddy.
As one who is au-fait with the traditions of wayang kulit, Perahu-Perahu comes across as an interesting interpretation of the genre but less fun than the real thing. There is no clown and the couple of gags slipped into the show are unfunny. It is certainly not “immersive” theatre as advertised but slow and, dare one say, obfuscatory for many.
Hence, while much of the music is interesting and the musicians clearly have a really good time, the message of Perahu-Perahu leaves one just a bit “bingung", as the Indonesians would say, or confused.
Samela Harris
When: 27 to 30 Oct
Where: The Space
Bookings: bass.net.au
The South Coast Choral and Arts Society. Victor Harbor Town Hall. 23 Oct 2021
Never underestimate the showbiz acumen of the out-of-towners. Yet again a fabulous show pops up under lights in the Victor Harbor Town Hall, this one not only showcasing some shining stage talent but also a seriously promising young director, one Jonathan Ogilvie.
For this beloved musical, he has drawn together a huge ensemble of experienced performers in musicals, many of them teachers, dancers, and tertiary students of the performing arts. Hence, there is no weak link, lest it be the limitations of the dear old Town Hall itself, something promised to be remedied in the one-day-maybe plan for a Victor Harbor Arts Complex.
True theatre troupers just get on with things - to which end, Ogilvie has tiered an excellent band of musicians over the top of the stage and assembled a classy chorus of press characters at cabaret tables around the stage’s catwalk with further vaudevillians onstage. No inch of space is wasted.
It is a vast cast of singers and scantily-clad dancers and it is clear that, despite the stringent masking rules which must have dominated through rehearsals, Ogilvie has worked this cast into ensemble quality. Everyone is cue-ready, in tune, facially expressive, word perfect and, blow me down, spot-on with American accents.
Perchance, one of Ogilvie’s secrets is collaboration. One notes from the impressive glossy program that, while he is director and designer, there are no less than three musical directors acknowledged as well as a choreographer and an assistant director.
While Ally Miller, in the principal role of Roxie, is an accomplished song-and-dance performer, alongside her as the fellow Chicago murderer Velma Kelly is young Shannen Beckett, an emerging talent and a specialist dancer with an extremely agreeable singing voice. Both performers deliver their prison inmate characters with verve, focus, and agility. Beckett, particularly, has some of the toughest dance challenges in the history of musicals as Velma and she braves them with panache.
Meanwhile, there’s the coveted male role of the sleazy, charming lawyer, Billy Flynn. Jon Grear strides down the theatre aisle, throws his mandatory mask to one side as he steps onto the stage and then, effortlessly, takes charge - just as his character is meant to do. Grear is no stranger to these audiences and they, rightly, love him. His voice is easy on the ear. His character nous is astute. If there is one comment a persnickety critic might make, it is that he could do with more eye makeup.
Perhaps also so of Chris Stevenson, a particularly gifted performer whose face is hidden behind a massive fuzzy beard. Oh, dear. He plays Roxie’s hapless husband, Amos, the man who sings that most poignant of all musicals' songs, Mister Cellophane. It is one of the treats of the production albeit he restrains his power throughout the storyline, to become a character so pitiable that the audience is sighing and moaning for him.
Georgia Martin embodies Mama, the prison matron. She is smooth, cool, commanding and possessed of a beautiful voice. Kiara Wiese is cast in the other featured part of Mary Sunshine. Once this was a drag role, now it is represented as a quaint female character which, with a powerful soprano range and lovely stage presence, is delivered by Kiara Wiese.
Chicago, with its book by Fred Ebb ad Bob Fosse, music by John Kander, and Lyrics by Fred Ebb, is not a short show. It only seems so, since it is rich with so many fabulous songs, such wild and sensual choreography, and such a ridiculously scandalous storyline. It enthrals and engrosses when, as here, it is well done.
Perhaps one could argue for some more oomph in the intros to a few solo numbers. Perhaps one could jog the lighting tech to enliven a slowish cue. Or, perhaps one’s attention has been so diverted by the energy and spirited commitment of the classy ensemble that flaws are rendered unobtrusive
All one can say, in the end of the salty-air Victor Harbor day, is that this Chicago production is worth the drive. If only there were tickets left to buy at the end of it.
Maybe it calls for a Fringe revival for the city audience.
Samela Harris
When: 23 Oct to 6 Nov
Where: Victor Harbor Town Hall
Bookings: Sold Out
Star Theatres. 22 Oct 2021
Currently available during the last two weekends of October at Star Theatres on Sir Donald Bradman Drive is the poorly publicised Back to Back Short Show Festival. It’s a celebration of local talent conveniently scheduled so that you may attend two or even three one-hour cabaret-style shows back-to-back in one evening.
In the opening number, the five men who dance energise the cabaret room in a robust display of prancing machismo while dressed in unbuttoned white shirts flying away off their bodies -beautiful like angels’ wings. This is going to be good!
And then there is the second act. Quirky. A projection introducing galactic conflict is followed by two of the men dressed like extras from a gay Ben Hur dancing a wrestling match until a kind of Nordic pupae complete with fur drops down from the fly tower and wiggles while confronted by both warriors. It’s so bad it's good fun, and an introduction to the variety these talented men of multicultural backgrounds are going to give us.
The next surprise is a young man singing a song of a lost love. He can’t go on with the lament and a voiced-over producer gives permission to pick a lady from the audience to waltz with. And he picks my wife! This is just getting better and better!
The numerous following acts are all short, surprising and inventive. The men have trained in distinctly different styles – ballet, hip hop and jazz - and the mishmash of the group choreography punctuated by some stunning tumbling and acrobatics is fresh and novel.
