MEDIA RELEASE – embargoed until 6pm Wednesday 30 July 2014
Welcome to Season Two at The Blue Room Theatre: eight shows celebrating the best independent theatre and performance in WA. We champion the now, the next and the new. For 25 years, we’ve helped generations of artists get their work made and seen, and have been the home of independent theatre and performance in WA. We’re inviting you to get involved. Come to The Blue Room Theatre, grab a drink in our bar, hang back and talk to the artists. Discuss, debate and enjoy this eclectic program of shows about you, created for you, by people just like you.
AUGUST Concussion by Ross Mueller is the surreal tale of a man who awakens with no memory of his past. As he struggles to piece his identity back together, the world around him is falling apart. A sexually charged, dark comedy. This Is Not A Love Song, written by and featuring comic legend Greg Fleet, is all about love. The irresistible first kiss… and the unstoppable, hate-fuelled wrecking ball that can follow. The end of a relationship can be agony – but does it hurt more to lose your partner, or your record collection? SEPTEMBER What Do They Call Me? features three female performers delivering powerful, timeless stories about how they came to find each other, their culture and themselves. This play incorporates Aboriginal culture, history and diverse sexuality, and explores what it is to be an Aboriginal woman in contemporary Australia. Letters Home is an unflinchingly honest autobiographical show from Renegade Productions’ Joe Lui, who will take to the stage for the first time in his professional career. It tells the story of his relationship with his parents and his native Singapore, and why he can never return home. OCTOBER Welcome to Slaughter is the story of a discontented city couple who travel to the bush hoping to heal old wounds. There they meet an eccentric counsellor intent on destroying everything they hold dear. A white-knuckle ride into terror with a grin; Wolf Creek meets Rocky Horror. Status Room is a new dance theatre work examining connection, alienation and the cost of personal exposure. What different parts of ourselves do we reveal to friends, lovers, strangers and online? SEASON & VENUE MEDIA CONTACT Gemma Sidney, Marketing Manager gemma@blueroom.org.au 08 9227 7005 / 0415 363 671
MEDIA RELEASE – embargoed until 6pm Wednesday 30 July 2014
NOVEMBER Joey: the Mechanical Boy is based on an article published in Scientific American in 1959 about 9½ year old Joey, who likes machines so much he wants to be one. This led to his diagnosis as autistic by Freudian and Holocaust survivor Dr Bruno Bettelheim. But sometimes, imagination can be the best medicine. Those Who Fall in Love Like Anchors Dropped Upon the Ocean Floor is the highly anticipated world premiere from celebrated Australian playwright Finegan Kruckemeyer, teaming up with acclaimed director Adam Mitchell. This love story transcends time, moving from a Cold War Russian submarine, to a Parisian street, to an Appalachian snow field, and beyond. BOOKINGS Our shows sell out fast so we encourage booking in advance via blueroom.org.au / 08 9227 7005. Our box office is open Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm and one hour before show time. All tickets are $15-$25. PUBLICITY CONTACTS Concussion by Ross Mueller (12 – 30 August) Kimberley Fulton / kim@showponymedia.com / 0408 710 685 This Is Not A Love Song (19 August – 6 September) Tegan Mulvany / twegno@gmail.com / 0414 282 650 What Do They Call Me? (9 September – 27 September) Andrea Fernandez / pyvmarketing@gmail.com / 0457 299 766 Letters Home (16 September – 4 October) Thom Smyth / thomsmythpr@gmail.com / 0416 002 560 Welcome to Slaughter (7 – 25 October) Adrienne Downes / downesadrienne@gmail.com / 0400 844 636 Status Room (14 October – 1 November) Jenna Mathie / jennarmathie@gmail.com / 0433 096 024 Joey: the Mechanical Boy (4 – 22 November) Leah Mercer / leahmerc@ozemail.com.au / 0422 322 062 Those Who Fall in Love Like Anchors Dropped Upon the Ocean Floor (11 – 29 November) Kate Hancock / kate.hancock09@gmail.com / 0413 831 961
SEASON & VENUE MEDIA CONTACT Gemma Sidney, Marketing Manager gemma@blueroom.org.au 08 9227 7005 / 0415 363 671
A DOCTOR, A POLICE OFFICER AND A SPIN DOCTOR WALK INTO A ROOM... CONCUSSION Written by Ross Mueller 12 AUGUST – 30 AUGUST, THE BLUE ROOM THEATRE
Somewhere in a city, a brutally beaten Caesar wakes up with no memory of his past. He lives in a house that might be his with a son he barely remembers, cared for by a doctor who may be his girlfriend. The world around him staggers and falters as he tries to piece his life together, one fragment at a time. Violently funny and sexually charged, Ross Mueller’s Concussion opens The Blue Room Theatre’s new season from 12 to 30 August 2014. Presented by local company Ellandar Productions (The Night Guardian, Pity), Concussion is a dark comedy of shattered identity that weaves six lives through a city in meltdown. Touching on everything from the depths of identity to selfies and teen porn, the play delivers fun and filthy tales of urban life with a stellar ensemble cast including 2014 Performing Arts WA Awardwinner Nichola Renton and WA theatre stalwart Richard Mellick, directed by Sarah McKellar. Ellandar artistic director Iskandar Sharazuddin describes Mueller’s complex piece as “a theatrical headache”. “Structurally and thematically there is a lot to overcome, the work is a challenge but easily one of the most exciting pieces of contemporary Australian writing we've ever tormented ourselves with.” Tickets available now via www.blueroom.org.au
