★★★
Adelaide Fringe. The World’s Best Worst Magician. Octagon, Gluttony. 14 Mar 21
Is Tahir the world’s best worst or worst best or the best of the worst or the worst of the best or just the worst or just the best? He’s a comedian and magician, in any case, and in this children’s show he attempts to combine the two. Sometimes it works, sometimes he’s not the best. Or the worst.
One man, a fair size stage, a table of props and a gig audience to use for participation. As Tahir notes, “three year olds are tricky, you’re not sure what they’re going to do”. Nor necessarily can you predict how they might take to a joke or a magician’s performance because whilst the Mystery of the Vanishing Bandanna is excellent (obviously, being misread, this became the vanishing Banana) the idea of plucking a dad from the audience and making him into a baby is less effective with preschoolers, who just couldn’t quite comprehend the joke.
The problem here is that Tahir is a good magician; so when he says ‘bad’ it’s irony, and kids have trouble with irony, preferring their backhanded humour to be a little less perceptual. Sardonic, even. So when Tahir pretends to show how a trick is constructed and in doing so reveals he’s not a dolt, he is actually revealing that he is clever and that the joke is on the audience. Just like all magic shows, since they all essentially play the same sleight trick upon their audience.
And so it was with the world’s best worst magician, a show of ‘one step forward’ and ‘two steps back’. The audience all played their parts: Harper and Lily played the innocents in the yellow silk scarf routine; three year old James was adorably passive, and Jeremy (renamed Jeff) as dad was excellent. Sadly the show just failed to capture the attention, except where it did so by assaulting the senses. Failed and dropped audio cues were one thing, but the attack by volume is an appalling oversight and unacceptable for a children’s show. Too many kids in the audience were forced to cover their ears too many times.
Tahir is clearly not the world’s worst magician, and this is not a bad show. It moves along quite well, and stretches to achieve its high points, which are quality, but it is also a patchy affair.
Alex Wheaton
When: 20 and 21 Mar
Where: Octagon, Gluttony
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
Adelaide Festival. Festival Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre. 14 Mar 2021
Sadly, racism, bigotry, persecution and their abhorrent consequences all remain alive and well – they are still children of our time.
Sir Michael Tippett’s A Child of Our Time is an oratorio akin to the likes of Handel’s Messiah, which we frequently hear performed at Christmas, and Bach’s Passions (such as St Matthew Passion) which are usually heard at Easter. Tippett’s oratorio, however, is not tied to a particular religious festival. It transcends religion and speaks to the human condition more generally, and this particular production addresses what is ugly about the way human beings and societies often treat each other.
A Child of Our Time was written in 1942 when the composer was in his mid 30s and World War II was raging. Although it was Tippett’s response to real events – the assassination of a German diplomat by a teenage Jewish refugee, and the subsequent persecution of the Jews – the work possesses a generality and timelessness that makes it relevant to later generations. A Child of Our Time is a very political work insomuch as it reproaches those who inveigle themselves into our collective conscience and beguile us into supporting vile policy responses. But of course, we all bear some responsibility.
Conductor and chorus master Brett Weymark commands an enormous contingent of musicians and singers, including the Adelaide Festival Community Chorus, singers from the aboriginal women’s Iwiri Choir, and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. Like other oratorios, it also inlcudes vocal soloists and this production features tenor Henry Choo, alto Elizabeth Campbell, Bass Pelham Andrews, and soprano Jessica Dean.
Weymark’s work with the choir is excellent: from the quietest of moments to the rousing fortissimos, the choir held together, and the pitching, phrasing and articulation appeared effortless. The members of the choir did not all stand at the same time for the opening chorus. Rather they stand in groups one after the other as does a crowd when it gradually reaches consensus and demands to be heard. It is a potent moment: simple choreography but pregnant with meaning.
Throughout the performance images are projected onto a large screen above the stage, including historical footage from various theatres of war, human conflict, and pitiful images of anguished and angry people. The images are often related to the sung text and the result is sobering. Some of the images relate to Australia’s Stolen Generation, and to the Black Lives matter movement. It is chilling to observe the members of the Iwiri Choir at these moments.
Henry Choo is outstanding as a soloist. His attractive tenor voice rises clearly above the choir and orchestra, and he sings with heart-felt expression befitting the text. Jessica Dean’s light soprano voice continues to be an attractive instrument, and Elizabeth Campbell and Pelham Andrews inject gravitas when needed.
A Child of Our Time is powerful and elicits heightened emotions and feelings of outrage, shock, and sadness. But it also stirs feelings of hope that we can do better as a species.
This heartfelt performance is important.
Kym Clayton
When: Closed
Where: Festival Theatre
Bookings: Closed
★★★★★
Adelaide Fringe. Norwood Concert Hall. 14 Mar 2021
Talk about high octane.
They’re not only the hottest act in town. Perchance they are the hottest act in the land.
The 60 Four is fuelled by old-school pop music - The Four Seasons, the Beach Boys, The Supremes, The Beatles, Elvis, the BeeGees…
From their beginnings as an instant-hit schoolboy group, they’ve grown to be a peerless super-sound foursome with the ability to pack out large venues. So popular are they that audiences arrive hours early to bag the best seats.
So it is a super-packed Norwood Concert Hall on Saturday night with covid marshals working like crazy to ensure the seating and dancing rules are properly respected.
And, while the hits may be Boomer era, truth is that the 60s era music is so good that nothing can make it die. They just don’t do tunes like this anymore. So don’t expect an oldies audience. It’s a cross-generational thing.
Furthermore, back in the 60s, no one could or did perform this material with the sort of energy and panache that the 60 Four turns on. They are not just singers. These boys are all serious theatre entertainers performing non-stop high-energy and sophisticated dance moves. The choreography is worth an award in its own right. And the synchronicity of the performers is impeccable. Their energy seems inexhaustible and their fitness is breathtaking. Footballers are pussycats by comparison.
