MiNDFOOD season of Two Ladies show programme

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SEASON OF

TWO LADIES BY

NANCY HARRIS


PA R T N E R

UNIVERSITY

FUNDER

ACCESSIBILIT Y

MEDIA

PA R T N E R

2021

B E N E FAC TO RS

S U P P O R T I N G PA R T N E R S PA R T N E R S

FUNDER

CORE

PRESENTING

MAJOR SUPPORTERS

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P R I N C I PA L

THANKS TO THE SUPPORTERS OF AUCKLAND THEATRE COMPANY

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SEASON OF

BY

NANCY HARRIS

CAST Hélène — Jennifer Ward-Lealand | Sophia — Anna Jullienne Sandy — Rena Owen | Georges — Adam Gardiner Fatima — Ban Abdul

CREATIVE Playwright — Nancy Harris | Director — Colin McColl Assistant Director — Sananda Chatterjee Set Designer — Rachael Walker Lighting and Sound Designer — Sean Lynch Costume Designer — Lucy Jane Senior

PRODUCTION Head of Production — Jess Leslie Company Manager (Maternity Cover) — Nicole Sarah Production Intern — Rose Herda Props Manager — Magdalena Hoult Technical Manager — Kevin Greene Stage Manager — Michael Clark Assistant Stage Manager — Chiara Niccolini Technical Operator — Spencer Earwaker French Language Advisor — Yannick La Dialect Coach — Genice Paullay-Bazley Audio Description — Nicola Owen NZSL Interpreting and Signing — Kelly Hodgins from Platform Interpreting AUCKLAND THEATRE COMPANY WOULD LIKE TO THANK THE FOLLOWING FOR THEIR HELP WITH THIS PRODUCTION: David Jones, Modes Eventwear, Munford Construction The New Zealand premiere of the MiNDFOOD season of Two Ladies is the first Auckland Theatre Company mainstage production of 2021 and opened on 11 February at ASB Waterfront Theatre. Following the Auckland season, it is touring to Hamilton, Tauranga, New Plymouth and Hastings. The production is approximately 2 hours including a 20-minute interval. Advisory: includes references to sexual assault and suicide. Please remember to switch off all mobile phones and noise-emitting devices.


Welcome TO THE MiNDFOOD SEASON OF TWO LADIES

We are very happy to be associated with Auckland Theatre Company as a media partner for another season. It has been a pleasure to watch director Colin McColl and ATC create thought-provoking theatre experiences that showcase the incredible talent that we have in this country. And I thank Colin for all he has done as artistic director, I will miss working with him. MiNDFOOD is proud to be part of this journey bringing theatre to life while supporting art and culture within New Zealand at such an important time. MiNDFOOD is about smart thinking and the talented Jennifer WardLealand has often featured throughout our pages over the years. Therefore, it seems fitting that MiNDFOOD is the proud sponsor and partner in this production where Ward-Lealand’s extraordinary talent will be on display. There is nothing quite like going out and having a great night at the theatre. It is smart thinking indeed, much like MiNDFOOD and ATC. Enjoy.

Michael McHugh MiNDFOOD Editor-in-Chief

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Colin McColl Director of Two Ladies

Happy New Year! Welcome back to the ASB Waterfront Theatre and welcome to the MiNDFOOD season of Two Ladies, the first play in Auckland Theatre Company’s 2021 subscription season. I’d just finished reading Michelle Obama’s excellent autobiography Becoming prior to picking up Two Ladies early last year so I had some idea of the disconnect in the life of a first lady between the glamorous, privileged world of state occasions, designer clothes, grand receptions and dancing with the stars and the frustrations of a controlled, corralled, constantly watched life as wife of the President where she is pretty much at the beck and call of her husband and his advisors. However, playwright Nancy Harris is more interested in playing with reality than simply representing it. While her characters are loosely based on Melania Trump and Brigitte Macron 4

– they are fictional creations – and the plot of Harris’ play takes entertaining turns from the satire to social realism to outrageous feminist revenge fable with more than touch of Medea about it. She has a lot of fun underlining the differences – personal, cultural, and political – between the two women. And we’ve had a lot of fun putting the play together for you. I couldn’t ask for two more perfect actors for these roles than Jennifer Ward-Lealand and Anna Jullienne. They’re both stylish, talented and investigative performers interested in exploring the pain and anguish behind their characters' glamorous “photoready” exteriors. Rena Owen and Adam Gardiner as press secretaries and Ban Abdul as the undervalued catering assistant have inhabited their roles with relish. My huge thanks to them all and to our stellar design and production team. Enjoy your evening.