MEDIA CONTACT: Kimberley Fulton - Show Pony Media Management e. kim@showponymedia.com p. 0408 710 685
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 30 JULY 2014
The Blue Room Theatre and TEEM Productions present What do They Call Me? Western Australian Premiere of Classic Indigenous Theatre Piece at The Blue Room Theatre TEEM Productions will take up residence at The Blue Room Theatre with the Indigenous classic, What Do They Call Me? from 9 September 2014. Written by award winning playwright Eva Johnson and directed by Eva Grace Mullaley, What Do They Call Me? was originally performed in 1990 by the playwright herself as a one-woman show. Making its Western Australian premiere in 2014, this production features three actresses delivering these powerful, timeless stories. “These three very different women will enthrall you with their stories while they revisit how they came to find each other, their culture and themselves,” Mullaley said. “Twenty four years and several productions later, this remains a very relevant piece of theatre that will take the audience on a powerful emotional journey.” What Do They Call Me? incorporates Aboriginal culture, history and diverse sexuality, exploring what it is to be an Aboriginal woman in contemporary Australia. Recommended for audiences aged 13 and over. The Blue Room Theatre and TEEM Productions present … What Do They Call Me? Previews 9 & 10 September | Season 11 – 27 September | 7pm Tuesday – Saturday Tickets $15-$25 Bookings www.blueroom.org.au | 9227 7005 | The Blue Room Theatre 53 James Street Northbridge Further info, interviews, photo opportunities and print quality images available. Media contact: PYV Marketing Andrea Fernandez m +61 (0) 457 299 766 | e pyvmarketing@gmail.com
BACKGROUND The production: Making its West Australian debut, this classic Indigenous theatre piece incorporates Aboriginal culture and diverse sexuality in a singular, incomparable way. Originally performed as a one woman piece by Eva Johnson, this production features three captivating actresses delivering powerful, timeless stories. Three wildly different women, a mother and her two daughters, reveal how they came to find each other, their culture and themselves. Connie, a rambunctious and matriarchal elder has lived through the toughest periods of Australian Aboriginal history. Regina, a nuclear mother adopted into a white household and raised as “Eurasian”, must confront the reality of her minority ethnicity. Alison, a lesbian activist, struggles with her partner’s perceptions of her heritage and how her culture affects her sexuality. A universal story about not growing up in your culture and how sexuality affects the way ones heritage is viewed. The playwright: Eva Johnson was born in 1946 and belongs to the Mulak Mulak people of Daly River in the Northern Territory. In addition to being a playwright, Johnson is a poet, feminist, political activist, travelling performer and public speaker. In 1993 she was the first Indigenous Australian to be awarded the Australia Council Red Ochre Award in recognition of her outstanding contribution to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Arts Culture. Her plays include When I Die You'll All Stop Laughing, Faded Genes, Mimini's Voices, Murras, Onward To Glory, Tjindarella, What Do They Call Me? and Heartbeat of the Earth. Johnson lives in Adelaide and continues her involvement with the arts. The director: Eva Grace Mullaley is a Yamatji/Widi woman from the Midwest Region of Western Australia. She graduated from the Aboriginal Theatre course at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts in 2003. She went on to perform with Yirra Yaakin (Whaloo is That You?), Black Swan State Theatre Company (Tear from a Glass Eye) and several student film projects. In 2005 Eva lectured the Aboriginal theatre students on script writing then dramaturged and directed the collaborated piece Black Tracks. She assisted David Milroy during Windmill Baby creative development for Yirra Yaakin and was Stage Manager during its first public season. Eva then went on to direct many small productions for community events and tour manage several dance troupes across Europe and Malaysia before coming back to Perth and continuing to assistant direct and direct theatre, predominantly with Yirra Yaakin and WAAPA. The second half of 2012 saw Eva finishing her second year of an Advanced Diploma in Stage Management at WAAPA, directing Good Lovin’ for a Pilbara tour and co-directing, with Rick Brayford, the world premiere of Crowbones and Carnivores written by David Milroy with the Aboriginal theatre Graduates. In 2013 Eva accepted an Artistic Associate position at Yirra Yaakin which comprised of producing, managing and directing the Yirra Yaarnz NAIDOC season at The Blue Room Theatre, coordinating and managing a high schools tour through the Goldfields and establishing Indigenous connections and recording stories in the Mid West. 2014 has seen Eva further develop her career in several positions including – as Producer/Event Manager for Yirra Yaakin’s 21st birthday celebration IALARU, an 800 audience and 80+ performer event developed as part of the Perth International Arts Festival, Project Manager and overseer of the published Novel and an exhibition, both detailing the history and story of Yirra Yaakin’s 21 years and a highly successful tour of the Kaatijin Double Bill and Culture 2.0 Workshops through the North West of WA. Eva is currently independently producing and directing a show at The Blue Room Theatre, lecturing in Character Analysis to students at WAAPA and Managing and coordinating a ‘culture in theatre’ workshops tour to schools and remote communities in the Midwest and Goldfields regions of WA.
