House of Sand. 2 Mar 2018
Director Charles Sanders is spot on when he describes his sister’s work as having “the logic of memory, dream and emotion.”
Pedal offers an extraordinarily striking range of contrasting images in movement and colour presenting themselves as a sort of tale peddled to the audience, as Eliza Sanders ‘cycles’ from one phrase of choreography and word song to the next.
It’s quite captivating once you surrender to it. There’s a sense this tale is one of a journey to another country, or another place within the self. Sanders is robed in a delightful multi coloured one piece costume, the set comprising a bare stage crossed by two long washing lines with pegs, suitcase and a small mirror representing water, rules the space. Sanders fills it with known contemporary moves, some highly exotic, some fabulist in construction.
Words repeated become at one with repeated actions. Beautiful songs wistfully glide aside the choreography. Moments addressed to the audience seem half an appeal to engage us directly and half to shift the direction of the piece, as if something stronger is needed to peddle the audience successfully.
A magnificent Fringe experience in the true spirit of the term.
David O’Brien
4 stars
When: 28 Feb to 17 Mar
Where: Holden Street Theatres, The Studio
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
Empyrean at Gluttony. 3 Mar 2018
The name says it all: ‘fuego’ is Spanish for ‘fire’, and, well…. ‘carnal’ needs no explanation. Put them together and you have a fiery (literally) and hot (in the sensual sense) display of circus skills that have you on the edge of your seat for an hour. Take away the fire, and there are probably better circus acts, but add the fire and it’s altogether something else. All of a sudden the bizarre seems almost unbelievable: not just fire blowing, but swallowing it; aerial gymnastics while on fire, and then a balletic landing on ice; sword swallowing, but ones that glow in the dark, even while they are deep within your torso; playing up tempo anthems on the bagpipes which shoot burst of fire on beat; fire sticks blazing at both ends being flung about and twirled around contorting bodies with seeming abandon.
The question on everyone’s lips is: how do the performers NOT get burned? It’s madness!
But it’s not all shock and awe. There’s humour as well, with the almost obligatory “let’s drag a poor unsuspecting punter up from the audience and embarrass him”. Such routines can be tiresome, but not this one. It was sharp, well-constructed, and, like good pantomime, was riddled with sexual innuendo that sailed completely over the heads of the kids in the audience but had the adults roaring with laughter; no doubt then left with the inevitable follow up questions from their sons and daughters!
The show is well choreographed, and the acts fit seamlessly together. The hour passes very quickly almost leaving you wanting more, but not quite. The show finishes with a traditional parade of the cast, rather than a fiery up-beat bang!
Recommended for all the family!
Kym Clayton
3.5 stars
When: 3 to 18 Mar
Where: Empyrean at Gluttony
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
Adelaide Festival. Ex Machina. Her Majesty’s Theatre.
The footage of early Russian space missions is grainy old black and white as seen from the porthole of Robert Lepage’s Far Side of the Moon.
There’s Soyuz, Luna, Saluyet, and Sputnik.
Actor Yves Jacques writes large upon the blackboard wall the name of Tsiolkovsky, the father of Russian rocketry, for the audience to ponder. The space program is more vanity than science, he asserts. It is the narcissism of the mortals who see the moon above them as a mirror. They probe space. They send messages into the mysterious infinity.
SETI is the computer reach of everyman to find and make contact with extra-terrestrial life. A puppet spaceman is seen in and through the portholes which open onto the void of space. He’s a little white space walker, a man probing the moon and yonder.
But, suggests the play’s creator, perhaps the sacred place should be the far side of the moon where instead of looking at himself, man would look into the great void.
Thus arrives the name of this renowned piece of Ex Machina Theatre.
And from the artistry of the marvellous French Canadian actor, Jacques, emerge the characters of an earthly story. Two estranged brothers are brought together by the death of their mother. Andre is a successful TV weather man. Phillipe is the thinker and dreamer, the space wonderer, but a man with an unlucky streak. He enters the SETI competition, to make a short film to be sent into space. He also gets all his timing wrong when he makes his own first air trip to a conference. His brother, Andre, is the busy one, too busy to take care of his mother’s fish, his mother’s last living thing. Indeed, he was too busy for much of the clean-out of her apartment and is left with the final chore of taking out the shelves which the brothers used to stay apart from each other in their bedroom. It gets stuck in the lift, another symbolic void in the story, stranding him against the clock. He telephones angrily for support and for someone else to tell work why he is going to be a no-show.
