Tense Dave (2007) program

AND

PRESENT

TENSE DAVE MERLYN THEATRE APRIL 24 - 29 2007

TENSE DAVE

AND CHUNKY MOVE PRESENT

TENSE DAVE Choreography & Direction Lucy Guerin, Michael Kantor, Gideon Obarzanek Dramaturge Tom Wright Cast includes Kristy Ayre, Brian Carbee, Michelle Heaven, Brian Lucas, Luke Smiles Set Design Consultant Jodie Fried Costume Design Jodie Fried Lighting Design Niklas Pajanti Original Music & Arrangements François Tétaz Initial Design Collaborators: Lighting Design Bluebottle: Andrew Livingston & Ben Cobham Sound System Design Byron Scullin & Don Eickhoff Stage Manager Frog-Philip Peck Assistant Stage Manager Naomi Adams MERLYN THEATRE APRIL 24 - 29 2007 Duration 65 minutes This project was originally assisted by the Confederation of Australian International Arts Festivals through the Major Festivals Initiative of the Australia Council, the Australian government’s arts funding and advisory body, Melbourne International Arts Festival, Sydney Festival and Perth International Arts Festival.

Tense Dave was first performed for the Melbourne International Arts Festival in the Merlyn Theatre, at The CUB Malthouse (October 2, 2003).

At the CUB Malthouse 113 Sturt Street Southbank VIC 3006 Box Office +61 3 9685 5111 Administration +61 3 9685 5100 Facsimile +61 3 9685 5112 Email admin@malthousetheatre.com.au Web www.malthousetheatre.com.au

Tense Dave can be seen as one man’s moment of crisis blown apart like an exploded diagram; each of its components separated and pushed out to their extremes.

A journey through strange and fractured versions of a world distorted by fears, paranoias and unfulfilled fantasies.

LUCY GUERIN

MICHAEL KANTOR

GIDEON OBARZANEK

Malthouse Theatre and Chunky Move are proud to present Tense Dave directed by the artistic team of Lucy Guerin, Michael Kantor and Gideon Obarzanek, originally commissioned by the Melbourne International Arts Festival 2003.

Personnel Artistic Director Gideon Obarzanek Executive Producer Rachael Azzopardi Production & Operations Manager Donna Aston Marketing & Development Manager Daniel Goodfellow Administrator Susan Jones Program Co-ordinator Kelly Warner Class Co-ordinator Jo Lloyd Board of Directors Stephen Armstrong (Chair) Louisa Coppel Kate Crawford Margaret Parker Katrina Sedgewick Tracey Mills Gideon Obarzanek Jeremy Blackshaw ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Chunky Move is supported by the Victorian Government, through Arts Victoria – Department of Premier and Cabinet and the Commonwealth Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.

Winner 2005 Bessie Award Outstanding Choreography / Creation.

A NOTE FROM GIDEON OBARZANEK After its critical and popular success within Australia, Chunky Move made the audacious move to self present Tense Dave in New York as well as travel it to two other prestigious dance festivals in the US. I have been involved in many premieres however I don’t think I was ever as nervous as when we opened in New York. I remember stepping out into the foyer to have a drink with friends and colleagues to find myself short of breath and unable to speak.

I had to retreat and sit backstage until the performance began. Even though I snuck into the auditorium I don’t think I saw anything of that first performance. With clenched teeth and squeezing Lucy’s hand into a pulp, I just stared straight ahead wishing nothing too horrible would happen, and that it would just all be over. Later that night, after the theatre staff had to kick out a packed reception onto the street (as people refused to leave) I got the feeling it all went well.

Receiving a coveted Bessie Award in New York for outstanding choreography and creation in 2005 and standing ovations everywhere it was performed, Tense Dave has made a deep and resounding impact in America for the company. By the end of 2007, Chunky Move will have returned to the US on four separate occasions.

This experience has built a confidence and depth in the cast’s performances and the touring has allowed the production to develop into a far richer and now different work to what originally premiered here at the Melbourne Festival of 2003.