The Blue Room Theatre and Renegade Productions presents
LETTERS
HOME
“If you keep going like this you will be nothing! A nobody! Son, what are you going to do with your future?!” - Mum … I guess this project is my answer. Unflinchingly honest, Letters Home is a new autobiographical show from Renegade Productions’ Joe Lui premiering at The Blue Room Theatre from 16 September 2014. Director, writer and designer Joe Lui is well known to Perth audiences, but they’ve never seen him like this. Taking to the stage for the first time in his professional career, Letters Home looks at the period in Joe’s life where he chose not to return to his native Singapore to take up military service, making him a criminal in the eyes of his parents and the Singaporean state. “It was one of the hardest decisions that I have ever had to make. Essentially it was about cutting off everything I had ever known, everything that was part of making me who I am today… for a shot at what I felt might be my calling – with no guarantees of success,” Lui said. Drawing on archival footage of his time as a child actor as well as the unsent letters he wrote to his parents, Letters Home will be lush theatrical production looking at youth, power and freedom. “I wanted to make this work primarily because I reached a point with the work I am trying to make and in life where I have to reconcile myself with the consequences of my decisions,” Lui said. “To start to really come to grips with my choices and what they meant for my future. It’s incredibly dramatic.” Audience members will also have the chance to dine with Joe on the set after the show in a series of Friday Night Salons, picking up on the themes in the show while patrons enjoy catering from Northbridge culinary institution Joy Café. The Blue Room Theatre and Renegade Productions present:
LETTERS HOME 16 Sept – 4 Oct The Blue Room Theatre Perth Cultural Centre, Northbridge Tickets/info: blueroom.org.au Images, interviews and review opportunities available. Media contact: Thom Smyth thomsmythpr@gmail.com | 0416 002 560
WELCOME TO SLAUGHTER
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Night falls on the bush.
A lone car drives through a dark wilderness.
They are lost…
But they are not alone…
The Blue Room Theatre & 11:47 Productions present an immersive Australian horror story told from the inside of a car. Welcome to Slaughter is an audacious, bold thriller drawing on classic
cinematic masterpieces for riotous thrills; think Wolf Creek meets Rocky Horror.
Fawn and Oliver, a discontented city couple, travel into the remote bush hoping to heal old wounds. Instead they meet Perdita – an eccentric counsellor intent on destroying everything they hold dear.
What are you most afraid of? The dark? Being lost? Being alone?
When was the last time you laughed until you cried? And then bled? The intimate space of The Blue Room Theatre will be transformed into a filmic wonderland with evocative projections of the Australian landscape. With a pumping soundtrack and sumptuous projections, this awardwinning team of artists create a haunting and hilarious drive into your deepest fears. Brought to you by an accomplished creative team, Michelle Robin Anderson (The Pigeons, Hope is the
saddest) will be jumping in the driving seat for her debut as director, joined by performers/devisors Jo
Morris (A Streetcar Named Desire, The Pigeons), Emily Rose Brennan (The Legend of Gavin Tanner,
winner of the 2014 WASA for Best Actress), and Adriano Cappelletta (CubbyHouse); the prolific Jeffrey Jay
Fowler (Elephents, Second Hands, Hope is the Saddest) will be on board as a devisor/dramaturge.
You experience this white-knuckle ride into terror with a grin; pulse-racing, sweat-inducing, wide-eyed, paralyzing fun. Horror meets comedy with unapologetic spectacle, larger than life characters, and a story that will terrify and delight in equal measure.