Made for the Moment. Made from New Zealand. 5


Cast

JENNIFER WARD-LEALAND

ANNA JULLIENNE

RENA OWEN

JENNIFER WARD-LEALAND TE ATAMIRA Hélène Since training at Auckland’s Theatre Corporate, Jennifer Ward-Lealand has worked extensively in theatre, film, television, musical and radio for 40 years. She is also a trained intimacy coordinator for stage and screen. Jennifer was a founding board member of the Watershed Theatre and The Actors’ Program. She is President of Equity New Zealand (since 2007), Patron of Q Theatre, Te Manu Tīoriori Trust and Theatre New Zealand, and serves as a trust board member of the Actors Benevolent Fund. In the 2007 New Year’s Honours List, she was named an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit (ONZM) for services to theatre and the community. In 2018 she was named SPADA Industry Champion and in 2019 New Year’s Honours List, she was named a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit (CNZM) for services to theatre, film and television and presented with a Woman of Influence Award (for arts and culture). Most recently, Jennifer was honoured as the Kiwibank New Zealander of the Year 2020. 6

ADAM GARDINER

ANNA JULLIENNE Sophia Anna Jullienne's previous appearances for Auckland Theatre Company include playing the lead in Anne Boleyn, disenchanted Miranda in Stuart Hoar’s thriller Rendered, the frustrated doctor's wife in In The Next Room (or The Vibrator Play), the meddling journalist Joanna in Enlightenment and the stunning Roly Poly Bird in The Twits, adding to a long list of credits, including Death of a Salesman, The Vagina Monologues and A View from a Bridge. Anna is also a familiar face on our screens with a television career spanning almost 20 years. Her credits, both local and international, include Mean Mums, Falling Inn Love, the awardwinning Australian drama 800 Words as well as Harry, Bombshell, The Blue Rose, Underbelly NZ and Shortland Street. Anna has twice been the recipient of Best Supporting Actress at the New Zealand Television Awards, most recently in 2020 for her portrayal of uptight alpha mum, Heather, in Mean Mums.

BAN ABDUL


RENA OWEN (Ngāti Hine/Welsh/European) Sandy Rena Owen trained at The Actor’s Institute in London in the mid-1980s and since then has worked extensively in theatre, television, and film. Her illustrious international award-winning career spans over three decades and multiple countries though she is still best known for her leading role in the cult classic New Zealand feature film, Once Were Warriors (1994) and as Taun We in Star Wars Attack of the Clones (2005). She is one of only six actors in the world to have worked with both legendary filmmakers, George Lucas and Stephen Spielberg and to date is the only woman. For the last three years, Rena has been working as a series regular on Disney’s hit TV series, Siren playing the beloved hybrid mermaid, Helen Hawkins. Rena considers the theatre to be her first love and is thrilled to be working again with maestro Colin McColl and ATC. Her last role for both was as the formidable lead, Aroha in their landmark production of Bruce Mason’s classic, The Pohutukawa Tree (2009). Also, a published playwright, Rena is now writing and producing for the screen and is incredibly grateful to be able to work during these COVID-19 days in Godzone, Aotearoa, New Zealand! ADAM GARDINER Georges Adam Gardiner’s first production with Auckland Theatre Company was in 2003 with performances in Play 2.03, New Gold Dream and Ladies’ Night. He has worked with Auckland

Theatre Company on numerous productions and in various capacities since then. Recent appearances for ATC include Other Desert Cities, Midnight in Moscow, Black Confetti, In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play), Rupert, Polo, the Troll King in Peer Gynt [recycled], Filthy Business, and as Tony Blair and David Cameron in The Audience. Recent screen credits include Mahana, Born to Dance, Pike River, Friday Night Bites, Agent Anna, Hillary, Dear Murderer, 1953, The Brokenwood Mysteries, Thomas Jefferson in The Men Who Built America: Frontiersmen, The Luminaries, Shortland Street, Centrepoint, Power Rangers, and the feature film Juniper. BAN ABDUL Fatima After graduating from NASDA (National Academy of Singing and Dramatic Art) in 2002, Ban Abdul’s vibrant and varied career started with the New Zealand production of Disco Pigs. This led to being cast in Downstage Theatre’s Top Girls, directed by Colin McColl in 2003, which gained a nomination for Most Promising Newcomer at the Chapman Tripp Theatre Awards that year. From musicals to performance art and everything in between, Ban’s most notable performances include Duck; Baghdad, Baby! and Wait Until Dark in theatre, Eagle vs Shark, Avatar and Put Your Hands Together Please in films, and Jane and the Dragon as a motion capture artist. Having debuted for ATC in Rendered (2018), Ban is now back for the MiNDFOOD season of Two Ladies, in its premier New Zealand season.