Having evolved over many appearances elsewhere in Australia and abroad, Tense Dave has probably become Chunky Move’s most important work to date. With the Malthouse Theatre, we are very proud and excited to present it to our home crowd in the theatre where it first came to life.

GIDEON OBARZANEK 2007 Artistic Director Chunky Move

CHUNKY MOVE 111 Sturt Street Southbank VIC 3006 Administration +61 3 9645 5188 Facsimile +61 3 9645 5199 Email info@chunkymove.com.au Web www.chunkymove.com

LUCY GUERIN CHOREOGRAPHER Born in Adelaide, Australia, Lucy Guerin graduated from the Centre for Performing Arts in 1982 before joining the companies of Russell Dumas (Dance Exchange) and Nanette Hassall (Danceworks). She moved to New York in 1989 for seven years where she danced with Tere O’Connor Dance, the Bebe Miller Company and Sara Rudner. Now based in Melbourne, Guerin has been commissioned by Chunky Move, Ros Warby, Woo Co (Denmark), Ricochet (UK), The Berlin Literature Festival (with poet Michael Lenz), JCDN/Hirano (Japan), Dance Works Rotterdam and Mikhail Baryshnikov’s White Oak Dance Project (USA) among others. Her works have toured throughout Europe, including France, The Netherlands, UK, Germany, Denmark and Switzerland and the US, including New York, Portland, Miami, Seattle, Houston, Durham and Ottawa (Canada). In 2000 Guerin was awarded the Sidney Myer Performing Arts Award for achievement by an individual. Other awards include the Prix d’auteur from the Rencontres Choregraphiques Internationales de Bagnolet in France, a 1994 New York Foundation for the Arts Choreographic Fellowship and several Green Room awards from the Victorian Arts Centre. In 1997 her piece Two Lies won a New York Dance and Performance Award (a Bessie) for choreography. In 2002 she established Lucy Guerin Inc. to support the creation and performance of new works which tour nationally and internationally. Structure and Sadness her most recent work, based on the construction and collapse of the Westgate Bridge premiered in October 2006 as part of the Melbourne International Arts Festival and was also presented at the Sydney Festival in 2007. This work won a Green Room award for Best Choreography as well as being nominated in four other categories.

MICHAEL KANTOR DIRECTOR Michael Kantor is the Artistic Director of Malthouse Theatre.

At Malthouse Theatre he has directed premiere productions of Not Like Beckett, Journal of the Plague Year and The Odyssey (Melbourne International Arts Festival & Perth International Arts Festival), and new productions of The Ham Funeral and Babes in the Wood. Michael’s work as a director covers several fields including the devising of new work: Excavation (1996 Adelaide Festival), Natural Life (1998 Adelaide festival and Playbox Theatre Company, later presented as Natural Life 2 in 1999 for The Lincoln Centre in New York) and the direction of new plays: Lenz (1996 Melbourne Festival), Meat Party (Playbox), Howard Katz (STC). He has also reexamined classic works in the productions of: The Caucasian Chalk Circle (Belvoir), The Ham Funeral (Belvoir), Ubu (2002 Melbourne Festival and Belvoir), Macbeth (Belvoir), Babes in the Wood (Playbox), and also the contemporary operas: The Burrow (1994 Perth Festival, touring to Sydney), Moon Spirit Feasting (2000 Adelaide Festival, later touring to Melbourne, Berlin, Zurich and Tokyo) and dance: Tense Dave (Chunky Move for 2003 Melbourne Festival, touring to Sydney and Perth Festivals 2004). Michael has collaborated with Barrie Kosky’s Gilgul Theatre, performing in The Dybbuk, Es Brent, The Wilderness Room, The Operated Jew. He studied at the University of Melbourne (1986-90) and at L’Ecole de Phillipe Gaulier, Paris (1988).