Don’t miss the opportunity to see horror theatre that will make you shriek! PRESENTED BY THE BLUE ROOM THEATRE & 11:47 PRODUCTIONS
WELCOME TO SLAUGHTER 7 –25 OCTOBER
7PM //TUES –SAT
Bookings/info: blueroom.org.au //08 9227 7005 Interviews, hi-res images + giveaways available Media Contact: Adrienne Downes downesadrienne@gmail.com 0400 844 636
WELCOME TO SLAUGHTER – CAST & CREW BIOS
Michelle Robin Anderson is a theatre-maker committed to collaborating with a variety of exciting and artistic individuals. Since completing her training in Contemporary Performance at WAAPA she has gravitated towards puppetry, physical theatre, and devised performance. As a performer/deviser she has worked for a diverse range of companies including My Darling Patricia with the The Piper for Sydney Festival, The Pigeons at The Blue Room Theatre for Fringe World, Erth Visual and Physical Theatre and the national tour of Murder (Helpmann Award nominee), Mythophobic Productions with the South African and New York tour of Hope is the saddest – playing a deluded Dolly Parton fan, and Red Lashes for the UNIMA International Puppetry Festival. She was also part of the national tour of the highly acclaimed Africa (Helpmann Award nominee), I Think I Can for Art & About, Don’t Look Back with UK company dreamthinkspeak, and The Laramie Project with Black Swan State Theatre Company. Jeffrey Jay Fowler is a playwright, director, dramaturg, deviser and actor. He is the Associate Director at Black Swan State Theatre Company. Whilst studying at WAAPA he founded Mythophobic Productions and has produced/directed and written Zen’s Red Mouth, Hope is the saddest and The Rusalka Thread under the company. He wrote and performed in A History of Drinking – a solo show that was nominated for the 2010 Philip Parsons’ Playwright Award, and also ELEPHENTS which was produced by The Last Great Hunt. As a playwright he has created Minnie and Mona Play Dead for The Duck House (winner of the 2013 Martin Sims Award), Earth for the West Australian Youth Theatre Company, Red Lashes for the UNIMA International Puppetry Festival, Duck, Duck, Goose! for Gray Ruby Productions. JJ wrote and directed the Fringe World smash hit Second Hands for Little y Theatre Company in 2014. Jeffrey graduated from NIDA in 2010 with a Graduate Diploma in Dramatic Arts in Directing. He graduated WAAPA in 2005 with a Bachelor of Arts in Contemporary Performance. Jo Morris most recently played the role of Stella in Black Swan State Theatre Company's A Streetcar Named Desire. She has also just returned from the UK where she performed in Cis and Barbiche at The York Theatre Royal for Agelink Theatre. Other performances include The Pigeons for Perth Fringe (Summer Nights), written and directed by Natalie Holmwood in collaboration with Michelle Robin Anderson, a regional tour of Scent Tales, produced by Country Arts and Little y Theatre Company, and three seasons of This Girl Laughs This Girl Cries This Girl Does Nothing, a co-production between Barking Gecko Theatre Company, Casula Powerhouse and Q Theatre. She has completed the three year Acting course at NIDA, graduating at the end of 2003, and since then has performed with Black Swan State Theatre Company in Death of a Salesman, The White Divers of Broome (2012 Perth International Arts Festival), The Crucible, Portraits of Modern Evil (nominated Best Supporting Actress 2009 Equity Guild Awards), The Caucasian Chalk Circle and The Laramie Project. Other Theatre credits include Pluck for Perth Fringe 2013, The Myth of Julian Rose (nominated Best Actress 2010 Equity Guild Awards), The Rusalka Thread, The Yellow Wallpaper (The Blue Room Theatre), and writer/director for Lipstick and Hessian (nominated for Best Production at the 2008 Blue Room Theatre Awards).