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Credit: Helen Maybanks

NANCY HARRIS

COLIN McCOLL

SANANDA CHATTERJEE

RACHAEL WALKER

SEAN LYNCH

LUCY JANE SENIOR

Creative NANCY HARRIS Playwright Nancy Harris’ new plays Two Ladies and The Beacon, directed by Tony Award winners Nicholas Hytner and Garry Hynes, had their world premieres over two consecutive days in September 2019. Two Ladies premiered at the Bridge Theatre, London. An award-winning playwright from Dublin, The Beacon marked Nancy’s debut with Druid and a return to the Gate Theatre after her adaptation of The Red Shoes in 2017. Nancy’s play Our New Girl opened in March 2020 at the Gate Theatre, Dublin, shortly before the theatres were shut everywhere. The Magician’s Elephant, a new musical with book and lyrics by Nancy and music and lyrics by Marc Teitler has been announced by the Royal Shakespeare Company to open on 29 Oct – 17 Jan 2021 (postponed from 2020). Nancy received The Rooney Prize for Irish Literature and The Stewart Parker Award for her debut fulllength play No Romance. Other theatre credits include: Our New Girl (Bush Theatre, London/ Atlantic Theatre, New York); No Romance, Love in a Glass Jar (Abbey Theatre); Baddies: The Musical (Unicorn Theatre, London); Journey to X (National Theatre Connections); The Kreutzer Sonata, (Gate Theatre, London/ La Mama, New York). Nancy has also written for radio and television and was nominated for a BAFTA as a Breakthrough Talent for her writing on the Channel 4 series Dates. A new original series The Dry for Element Films is making its way to production in 2021. 8

COLIN McCOLL Director Colin McColl has directed for the Norwegian National Theatre and the Dutch National Theatre, as well as leading New Zealand and Australian theatre companies. He is the only New Zealand director to be invited to present his work (Hedda Gabler) at the official Edinburgh Festival. The production played to great acclaim and, also, was presented at other festivals around the world. Colin has won Best Director at the Chapman Tripp Theatre Awards several times. Colin has been directing for Auckland Theatre Company since its inaugural season in 1993 and has directed more than 50 productions for the Company. His opera-directing credits include: Quartet (New Zealand International Arts Festival 2004); La Bohème (Wellington City Opera); and The Italian Girl in Algiers, The Marriage of Figaro and The Prodigal Child (NBR New Zealand Opera). In 2009, he remounted his production of The Italian Girl in Algiers for the Scottish Opera. In November 2007, Colin was honoured for his artistic achievements and excellence at the eighth annual Arts Foundation of New Zealand Laureate Awards. He was named an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in June 2010. SANANDA CHATTERJEE Assistant Director Sananda Chatterjee has worked with New Zealand's largest South Asian theatre company – Prayas – since 2005. In 2020, she expanded


her repertoire with Yatra, coming on board as an Ensemble Director and Associate Producer. Outside Prayas, she collaborated with Sarita Das on their performance piece Perfect Shade in the Auckland Pride Festival (2020) and opened Proudly Asian Theatre’s Fresh Off the Page initiative by directing XoX (first as an audio play in May and then on stage in October 2020). She first worked with Auckland Theatre Company in 2019 as Assistant Director for A Fine Balance with Ahi Karunaharan, for their ground-breaking collaboration with Prayas. She is very excited to be learning from Colin McColl as part of the Engine Room initiative for the MiNDFOOD season of Two Ladies! RACHAEL WALKER Set Designer Despite COVID-19 challenges and with continued optimism and passion for theatrical set and prop design, Rachael Walker has amassed more than 100 projects as a professional designer over 20 years. She has collaborated with NZ Opera, Silo Theatre, NZ Dance Company, Court Theatre, Tim Bray Productions, Auckland Festival, Comedy Festival, Unitec School of Performing and Screen Arts, Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, Canterbury Opera, The Actor’s Program, and many independent production companies. For Auckland Theatre Company, her works include Black Lover, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead (which won a Design Excellence Award at The 2019 Auckland Theatre Awards), Here & Now – The Gangster’s Paradise, The Daylight Atheist and Joan, Under the Mountain, Last Legs, Nell Gwynn, Venus in Fur, That Bloody Woman, You Can Always Hand Them Back, Lysistrata, The Ladykillers, The Lollywitch of Mumuland, Other Desert Cities, Polly Hood in Mumuland, Anne Boleyn, Kings of the Gym, The Gift, In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play), Calendar Girls, God of Carnage, Who Needs Sleep Anyway?, End of the Rainbow, The Tutor, The Bach, The Vagina Monologues, Play 2 and Play 2.03. She also won