This and the many scenes of the play are delivered via the opening and closing of a wall of sliding panels which cover the lower quarter of the stage. The washing machine throbs there and the porthole opens there. A lecture theatre materialises from there. An apartment materialises there with that poor fish swimming in its own black void. The actor moves between characters, with an ironing board as his primary prop becoming all things, most spectacularly, a motor scooter zooming past a projected landscape to Quebec’s Plains of Abraham whence a war with the English was lost.
The low-set staging of Far Side of the Moon is fascinating to behold. The solitary actor segues between characters, including his mother and a doctor, with practised ease. It is two hours of hard work for the actor, his only companion the puppeteer, Eric Leblanc, out of sight. He, himself, must fly through the porthole into space. It is an extraordinary moment. But, none more so than the climax of the production when he is seen as a weightless man floating upside down in space. It is quite spectacular and it’s all achieved through mirrors.
Samela Harris
When: 2 to 7 Mar
Where: Her Majesty’s Theatre
Bookings: bass.net.au
Chrissie Brown & Liz Cahalan. La Boheme. 3 Mar 2018
Chrissie Brown and Liz Cahalan’s latest production is a very raw look at their own experiences with parenting, and childbirth.
Both mothers to two year old toddlers, their tales have the parents in the audience nodding with understanding, wincing at the graphic detail, empathising as the girls lament, and sympathising with their experiences.
Fair warning should be given to any would-be parents, and especially to those who may currently be pregnant with their first. This show might put you off the idea altogether.
They milk the routines for all it is worth and dine out on their love for Bonds trackies, wine, and maternity underwear. But it is all met with a good dose of humour and plenty of feminine empowerment.
More cabaret than burlesque, on the rare occasion the women do dance it is clear that parenthood has not stripped them of their sensuality or sexual appeal.
But this show is more catharsis than revelation, and despite almost being cancelled due to the difficulties of juggling parenting, business, and performance, goes resolutely on. If for no other reason but to prove it is a story these women have earned the right to tell.
It is unpolished, honest, oddly humorous, and in your face. A lot like the daily responsibilities of parenting.
Paul Rodda
3 stars
When: 3 to 11 Mar
Where: La Boheme
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
Gluttony. The Octagon at Gluttony. 1 Mar 2018
The queues to see Hans aka Matt Gilbertson in Gluttony are quite the place to be for the Fringe. Since his shows are at the early slot of 6.30 this year, audiences fall into line at about 6, complete with wine and beer and nibbles. Outriders trot off to bring back additional supplies if the drinks have gone down too fast. Everyone chums up and, it turns out, few are seeing Hans for the first time. The man has a hard-core Adelaide following.
It’s not surprising, of course.
He gives them their money’s worth. Year by year his shows have grown slicker and more expertly honed.
Needless to say, this year, back from triumphs in the UK, he is better than ever; his voice, his moves, his pace, all have been refined.
This is his great ‘Australia’s Flair’ tribute show. Hans is one of us, as dual-citizened and Aussie as Barossa mettwurst. “Come and see the real thing,” he sings draped in a piece of green and gold kitsch.
With saxophone soaring, the Ungrateful Bastards play, the downlights splay and the Lucky Bitches kick up their choreographed heels with high-octane energy. They need that energy to keep up with Hans who is in top condition and exuding a power of foot-stompin' vigour.
Prancing, dancing and Hansing. Hans picks his targets from the audience. "Are you old enough?” he sings and picks Kel with the walking stick and straw hat who, he reckons, is clearly out from the retirement home. Kel’s an old Hans fan and he’s right into any mischief Hans can throw his way. Perhaps less so Patrick or Torsten the genuine Germans from Kent Town. Hans milks their bemusement with glee.
From his Southern Cross sequinned outfit and into his Aussie bush bling complete with perplexed-looking toy kookaburra on his shoulders and a cling of weeny koalas on the neckline, Hans powers through the Australian song book and some nice, sizzling political satire.
There’s a burst of spectacular tap dancing, a whirling Flight of the Bumblebees on the keyboard, some rousing accordion and an aerial stunt which rather takes the breath away. Costume changes, blinding bling, some rowdy rock; Hans rounds off the show with the Angels’ great Aussie anthem and the audience replies in traditional loving invective.
The 6.30 timeslot might be a bit early for some of the Hans content, but whatever time of day, his people will find him and adore him. Again. And rightly so. He’s our showbiz treasure.
Samela Harris
5 stars
When: 1 to 18 Mar
Where: Gluttony, The Octagon
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au