Adriano Cappelletta is a NIDA acting graduate. In 2008 he was awarded The Marten Bequest and Mike Walsh Travelling Scholarship to study with master clown/theatre guru, Philippe Gaulier in Paris for two years. Adriano has been a theatre maker for more than 10 years and has devised/performed the hit comedy shows CuBBYHOuSE (The Public Theatre: New York, Adelaide Fringe 2010, Tamarama Rock Surfers, The Blue Room Theatre: Perth) and Connie Chang’s Cabaret Roadshow (Melbourne Comedy Festival, Sydney Comedy Festival, Sydney Opera House, Great Escape Festival). In 2011 he established an international theatre collective, Les Freres Du Monde and premiered Shane & Eddie: Picking up the Pieces at The Edinburgh Festival, picking up a Best Double Act nomination in UK's The Observer. With Kim Carpenter’s Theatre of Image, he devised a physical/visual theatre work, Little Beauty for The National Portait Gallery, Canberra. Emily Rose Brennan completed her acting degree at NIDA in 2005 and has since performed extensively in screen and stage projects all over Australia. Most recently she performed in The Boat People for The Hayloft Project/Rock Surfers at Bondi Pavilion, and won the 2014 Best Actress Award at the WA Screen Awards for her work in The Legend of Gavin Tanner. This year she also starred in the web series Love Bytes, and featured in the ABC Fresh Blood series Ultimate Fanj. Emily played leading roles in both Underbelly Razor (Ch9) and :30 Seconds (Foxtel) and also appeared in Tricky Business (Ch9). She has appeared in several short films, commercials and corporate videos and has appeared in videos for A Rational Fear, Get Up and The Australian Youth Climate Coalition. Last year Emily established her own production company Awkward Horse and began making online comedy content. Emily appeared with Dan Ilic in the two-hander comedy Sidekicks at the 2013 Adelaide Fringe Festival and The Melbourne Comedy Festival. Emily has performed for Bell Shakespeare Company, Sydney Theatre Company, Riverside Theatre Company Deckchair Theatre Company, Glass Umbrella Productions and Jo Morris Productions/The Blue Room Theatre. Meabh Walton is currently in her fourth year at Curtin University of an Arts/Commerce double degree, majoring in Performance Studies and Events Management respectively. Her stage management experience includes working on the 2013 Blue Room Theatre productions of Fat Pig and The Tribe (Blue Room Theatre Best Production Team winner). She has also been heavily involved within The Hayman Theatre, stage managing their major productions of Broken Valley, The Knife the Fork and the Stranger, Full Circle and Mad Fred.
EMERGING WEST AUSTRALIAN CHOREOGRAPHERS EXAMINE THE VALUE AND COST OF PERSONAL EXPOSURE STATUS ROOM
14 OCTOBER – 1 NOVEMBER 2014, THE BLUE ROOM THEATRE What do you show to your lover? A stranger? Online? Status Room explores the different parts of ourselves we present to, or hide from the world, premiering at The Blue Room Theatre from 14 October 2014. A new dance theatre work by emerging West Australian artists Daisy Sanders and Shuling Wong, Status Room showcases the work of Jo Pollitt as director and Joe Lui as sound and lighting designer. Each night, Sanders and Wong will invite audience members to share genuine or fabricated experiences and feelings as part of the performance. Sanders states “living in a world where methods of connection are abundant can be alienating. We’re trying to uncover where and how we expose ourselves and if this makes us more or less connected”. While researching for the show, Sanders and Wong swapped social media personas for a month, with each posting in the spirit and style of the other. “Shuling is private but excessively publishes fun things, and I tend to be ambiguous so that my heartfelt truths are disguised inside poetry. When we swapped personas, Shuling's attempt to be poetic only made her more private while my daily posts revealed more and more. It was extremely uncomfortable for both of us.” Status Room is being developed with support from the Department of Culture and the Arts, Propel Youth Arts WA, and Healthway, to promote the Drug Aware message. Co-Devisors & Performers: Daisy Sanders & Shuling Wong | Director: Jo Pollitt | Lighting & Sound Designer: Joe Lui | Guest Mentor: Alexandra Harrison STATUS ROOM Preview: 14 October Season: 15 October – 1 November 2014 The Blue Room Theatre Perth Cultural Centre, Northbridge Bookings/Info: www.blueroom.org.au | 08 9227 7005 MEDIA CONTACT Jenna Mathie jennarmathie@gmail.com 0433 096 024