But wait! There’s more! A Vaudeville tap dancing duo complete with straw hats. Men dressed in fluorescent Woody Allen sperm suits (aka Everything You Wanted To Know About Sex *But Were Afraid To Ask) on wheels, a narcissistic American cowboy, and a mallet-wielding macho man. A bit of singing. What a hoot! Charlie, Kurt, Ricki-Jai, Willian, and Felipé – take a bow! Plenty here for the ladies, and the men, too.
David Grybowski
When: 22 to 31 Oct
Where: Star Theatres
Bookings: startheatres.com.au
Ellis Dolan. Star Theatres. 22 Oct 2021
Currently available during the last two weekends of October at Star Theatres on Sir Donald Bradman Drive is the poorly publicised Back to Back Short Show Festival. It’s a celebration of local talent conveniently scheduled so that you may attend two or even three one-hour cabaret-style shows back-to-back in one evening.
Ellis Dolan is a natural and easy-going singer eager to perform, so when the viral guillotine beheaded his gig touring with The School of Rock, Ellis found succor in his love of the music of the most important composer and lyricist of American musical theatre of the late 20th Century, Stephen Sondheim. I like Sondheim, too, but Ellis has a tattoo on the inside of his wrist, Look, I Made a Hat, which is the title of Sondheim’s collected lyrics from 1981 to 2011 with his commentary on creation thereof.
This is a most excellent show! While most of us learned how to use Zoom or make a coffee at home during the lockdowns, Ellis levitated his experiences and musings on life’s journey, loss of loved ones, and family friction by finding the perfect Sondheim song to express his fragility. Each song is introduced with a warm and honest explanation of his emotional match. It is poignant and courageous, and a compelling vulnerability.
You will not hear the usual Sondheim catalogue, but instead be thrilled with more quirky work. Sondheim’s choppiness and complexity is expertly rendered. Cadence, his accompanist, is another sweet person dressed in earrings and pearls to match their pearly grin. Their easy-going nature disguises the hard work in mastering the Sondheim keyboard, and the rapport between the performers is deep.
The Dolan hour is spent with a Sondheim singer, a comic, a philosopher and a friend. Bravo!
David Grybowski
When: 22 & 29 Oct
Where: Star Theatres
Bookings: startheatres.com.au
Adelaide Premiere. Red Phoenix Theatre & Holden Street Theatres. Holden Street Theatres. 21 Oct 2021
Such a dense and emotionally gripping piece of theatre leaves one almost drained of superlatives.
Red Phoenix’s production of the unique documentary play about the monstrous 1998 gay-hate killing of young Matthew Shepard in Laramie, Wyoming, is so powerful and immediate that, at its denouement and, indeed, intermittently throughout, audience members are streaming tears.
How can a play that is so sad and disturbing also be uplifting and enriching?
Ah, there’s the artistry of the theatre. There is the very “why” of theatre.
Within that black box at Holden Street, we were transported. There was no world other than the actors under lights and, through the consummate skill of director Brant Eustice, the piercing and poignant exposition of a town reliving the shock and shame and, in some cases ferocious ambivalence, of an act of unspeakable cruelty by some of their own.
The play, The Laramie Project, was devised by America’s Tektonic Theatre Company whose members went in person to Laramie to record one-by-one the reactions of the citizenry to what had happened in their midst. It is a brilliant dramatic construction wrought of human verite, of very conservative country folk juggling their own disapproval of homosexuality against their horror of others’ hatred for it. It reveals the quietly covert world of sexual diversity in such environments. It scrapes at the underbelly of Christian values and yet manages to bring human beauty out of gut-wrenching tragedy.
It requires a huge cast. There are about sixty voices represented from ye olde plain folk on the land to barflies and pastors, from academics to waitresses, family, friends, police, and doctors.
It takes three acts of theatre, almost three hours, to tell this massive crime story.
And yet, for the audience immersed in this brave piece of Red Phoenix dramatic expertise, time stands still. There is no other reality.
And thus one salutes Eustice, his assistant director, Tracey Walker, and the ten actors on stage.
They have elicited a copybook piece of ensemble acting. It is a production of sheer eloquence and sophistication, albeit executed on an oily rag of a budget. Kate Prescott’s set is just a series of cleverly positioned black platform boxes and a striking log fence.
The actors wear white t-shirts, jeans, and boots but, for each character they embody, they take a token garment from a clothes rack and, in the age-old tradition of the theatre, they slip into a different persona. These are the exercises and subsequent achievements of drama training and stage experience. And the cast is accomplished.
It works on delivering American accents and cultural nuances, some actors impeccably, others well, none badly.
Outstanding in the field are Sharon Malujlo, Nick Kennett, Matt Houston, Samuel Creighton, Tom Tassone, Chris Gun, and Nadia Talotta with some fine moments from Cheryl Douglas, Jasmine Leech, and Anita Zamberlan Canala. From every cast member, it is astute collaboration, snappy cues, and fluid movement, enhanced by Richard Parkill’s perceptive lighting.
From this superb work, one takes away indelible images: the totality of Matt Houston’s Wyoming-rustic with simply a facial expression and a ten-gallon hat; the transformation of Samuel Creighton as he dons a priest’s collar; the croaky cigarette-voiced credibility of Sharon Malujlo’s old mum; the vocal authority if Tom Tassone’s judge; the easy likeability of Chris Gun’s teatowel-twisting bartender; the collective chaos of the voracious American media; the incredible gentleness of Amazing Grace; and the sweet poignancy of the dying boy’s “friends”. There are so many memorable moments in such a big and finely-honed show.
Applause. Applause.
Samela Harris
When: 21 to 30 Oct
Where: Holden Street Theatres
Bookings: holdenstreettheatres.com