There’s not a moment of dead air in the two-hour show. With the nine-piece band on full throttle, they charge from one song into another, from one seemingly exhausting dance routine into another. With the help of some careful stage smoke, the lighting thrills with the music as moving shafts of colours. The boys keep their patter to a minimum. But they do introduce themselves - Ben Francis, who is the mover and shaker leader of the pack, Kyle Hall, who is the dance moves genius, with Lachlan Williams and Jack Conroy completing this talent team perfect.
While Francis's superb falsetto range has been a key ingredient of the Four’s success, it is the spirit of the Four and their clearly diligent discipline which attracts admiration. No one can turn on this sort of professionalism without hard work and much consideration. For instance, the arrangements are their own. They are not a mere “tribute” group. They are a fantastic musical powerhouse in their own right - vividly versatile and masses of foot-stomping good fun. They just make an audience feel uplifted. They make the world a happier place. Even in a pandemic.
Hence, with the areas fastidiously marked out in covid quotas, their audience dances in front of the stage. Post interval, the Four really turn on the dance numbers, and the Twist is born again, and again, and again.
The sound is amped up after interval, which is not really necessary. The place is already rocking.
Quite a few songs bring the roof down. . Williams does a wow version of Tom Jones' It’s Not Unusual. Francis simply rips into Johnny O’Keefe’s Shout. Even J’OK would be blown away.
It is just a bravo, bravo show, boys.
Five stars does not really seem enough.
Samela Harris
When: Closed
Where: Norwood Concert Hall
Bookings: Closed
★★★★
Walter Buckley. The Jade. 12 Mar 2021
Walter Buckley is living his dream. Inspired in his not-so-long-ago teenage years by David Gauci - Adelaide’s own cabaret entertainer and producer - at the Music Theatre Camp, Buckley is starring in his very own world premiere musical for which he wrote the music and lyrics as well. And it’s a Grand Final win!
Pals, footy fans, screenwriters and film makers Michael Whyntie and Jacob Buckley were inspired by the 2016 AFL Footy Show spectacle of retired player Billy Brownless tearily exposing the affair between his ex-wife Nicky and mate Garry Lyons. From here, Whyntie and Buckley delve deep into Brownless’s misery to great mirth capitalising on footy player stereotypes – vanity, drinking, insensitivity, partying, and social stupidity. The wife doesn’t come off so well either, appearing as a gold digger and then focusing on the alimony. I don’t know whether Brownless is an innocent vehicle for stereotypical footy buffoonery or if this is a deliberate character assassination of the hapless Brownless; the former could be mistaken for the latter and the latter would indeed be cruel.
For one attending without a priori knowledge of the actual events and not musing on the ethics, the musical is a little ripper. It’s a pretty tightly written story with highly illustrative scenes of the main events, be them in a pub, restaurant, locker room or family court. The use of high resolution back screen projection with effective perspective is very successful. The songs weave seamlessly with the narrative. Walter Buckley is a dynamic performer and the entire cast sings and performs with crash-through credibility and cheeky amusement.
It was a near sellout crowd and The Jade is the best Fringe venue. A definite go-see. 4 Stars for the show, 1 Star for empathy.
David Grybowski
When: 1 to 21 Mar
Where: The Jade
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
★★★★★
Adelaide Fringe Festival. Mainstage at Bakehouse Theatre. 12 Mar 2021
Devised and performed by Andi Snelling, and produced in association with award-winning Adelaide-based theatre company Under The Microscope, Happy-Go-Wrong is about facing one’s own mortality, surviving, and emerging intact but changed at the other end.
As one enters the theatre to the wistful (and, as it turns out, appropriate) strains of Bonjour sung by French singer-songwriter Philippe Katerine, we are subsumed into an other-worldly space. Clouds are visible through the pervasive mist and shards of light cut through and illuminate the playing area that is dominated by curious but imposing amorphous sculptures of twisted brown paper and first aid boxes. Evidently a story about a health emergency is about to unfold, and the French speakers in the audience may recall the lyrics “Je n’ai pas envie de crever” (I don’t want to die) from Bonjour.
Out of the mist Snelling materialises seemingly none-too-steady on roller skates and illuminating her way with a small torch. And there was light, and the antics begin! We soon learn that the performance is autobiographical and its essence is that Snelling suffered Lyme disease after being bitten by a tick, became dangerously ill, but survived. She tells the story of her journey to recovery through storytelling that borders on philosophical discourse, intelligent clowning, and choreographed movement that is expressive and synchronised with the cleverly devised underscore.
Throughout the performance she directly engages the audience, and this breaking of the so-called ‘fourth wall’ is fertile ground for her to not only play her live self, but to also play out what she imagines might become of her once she has slipped the bonds of this life. The whole thing very much keeps the audience on its toes, guessing and wondering what is unfolding before their eyes, and the hour passes very quickly.
Snelling is the consummate performer. Her stagecraft is well honed with first-rate timing. She relishes provoking the audience into a response, whether it be laughing at her antics, wincing at her blunt observations of the human condition, laughing at her insights into some of the absurdities of modern life, or being stunned into uncomfortable silence as she strips away the façades behind which we live (including all her clothing near the end of the show). Her use of the masses of twisted brown paper is genius. It becomes a physical metaphor for society’s choking bureaucratic response to life’s predicaments as she twists, turns and fights her way to overcome the writhing mass.
This show is provoking and unsettling in parts, but it is also an exciting, joyous and life-affirming romp that leaves a wide and persistent smile on your face.
Kym Clayton
When: 10 to 13 & 17 to 20 Mar
Where: Mainstage at Bakehouse Theatre
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au