DAISY SANDERS Daisy graduated from WAAPA with a BA Performing Arts (Dance) in 2013 and has undertaken secondments with the Los Angeles Contemporary Dance Company, Company Chameleon and Fabulous Beast Dance Theatre in America and Sue Peacock, Lucy Guerin Inc, Cadi McCarthy and KAGE Physical Theatre in Australia. In 2013 Daisy’s work ‘An Invitation to Balter' was presented in FRESH at the UWA Dolphin Theatre and at The Blueroom Theatre as part of Fringeworld's Summer Nights 600 Seconds season earlier this year. SHULING WONG Shuling Wong graduated with a Bachelor of Arts (Dance) from WAAPA in 2013 and was awarded the Finley Award for Dance (Bachelor). Shuling has worked with Leigh Warren, XiaoXiong Zhang, Raewyn Hill, Philip Channells, Paea Leach and Jo Pollitt. Since graduating, Shuling has performed in Ecobots directed by Lucas Jervies, done a creative and was appointed as Associate Artist by Philip Channells for Dance Integrated Australia – Hong Kong Tour “New Works Forum – Challenging Perspective on Physicalities and Bodies”. JO POLLITT Jo Pollitt is a dancer, choreographer and writer whose practice is grounded in improvisation and creative arts research. As the director of the response project, Jo works with performers as authorities in revealing traces of lived experience and physical imagination. Jo has created and co-created many works including Re-render for Chrissie Parrott at His Majesty’s Theatre (2009), Check Point Solo for Rhiannon Newton (Judson Church, New York, and Under the Radar Festival, Brisbane, 2011), the Beast series with Paea Leach (2012-2014) and divided (2013). Jo lectures at WAAPA, works as dramaturg and mentor, fronts the writing/dancing project co-works (co-works.co) and is the Creative Director of BIG Kids Magazine. JOE LUI Joe Lui is a founding member of Renegade Productions. Within its aegis he creates, writes, directs, designs and composes theatre and performance works. Performances with the company include Frankenstein; or the Modern Prometheus, The Stratagem of Interlocking Rings, and the critically acclaimed Laryngectomy. Joe is a regular and contributing part of the professional and independent theatre industry in Perth as a sound and lighting designer. STATUS ROOM Preview: 14 October Season: 15 October – 1 November 2014 The Blue Room Theatre Perth Cultural Centre, Northbridge Bookings/Info: www.blueroom.org.au | 08 9227 7005 MEDIA CONTACT Jenna Mathie jennarmathie@gmail.com 0433 096 024
MEDIA RELEASE
For immediate release, 30 July 2014
The Blue Room Theatre and The Nest Ensemble present
Joey: the M echanical Boy
Season: 4-22 November 2014 7.00pm Tuesdays-Saturdays The Blue Room Theatre Perth Cultural Centre, Northbridge Bookings and info: blueroom.org.au / 9227 7005 Tickets: $15-$25 Joey: the Mechanical Boy will premiere at The Blue Room Theatre from 4 to 22 November, and is the new work from the award-winning Nest Ensemble (Eve, 2012 Members’ Choice, The Blue Room Theatre Awards).
Based on an article published in Scientific American in 1959, the play explores how personalities are made, destroyed and made again, and how sometimes imagination can be the best medicine. Joey is 9½ years old and he likes machines so much he wants to be one. But sometimes, Joey explodes… Enter Dr Bruno Bettelheim: world-renowned child psychologist, Freudian, best-selling author, Holocaust survivor and Director of the School for Emotionally Disturbed Children and Adolescents at the University of Chicago. Dr Bettelheim diagnoses Joey with autism, a term he made famous and which he applied to any child who withdrew into a fantasy world. But what does Joey’s mother have to say about all of this? And does the diagnosis say more about the doctor than the patient? Performed by the highly accomplished Philip Miolin and Vivienne Glance, directed by Leah Mercer, co-written with Margi Brown Ash, Joey: the Mechanical Boy is a thought-provoking examination of the impact of social alienation, post-natal depression, trauma and the struggle for connection.
Joey: the Mechanical Boy underwent initial creative development in 2010, as part of The Blue Room Theatre’s Summer Nights program, so this will be its world premiere.
ABOUT THE COMPANY: The Nest Ensemble was founded in Brisbane in 2004 by co-Artistic Directors Leah Mercer and Margi Brown Ash. It is a dynamic, fluid collective of theatre artists who, through productions, creative developments and workshops, generate performances that deal in ideas, imagination and transformation. So far their productions have had seasons at the Darlinghurst Theatre, the Adelaide Fringe Festival, the Brisbane Powerhouse, La Boite Theatre, Metro Arts and The Blue Room Theatre. Awards won by the company include the Gold Matilda for Best Actress (Brown Ash), the Silver Matilda for directing (Mercer), and both Blue Room Theatre and Turnstile Award for Best Performance (Brown Ash for Eve) and Members’ Choice Award for Best Production (Eve) at The Blue Room Theatre Awards in 2012. MEDIA CONTACT: Leah Mercer 0422 322 062 / leahmerc@ozemail.com.au
The Blue Room Theatre and The Nest Ensemble present