Excellence at the Auckland Theatre Awards in 2017 for Nell Gwynn, in 2016 for ATC/The Court Theatre’s production of That Bloody Woman and in 2014 for Silo Theatre’s production of Angels in America. Rachael was the 2008 URBIS Best Stage Designer. SEAN LYNCH Lighting and Sound Designer Sean Lynch has been working in New Zealand professional theatre for more than 30 years. He is a musician, actor, and lighting and sound designer. Previous sound designs include Havoc in the Garden, Flintlock Musket, Yours Truly, I Love You Bro, Tribes, The Pitchfork Disney, The Heretic, Polo, Hir, Rendered, The Daylight Atheist, Joan and Six Degrees of Separation. Previous lighting designs include Brel, Speaking in Tongues, Chicago, Angels in America, Belleville, A Streetcar Named Desire, Once on Chunuk Bair, Jesus Christ Superstar, Hudson & Halls Live!, The Book of Everything, Live Live Cinema’s Little Shop of Horrors, Hir, Rendered, The Daylight Atheist, Joan, The Audience and The Wolves. LUCY JANE SENIOR Costume Designer Lucy Jane Senior is thrilled to be included with this talented group of actors and designers under the expert direction of Colin McColl, bringing her trademark elegance and impeccable style to this production for Two Ladies. Originally from the United States, Lucy worked as a stylist in New York City for 12 years, with her work gracing the front pages of Self, Vanity Fair, Desert Living and Ocean Drive. Lucy now lives and freelances in New Zealand, working in costume design for advertising, fashion styling and theatre. Commercial clients include Farmers, Sealy, ASB, Sovereign Insurance, Countdown, New World, McDonalds, Fresh Start, Anchor and Warehouse Stationery. Her past productions with ATC include Other Desert Cities, Six Degrees of Separation, Boys will be Boys and A Streetcar Named Desire. 9


Behind The Scenes

Image credit: Vanessa Preston


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Unpaid, unelected, unknowable? THE MYSTERY OF PRESIDENTIAL FIRST LADIES

by Nancy Harris

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It is 14 July 2017. Donald Trump is guest of honour at the annual Bastille Day celebrations in Paris – a double whammy that year, marking the centenary of America’s entry into the first world war. Emmanuel Macron and the French weren’t stinting – there was pomp, ceremony and lavish military displays, not to mention handshakes between the two new presidents. Handshakes that went on and on… and on, like some bizarre courtship ritual, simultaneously friendly and mildly aggressive. But as they primped and preened and smirked and backslapped, my eyes were drawn not to the men but to the two women standing, somewhat awkwardly, either side of them trying to smile. The wives. Brigitte Macron, the former schoolteacher who, it was noted relentlessly at the time, is 25 years older than her husband, and Melania Trump, the ex-model from Slovenia who, it is much less noted, is 24 years younger than her husband. Brigitte, it was widely reported, was the rock of strength with whose support, encouragement and, indeed, rumoured coaching, Macron had built his movement La République en Marche, beating the far right Marine Le Pen. Melania,

it was generally gossiped, just wanted to run for the hills. “What do they make of all this, really?” I wondered, as I watched the women glance and smile at one another, something polite but strained in their interactions. Were they embarrassed? Exhilarated? Bored? These silent women, whose only means of communicating at such events is generally what or who they’re wearing – what do they say to one another when the doors close and the cameras depart? And what’s it like to be in such close proximity to power but not – in the direct sense at least – to have power yourself? These questions were the seeds of my play Two Ladies. The play presents an alternative reality involving a heightened global crisis. The two ladies in question are fictional characters, but admittedly share similarities with certain real-life ones. Playwrights tend to look for gaps. The best stories are often found in that space where the real world meets the unruly underworld of our imaginations. Watching Brigitte and Melania that day, I began thinking of the women of Greek mythology: Helen of Troy, whose famed beauty supposedly sparked the Trojan war; and Iphigenia, sacrificed at the hands of her

Opposite page: The official arrival ceremony of the President of France and Mrs. Macron (Official White House photo by Andrea Hanks). 24/04/2018.