GIDEON OBARZANEK CHOREOGRAPHER Artistic Director Gideon Obarzanek founded Chunky Move in 1995. Since then the company has created many dance productions performing at numerous cities and festivals around the world. Gideon originally studied at the Australian Ballet School and danced with the Queensland Ballet and the Sydney Dance Company before working as an independent performer and choreographer with various dance companies and independent projects within Australia and abroad. Most recently Gideon has received a New York Bessie award for Outstanding Choreography/Creation for Tense Dave and two Melbourne Green Room Awards for Original Choreography and Concept and Realisation for I Want to Dance Better at Parties. In 1999 he received a Mo award for best choreography for Bonehead and the Prime Minister’s Young Creative Fellowship in 1996.

KRISTY AYRE PERFORMER Kristy graduated from the VCA in 2001 completing a Bachelor of Dance and receiving the Mary Orloff Prize for Most Outstanding Dancer. Since 2002, she has developed and performed in all major works with Chunky Move including Glow, Singularity, I Want to Dance Better at Parties, Tense Dave, Crowds and Wanted. She also performed in Prue Lang’s Infinite Temporal Series and Kim Itoh’s Butterfly and Me. She has toured extensively nationally and internationally for the company and also performed in Lucy Guerin Inc’s Love Me for the 2005 UK Tour and in Shelley Lasica’s Play in a Room. Kristy also teaches regularly for Chunky Move and most recently for Patrick Studios Australia. In 2007 she joined Luke George, Luke Smiles and Martyn Coutts for the first development of a new show Life-Size which will continue to further develop in 2008.

BRIAN CARBEE PERFORMER Originally from the Untied States, Brian moved to New Zealand in 1981 to join Limbs where he created two major works, Disturbing the Peace and Parts Unknown. In 1991, he founded his own company, the Jump Giants and produced Heaven, Hell & Hamilton and Bedrock. He choreographed West Side Story and Peter Pan for the Mercury Theatre and Cabaret at the Watershed Theatre. He danced with Douglas Wright Dance in its Sydney production of Forever and in Commotion Company’s stage and film productions of The Dark Forest. Now based in Sydney for nearly ten years, Brian recently toured New Zealand and Sydney in Black Milk with Douglas Wright Dance. He won a 2005 Australian Dance Award for best choreography for In the Dark, directed by Wendy Houstoun and won a Special Festival Award for his production of Stretching It Wider at the 2001 Mardi Gras Gay and Lesbian Arts Festival. Brian’s 1997 solo work In Search of Mike was adapted into a short dramatic film, which has won ten international short film awards including third place in the world’s best short film competition in Paris.

MICHELLE HEAVEN PERFORMER Michelle Heaven graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts with a Bachelor of Dance in 1992 and Masters of Dance Performance in 2001. She has made extensive contributions as a performer and collaborator to both live theatre and film, working nationally and internationally with many prominent Australian choreographers and directors such as Phillip Adams, Sue Healey, Gideon Obarzanek, Lucy Guerin, Michael Kantor, Douglas Horton, Sandra Parker, Tracie Mitchell, Kate Denborough, Nancy Black, Rebecca Hilton and Leigh Warren.

Michelle also creates her own work within the mediums of dance movement, puppetry and film/video. Michelle won an Inaugural ReelDance award at the ReelDance Festival in Sydney, 2000 for her first short film. She is a recipient of The Dame Peggy Van Praagh Choreographic Scholarship, The Australian Post Graduate Award (Industry) Scholarship and Victorian Green Room Award in the category of female dancer. Recently Michelle choreographed Pillock for the Album project, curated by Natalie Cursio, which is to be documented

by ABC Television in 2007. In 2006 she codirected a new movement based performance work with Douglas Horton for ChamberMade Opera as well as choreographing Spooky Little for Pieces for Small Spaces curated by Lucy Guerin.