Joey: the M echanical Boy Season: 4-22 November 2014 7.00pm Tuesdays-Saturdays The Blue Room Theatre Perth Cultural Centre, Northbridge Bookings and info: blueroom.org.au / 9227 7005 Tickets: $15-$25
ABOUT THE CAST AND CREW: LEAH MERCER (co-writer/director/co-producer/co-deviser) founded The Nest Ensemble with Margi Brown Ash in Brisbane in 2004. Mercer co-devised and directed their award-winning Eve, which had a hit season at The Blue Room Theatre and Metro Arts Theatre in Brisbane, directed Home as part of La Boite Theatre Company’s Indie Season and co-wrote and directed The Knowing of Mary Poppins, for which she won a Silver Matilda for directing. Mercer’s other directing credits in Brisbane include Stace Callaghan’s between heaven & earth (one hand clapping, Brisbane Powerhouse, 2006), Ted Hughes’ Metamorphoses (QSE, Metro Arts Theatre, 2006), Michael Gurr’s Something to Declare (Actors for Refugees/Qld Arts Council, 2005) and Joy Gregory’s Dear Charlotte (Metro Arts’ Independents, 2004). She co-wrote and directed The Physics Project as part of her practice-led PhD in Performance at the Loft, QUT (2006). It won a Philip Parsons Prize for Performance as Research in 2008. Mercer also wrote Melancholia, produced at the Looking Glass Theatre (New York City, 2005) and showcased at the Playworks Festival (Sydney, 2006). Most recently she directed The Hardest Way to Make an Omelette (Cracked Egg Productions) in partnership with Spare Parts Puppet Theatre for the 2013 Fremantle Festival. Mercer coordinates the Performance Studies course at Curtin University. MARGI BROWN ASH (co-writer/co-deviser) has a number of professional ‘lives’, including being a theatre maker (performer/writer/director), educator and psychotherapist, with her own creative arts therapy studio, 4change coaching. Brown Ash has devised postmodern theatre training for artists called ‘Relational ImpulseTraining’. She has been a stage performer/devisor for over 35 years in Sydney, New York (training with Stella Adler and Polish mime Stefan Niadziakowski), and Brisbane. Brown Ash has just founded the first Intentional Intergenerational Theatre Company in Australia, Force of Circumstance, and is also coartistic director (with Leah Mercer) of The Nest Ensemble, devising and co-writing the now published The Knowing of Mary Poppins (winner – three Matilda Awards including Gold for Best Actor), writing/co-devising/performing the now published Home (winner – Gold Matilda) and writing/co-devising/performing Eve (winner – Gold Matilda, and winner – Members’ Choice and Best Performance at The Blue Room Theatre Awards).
Brown Ash’s latest work, He Dreamed a Train was Work in Residence at Metro Arts 2013, won the Brisbane Powerhouse’s ‘SWEET’ 2014 and will have a season at the Brisbane Powerhouse in October 2014. She is a Taos Associate, a 35-year member of Australia’s Actors Equity, a registered counsellor and a member of Australian Society for Performing Arts Health Care. PHILIP MIOLIN (co-producer/performer) produced, directed and designed Robots Vs Art at The Blue Room Theatre, as well as directed and designed A Doll’s House (Hayman Theatre Company). Miolin regularly performs at The Blue Room Theatre: in Hedda (This One Show – winner of a 2013 Turnstile award), Tinkertown, Eve (The Nest Ensemble) and Public Space (Little y Theatre & theMOXYcollective – winner Best WA Performance at Fringe World 2013). He was nominated for Best Actor at the 2007 Equity Guild Awards for his role in The Mozart Faction (Red Ryder). Other theatre credits include The Removalists (Perth Theatre Company), Three On, One Off (Shanghai Lil) and the Maj Monologues. Film credits include Drift, Hidden Clouds, Bystander, One Night Only and George Jones and the Giant Squid. Television credits include Outriders, Legacy of the Silver Shadow and Blue Heelers. Miolin is Associate Lecturer at Curtin University for the Performance Studies program. VIVIENNE GLANCE (performer) has an acting career that spans more than two decades and has ranged from working in London’s West End with the Royal Shakespeare Company to a garage theatre in the backstreets of Seattle, from playing Hecuba (Trojan Women) in a palace in Krakow to Helena (A Midsummer Night’s Dream) on a Welsh mountain. A Perth resident since 1995, Vivienne has appeared in many shows including Putting On An Act (PICA), Sydney’s Short & Sweet Festival, Class Act’s Shakespeare Productions, The Woman Who Cooked Her Husband (Shanghai Lil) and The Ships Pass Quietly (Prickly Pear – Equity Guild nomination for Best Actress). Her most recent performance was as Gertrude Stein in Wim Well’s play Gertrude Stein and a Companion. Glance has appeared in films, TV shows and commercials, including Parallax (GWE/ABC TV), Rapture of the Deep (Granada Productions) and The Great Escape (ABC TV). She is also an award-winning