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First Lady Melania Trump poses with French President Emmanuel Macron's wife Brigitte Macron, second left, and other leaders's partners at the Palace of Versailles Sunday, 11 Nov 2018, in Versailles, France. (Official White House photo by Andrea Hanks)

father so the winds could change and the Greeks could sail for Troy. These mythic women were so often the catalysts for the action of Homeric epic poetry, but banished to the sidelines of the action itself. (Except for Penelope in The Odyssey who, thrillingly, gets to wait.) Had you asked me three years ago if I had a particularly avid interest in writing about first ladies, I might have laughed. In this era of third-wave feminism and #MeToo, when Angela Merkel and Jacinda Ardern and, yes, alright, Theresa May have proven that women can and do make it to the top jobs in politics, why should any of us care about the wives? What even is the point of a presidential spouse, other than to be married to the president? And anyway, hasn’t the role changed with the times? In Ireland, where I’m from, 14 14

our Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has a boyfriend, Matthew Barrett. In the UK, Carrie Symonds has become Downing Street’s “first girlfriend”. Roles are evolving, things are moving on… but then up pop photographs like those from the G7 summit in August, where Angela Merkel is the only woman amid a throng of male world leaders. Or last June’s G20, where presidential spouses are lined up like expensively dressed schoolchildren and Philip May is the only man. And we realise that actually, shockingly, not much has changed at all. The role of presidential partner is still primarily a female one, and the balance of world power is overwhelmingly in the hands of men. But what of the role itself? Lady Bird Johnson famously described the first lady as “an unpaid public


First Lady Melania Trump and Mrs. Brigitte Macon, wife of French President Emmanuel Macron, walk through an American and French Honor Cordon en route to the 75th Commemoration of D-Day Thursday, 6 June 2019, at the Normandy American Cemetery in Normandy, France. (Official White House photo by Andrea Hanks)

“Lady Bird Johnson famously described the first lady as “an unpaid public servant elected by one person, her husband.” servant elected by one person, her husband”. In the US, where her popularity plays a role in his, the president’s spouse tends to serve as part of the administration, with her own offices and her own staff. She hosts state dinners and has official duties. But in other countries, the position is far less well defined. In France, for instance, Macron introduced a “transparency charter” to clarify the role of presidential spouse – and the amount of public money being spent on her. But his reported intention to give his wife a budget, salary and official title was met with derision, outrage

and a petition of protest signed by almost 300,000 people. He backed away. The French were adamant they did not want an official première dame. This reveals a larger issue: the suspicion with which we treat a presidential spouse if they appear to be angling for more power than deemed appropriate. Having access to those in power means being able to exert influence. Exerting influence when you haven’t been elected is dangerous to a democracy. And who is better placed to wield undue influence than the person sharing the president’s bed? 15


But is proximity to power a red herring? What about the cost? Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton gave up highly accomplished, professional careers to take on the unpaid role of first lady, with all the scrutiny it entails. Each has talked about the “privilege” and “honour” of serving their country. But wasn’t it also a sacrifice? And a painful one at that? Would they tell us if it was? And once their husbands were elected, what choice did they really have? How can we ever know the true personal cost to these women of supporting their husbands politically, when all we ever really see is what their spin doctors, speech writers and carefully-crafted memoirs want us to?

Which brings us back to mythology. I’m aware it’s a stretch to compare Melania Trump to Helen of Troy or Cherie Blair to Iphigenia, but in a general sense, I feel there is some truth in it. It took the tragedians of fifth-century BC Athens to give voice to the women of Greek mythology. Without sounding grandiose, or worse absurd, I wondered if it was worth exploring something similar with first ladies. After all, is there not something mythic about these women whom we watch on the world stage but never truly know? And if they did get to speak, might they be able to bring us a new kind of political – and personal – story, that resonates with our times? Copyright Guardian News & Media Ltd 2021

The arrival ceremony of the President of France and Mrs. Macron. (Official White House photo by Andrea Hanks). 24/04/2018.