BRIAN LUCAS PERFORMER Brian Lucas is a Brisbane-based freelance performer and choreographer. Trained in both acting and dance, he has worked with many of Australia’s most well-known performance companies, including Chunky Move, Rock’n’Roll Circus, ChamberMade Opera, QUT Creative Industries, Dance North, Extensions Youth Dance Company, Queensland Ballet, Queensland Theatre Company, La Boite Theatre, The Lyric Opera, and for almost eight years with Expressions Dance Company (four of those as Assistant Artistic Director). Brian has been involved in an extensive range of performance and creative development projects, and has initiated a wide variety of independent and fringe projects, including the Crab

Room Performance Space, the Cherry Herring Collective, and the EMERGENCY peer-mentoring project. Since 2001, Brian has held the position of Artist-in-Residence at Brisbane Powerhouse, where many of his highly-acclaimed solo performance pieces - including Monster and The Book of Revelations - have premiered. Brian is currently the recipient of a two-year Fellowship from the Dance Board of the Australia Council, during which time he is creating and presenting two new solo works at Brisbane Powerhouse. The first of these - Underbelly - premiered in June 2006 to critical and popular acclaim, and was short-listed for an Australian Dance Award. The second new work is scheduled for performance in November 2007. Also during 2007, Brian will be performing with Clare Dyson’s Subject to Change collective on a new work entitled absence(s), and presenting Underbelly in Canberra and Brisbane.

LUKE SMILES PERFORMER Luke started dance training at the Miranda Kalgovas Ballet School, later completing a Bachelor of Dance at the Victorian College of the Arts. Apart from being a founding member of Chunky Move, he has also performed with Vis-a-Vis Dance Canberra, The One Extra Dance Company, Meryl Tankard’s Australian Dance Theatre, Thwack, and ADT. Working under the name motion laboratories Luke’s music work includes composition/sound design for Chunky Move including Corrupted 2, All The Better To Eat You With, Live Acts, Flexible, Wanted and Glow. His other composition credits include soundtracks for NDT1, Australian Dance Theatre, West Australian Ballet, Dance Party Performance Group, Stompin, Ox, Tasdance, and Dancenorth. Luke dedicates his performance to Chunky Move and the entire dance community for their generous support in recovering from that skatepark disaster.

TOM WRIGHT DRAMATURGE Tom Wright was born in Melbourne and lives in Sydney. He has worked as an actor and director at MTC, Playbox, La Mama, Company B, Anthill, Gilgul, Mene Mene, Bell Shakespeare Company, Chunky Move, Black Swan Theatre Company, Malthouse Theatre, the Adelaide Festival and the Melbourne Festival (MIFA). He has written or co-written a number of plays or adaptations, including Ghost Train (after Kroetz) (1994) (MIAF), Excavation (with Mene Mene) (1996) (1996 Adelaide Festival), A Journal of the Plague Year (after Defoe) (1996) (Malthouse 2005), The Caucasian Chalk Circle (Brecht) (1997) (Company B), Hideous Portraits (1997) (La Mama), Ubu (after Jarry) (1999) (Company B, MIFA), This Is a True Story (2000), Lorilei, (2003), The Golden Ass (after Apuleius) (2003) (MTC), Medea (Euripides) (2002) (MIFA), Babes in the Wood (2002) (Playbox), Puntila and His Man Matti (Brecht) (2003) (ATYP), The Odyssey (after Homer) (2003) (MIFA, Malthouse & Black Swan 2005-6), All Walls Dissolve (theatre@risk 2005), Tales From the Vienna Woods (Horvath) (2006), Lost Echo (2006) (STC). He was appointed the Artistic Associate of Sydney Theatre Company in November 2003, and since 2006 has been the Associate Director of the Actor’s Company.

JODIE FRIED SET & DESIGN CONSULTANT & COSTUME DESIGNER Jodie Fried graduated from the NIDA design course in 1998 and since then has worked internationally in both theatre and film. In 2005 Jodie was the costume designer on the feature films Romulus My Father (directed by Richard Roxburgh), Candy (directed by Neil Armfield) and Caterpillar Wish (written and directed by Sandra Sciberras), and was production/ costume designer for the short film Love This Time (directed

by Rhys Graham). In 2004 Jodie designed the costumes for the short feature Jewboy, directed by Tony Krawitz (Un Certain Regard, Cannes Film Festival 2005), and was assistant costume designer on Rowan Woods’ feature film Little Fish.

Jodie’s theatre costume credits include Royal Shakespeare Company’s Midnight’s Children, Eternity Man (Almeida Theatre, London), Tense Dave and Arcade for Chunky Move, Twelfth Night, Gulpilil, Aliwa, Threepenny Opera, Page 8 for Company B Belvoir.