playwright and poet, with works produced in Australia, England, Scotland, Italy, Latvia and USA. TESSA DARCEY (designer/co-deviser) trained at WAAPA (2005-2007) and has been working as a designer in theatre for nearly eight years. Her recent works include The Agony, the Ecstasy & I (Toyi-Toyi Theatre Company), Eve (The Nest Ensemble), Dear Charlotte, The Three Birds and Beyond the Neck (all Hayman Theatre Company). Darcey has also worked as a visual artist for feature film Sororal (Nakatomi Pictures), exhibited sculpture for City in Bloom (City of Perth), worked as a graphic designer/blogger and is currently working on illustrations for children’s books. CHRIS DONNELLY (lighting designer) graduated with First Class Honours (theatrical design praxis) from Murdoch University and has helped start two independent theatre companies as designer, producer and tech. He has toured extensively nationally and internationally with several companies as a technical director, manager and LX crew, to theatres as diverse as Southbank Centre in London, opera theatres in Korea and the Jetty Memorial Theatre in Coffs Harbour. He currently works at the State Theatre Centre of WA as LX crew as well as working in various roles for many professional and independent theatre companies in and around Perth. Career highlights as lighting designer include: Flood (Black Swan State Theatre Company), Helpmann nominated Letters End (SpoonTree Productions), 10,000 Beers (Turquoise Theatre), Running on Stilts (Bizircus), and Eve (The Nest Ensemble). MEDIA CONTACT: Leah Mercer 0422 322 062 / leahmerc@ozemail.com.au
MEDIA RELEASE, 30 JULY 2014
INDEPENDENT PERTH ARTISTS SCORE FINEGAN KRUCKEMEYER WORLD PREMIERE:
‘THOSE WHO FALL IN LOVE LIKE ANCHORS DROPPED UPON THE OCEAN FLOOR’ Independent Perth artists Jo Morris and theMOXYcollective (Renee Newman-Storen and Mark Storen) are proud to present the world premiere of a new play by celebrated Australian playwright Finegan Kruckemeyer as part of The Blue Room Theatre’s latest season, running 11 – 29 November. “One of the world’s most intriguing writers” (Adam Brunes, ABC Arts) Kruckemeyer has had 71 commissioned plays performed on five continents, in five different languages. His work has been programmed at prestigious venues such as Sydney Opera House, New York’s New Victory Theater and Washington DC’s Kennedy Center for the Arts. In 2011 Kruckemeyer was the inaugural recipient of the Sidney Myer Creative Fellowship. All this, at only 33 years of age. Perth audiences will recognise Kruckemeyer for his enchanting plays for young people, including the internationally acclaimed The Tragical Life of Cheeseboy (Perth Festival, 2009) and Barking Gecko’s award-winning This Girl Laughs, This Girl Cries, This Girl Does Nothing. It was during This Girl Laughs that Perth actress Jo Morris met Kruckemeyer and the opportunity to produce a work for adult audiences developed. "Finegan's stories encapsulate everything I love about theatre and all its potential for magic and heart, hilarity and imagination. The seed for this project sprouted in a pub (as all good projects do!) and of course Mark, Renee and I couldn't let such an incredible opportunity pass us by. I am so excited to see this play grow amidst such a magnificent team of artists, ” says Morris. THOSE WHO FALL IN LOVE LIKE ANCHORS DROPPED UPON THE OCEAN FLOOR, perhaps the longest title in Blue Room Theatre history, could only belong to Kruckemeyer. His work has been described as “achingly magical and charming… a marvel of exquisite theatre-craft” (The Herald, Scotland) and “the theatrical equivalent of going to bed on Christmas Eve” (The Sunday Times). THOSE WHO FALL IN LOVE is a story that transcends time, moving from a Cold War Russian submarine, to a Parisian street, to an Appalachian snow field. The cast of three actors will play over twelve different characters whose lives are collided by fate. For award-winning director Adam Mitchell (When The Rain Stops Falling, Black Swan State Theatre Company – Equity Best Director Award 2012), actors Jo Morris (A Streetcar Named Desire, Black Swan State Theatre Company) and Renee Newman Storen (Second Hands, Virgie) securing this high profile premiere presents an exciting opportunity to join Kruckemeyer in showcasing their talents on the international stage. When: 11 – 29 November 2014, 8.30pm Where: The Blue Room Theatre Preview: Tue 11 Nov Members Night: Wed 12 Nov Q&A + Schools Performance: Wed 19 Nov Bookings: 9227 7005 // www.blueroom.org.au Tickets: $15.00-$25.00 >> Click here for dropbox link to images Directed by Adam Mitchell // Featuring Jo Morris and Renee Newman-Storen // Sound design by Ben Collins // Lighting design by Chris Donnelly. MEDIA ENQUIRIES Kate Hancock 0413 831 961 kate.hancock09@gmail.com
Pictured Mark Storen. Credit Simon Pynt Photography