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“What a task to draw fashion inspiration from two sitting first ladies, each with eye-watering wardrobe budgets and the bodies to make it all work! �

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Costume Design Notes by Lucy Jane Senior

In my background research on Melania Trump and Brigette Macron for Two Ladies I discovered that one of these President’s wives is arguably leaving no fashion legacy at all. The American first lady’s fashion choices almost appear random, with missed opportunities to celebrate a fellow immigrant-turned-fashiondesigner, or confusing, with bizarre messages. Remember her pith hat or natural disaster stilettos or the “I really don’t care do u?” graffiti jacket? The only constant was her impeccable grooming and caramel blow wave. In contrast, France’s first lady consistently showcases her country’s best luxury designs, wears age-defying shortened hems and narrowed pant legs, and always has her signature charcoal-lined eyes. Powerful messaging in skinny jeans and a chiseled blazer or a leather mini skirt! The French je ne sais quoi

definitely comes out in the way Macron dresses. Fantastic style that would never be acceptable to conservative America. First ladies can have considerable influence and are often more popular than their husbands. No country puts more value on minutiae than the good old USA. The former American first lady had devoted fans who felt she dressed the part - US royalty, unattainable, poised, polished and plastic. Her critics instead saw fashion straight out of a Fed Ex box and parodied fashion shoots. I heard of a theory connecting her style choices with how well the first couple were getting along! Apparently FLOTUS (First Lady of the United States) intentionally wore masculine trouser suits after embarrassing incidents. Like Sophia in Two Ladies she protests and sends a message to her husband via her clothing, who prefers her in figure-hugging bodycon. 19


What's On AT ASB WATERFRONT THEATRE

Presented by Auckland Theatre Company and Auckland Arts Festival

The Haka Party Incident by Katie Wolfe

5 – 13 Mar

The Haka Party Incident resurrects the eventful day when a group of University of Auckland engineering students rehearsing their annual tradition of a mock haka are confronted by the activist group, He Taua. Violence erupted that sent ripples through the nation and changed race relations in New Zealand forever.

Strasbourg 1518 19 – 20 Mar

A story of revolution through dance, this electrifying production explores one of history’s most fascinating mass movements – the dancing plague of 1518. Living in poverty and under the rule of the patriarchy, the people of Strasbourg revolted one summer against oppression by taking to the streets. No ordinary protest, their uprising was a fever of dance on a scale never seen before – nor again – that lasted for months.

Auckland Theatre Company presents

Auckland Theatre Company presents

Single Asian Female

The Life of Galileo

27 Apr – 15 May

22 Jun – 10 Jul

by Michelle Law

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Auckland Arts Festival presents

Meet Pearl Wong. She’s a first-generation Chinese immigrant and a single mother who’s barely keeping her restaurant, Golden Phoenix, afloat. Meanwhile, her older daughter Zoe has moved back home and her teenage daughter Mei is kicking back against her cultural heritage. With the Wongs on the ropes and an ominous secret hanging over their heads, will Pearl’s indomitable willpower – and the healing power of karaoke – be enough to hold the family together?

by Bertolt Brecht, translated by David Hare

It may have been more than 400 years since the Roman Inquisition challenged Galileo Galilei’s proof that the Earth rotated around the sun but, sadly, the story of arrogant leaders refusing to accept the findings of science is all too timely. Bertolt Brecht’s masterly portrait of genius under fire positively bristles with thought-provoking contemporary resonances.


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HEARTFELT THANKS TO THE FRIEDLANDER FOUNDATION FOR ITS GENEROSITY. In 2020, ticket-holders donated 26% of the cost of their cancelled tickets back to us. This prompted our Supporting Acts group to increase dramatically, from 23 donors in 2019 to 442 in 2020. We will be forever grateful to these donors, who made being offstage a little brighter during the many months of darkness.

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The last New Zealand war took place in Auckland in 1979. It lasted three minutes.

The Haka Party Incident by Katie Wolfe

5–13 MAR 26

0800 ATC TIX / atc.co.nz PRINCIPAL FUNDERS:

The Haka Party Incident was commissioned and developed by ATC Literary. Presented by Auckland Theatre Company and Auckland Arts Festival.


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