NIKLAS PAJANTI LIGHTING DESIGN Niklas works as a lighting designer whose practice ranges across contemporary dance, drama and events. His work for performance includes designs for Chunky Move, Dancehouse, Eleventh Hour, Kage Physical Theatre, Malthouse Theatre, Not Yet It’s Difficult performance group, Melbourne International Arts Festival, The Commonwealth Games 2006, Melbourne International Comedy Festival, The International Puppet Carnival, Daniel Schlusser, Tracie Mitchell and Gerard van Dyck.

Niklas’ career has seen him realise architectural installations, arena events, dance performances, physical theatre, drama and mixed media performances. His designs have toured with shows throughout Australia, Europe, Asia and the USA. He is a graduate of the Victorian College of the Arts and holds post graduate qualifications in Illuminating Engineering from The Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. Niklas has been nominated for four Green Room Awards in Lighting Design and is the recipient of the award for Lighting Design in Dance 2002.

FRANÇOIS TÉTAZ ORIGINAL MUSIC & ARRANGEMENT François Tétaz is a composer/producer based in Melbourne, Australia. He has collaborated with Chunky Move on Tense Dave, Crumpled and Corrupted, Crowds and Arcade. His soundtrack for Wolf Creek won best score at the 2006 APRA-Australian Guild of Screen Composers awards. His work includes the score for Patricia Piccinni’s Venice Biennale pavilion and the score for the man eating crocodile movie Rogue, due for release in August 2007. He is currently working with Paul Schutze on a 8 hour surround sound work commissioned for James Turrell’s Roden Crater. Franc also runs a music post production studio and is in the middle of producing albums for singer/song writer Lior, Dave Brown’s improvised prepared guitar project Candlesnuffer, Gotye and up and coming mega stars Hot Little Hands.

BYRON SCULLIN & DON EICKHOFF INITIAL SYSTEM SOUND DESIGN Byron has worked as a composer, producer and audio engineer for the past 10 years. During this time he has worked across a broad and diverse range of projects and collaborations. Recent work includes, production and engineering on a full length album for Melbourne band All India Radio, music for Lonely Planet’s Six Degrees TV show (with Nicole Skeltys of B(if)tek fame), music and production on Stories From The Stars for Melbourne Planetarium (with David Bridie). Music for Under The Weather for Tracie Mitchell, Play Dirty and Australian Marriage Act for Arena Theatre, music and production for Back to Back’s Theatre Of Speed DVD (with J. David Franzke). Byron continues to work as Chunky Move’s sound system designer and touring audio engineer for numerous productions. Byron has also worked as a music assistant on films such as Wolf Creek and The Hard Word, as well as completing the score and sound design for Tracie Mitchell’s short film Whole Heart. Byron has mastered many LP’s and EP’s for various local artists as a freelance engineer for Moose Mastering. Byron currently works out of Audrey Studios in Coburg and lectures in Recording Techniques in the Sound Dept. at RMIT’s School of Art. FROG - PHILIP PECK BLUEBOTTLE 3 STAGE MANAGER Frog studied Stage Management at the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne, graduating in 2002. Since 2003 Frog has worked consistently with Chunky Move as stage manger on: Tense Dave, I Want to Dance Better at Parties (Melbourne, Sydney, New York, USA and regional touring) and Crowds. Frog’s Dance Production and Stage Management credits include Lucy Guerin: Pieces for Small Space & Setting. Jo Lloyd: Public=Un+Public. Kage Physical Theatre/ Malthouse Theatre: Headlock. Natalie Cursio: With A Bullet: The Album Project. Stompin Youth Dance Company: Age of Consent, SYNC. Ballet Lab: Fiction. Other stage management experience includes work with Malthouse Theatre Company Not Like Beckett, Circus Oz, L’Oreal Melbourne Fashion Festival, and the Commonwealth Games Festival Melbourne 2006. Frog currently works with Bluebottle 3 on a variety of dance and theatre productions.