Stage Whispers March/April 2023 edition

Regular Features

Dear theatre-goers and theatre-doers, During my previous life as Drama and English teacher, my co-curricular missions were creating performances involving students, and arranging theatre-going experiences for them.

Theatre visits ranged from organising touring performances in the school hall, through small theatre visits for my own drama students, to coordinating multiple buses to take an entire year group to see a play or musical. At one school, we even extended this to organising family groups to evening performances.

The organisation and logistics of creating a school production, running an excursion or incursion, or having your students participate in an inter-school or regional festival are huge, while the out -of-school and weekend commitment can really be above and beyond.

But I wouldn’t have had it any other way. The personal rewards stick with me the thrills, excitement, and personal growth of the students so I salute the teachers who continue to create these experiences, especially with the increased formalities, regulations and paperwork now falling on the same pairs of dedicated shoulders of those who choose to helm these extravaganzas.

At the same time, a recent trip down memory lane via my programs, posters and photo albums reminded me of just how remarkable the level of collaboration across all faculties can be when staging a school musical. It wasn’t unusual to have about 20 diverse staff members actively involved, fostering a keen awareness in every staff room.

One principal even ran a lunch-time mini-golf competition on the school playing fields to help raise awareness of, and funds for, a production.

Meanwhile, student involvement stretched across all areas of production, with those not looking to perform becoming active in backstage, technical and front of house capacities lighting, sound, stage management, make -up, costuming, orchestra, program, ushering, canteen...you name it!

I recently reflected on Facebook about this. Ex-students reminded me what a positive experience these shows were for them personally, that a few even went on to professional performing careers, while at least one of my former cast members went on to become a Drama teacher who also staged school musicals, some of them at the same school, in the same hall where we’d shared the experience of school musicals as teacher and student.

Yours in Theatre,

NeilLitchfield Editor

Cover image: Jason Donovan as Frank N Furter, Ethan Jones as Brad and Deirdre Khoo as Janet in The Rocky Horror Show Read Coral Drouyn’s retrospective on page 6 as the show marks its 50th anniversary.

Photo: Salty Dingo.

Paulini and Trevor Ashley read all about Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat in Stage Whispers.

No wonder she is excited by the 50th birthday production Stage Whispers’ Coral Drouyn has seen The Rocky Horror Show (and Picture Show) more than 30 times with eight different Franks.

Jason Donovan as Frank N Furter and Henry Rollo as Riff Raff in The Rocky Horror Show

Photo: Daniel Boud.

“I remember doing the Time Warp.”

Yes, I do, quite literally. The first time was only in my head. The year was 1974 and I hadn’t yet turned 30 but I had two kids and was writing directing and appearing at my own theatre restaurant five nights a week. But a couple of days break in Sydney and getting a night out at a dump (perfect venue) like the New Arts Cinema (which became the Valhalla) a tacky cinema...tacky in a way that the carpet stuck to your shoes was a veritable treat.

After all, it was Jim Sharman and Reg Livermore, and if the show was a little weird, and there were no Rodgers and Hammerstein type songs...well, you can’t have everything.

We had only heard whispers about The Rocky Horror Show itself. It was apparently a send-up of all the schlock B-grade sci-fi horror movies, and it was very camp...a hugely popular word at the time.

I had known Reg in a minor capacity for about 10 years. We had both auditioned for the film The Delinquents (Kylie ended up playing

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Join Stage Whispers TV at the opening night of The Rocky Horror Show

youtu.be/BV0eST7pjhU

my role years later) and Reg had done Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mamma’s Hung You in the Closet and I’m Feelin’ So Sad at the Independent Theatre (North Sydney) where my then hubby was stage manager.

We watched Reg’s rise through Hair and Jesus Christ Superstar (both directed by Jim Sharman) and wondered where he could possibly go next. Reg was different we knew that; and I am not talking about his sexuality. He was a star even before he was a star. He only had to walk on stage and look at the audience and you felt he was saying, “Who are you? This is my domain, you owe me rent and it will cost you shitloads to worship me.”

Off stage, Reg was quiet, almost shy, but hit him with a pink or amber spot and this other creature would emerge bigger than anything you could ever imagine scary but delicious, an honest to God superstar.

I think I sat open-mouthed through three quarters of Rocky Horror as Reg trissed and trounced, stomped and sashayed, in ridiculously high platform heels, alternately

scaring us into submission and almost killing us with hysterical laughter.

Hard to believe, but only a small clique knew in those days that a transvestite could be a heterosexual cross-dresser, or a drag queen, or pretty much anything in between. Coming out of the ‘60s into the ‘70s, gender diversity, in all its forms, was as impossible to understand as quantum physics. To say The Rocky Horror Show was confronting is like saying ice-cream is cold. Well, yeah, what did you expect?

Reg has said, and I quote, “Frank is the fearless embodiment of all that’s unspeakable.”

The reason was, of course, that Reg and Jim created him that way. Depraved and irredeemable, yet also irresistible. I had to go back twice more before I believed what I was seeing, and by that time I knew the “Time Warp” lyrics and sang along, silently.

The following year the show opened in Melbourne with one of our best and most diverse actors, Max Phipps. He was a less scary Frank, not

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Cover Story

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so confronting, but still like nothing we could relate to. I must have seen him at least once a fortnight for the entire run. He was brilliant.

Trevor Kent took over from Reg in Sydney and really relished getting inside what made Frank tick. He was a classically trained actor who created for himself an entire universe where Frank was emperor. Trevor was so great that later, when I had the pleasure of working with him in Prisoner, I called his character Frank.

By the time the movie was made, with Tim Curry reprising his London role, and Frank being super attractive instead of compellingly grotesque, the show had run its course here (temporarily). But it had been a huge success for a little cult show which opened to just 63 people in a derelict building.

The movie was a cult hit, after a slow start. And I remember it was the midnight show at the Valhalla in Richmond on a Friday or Saturday night and the kids from the casts of the major shows in town would all front up.

We would all go dressed as the characters and there were true fanatics on stage in front of the screen (not pros, but civilians who actually believed they were the characters). This time we all stood and did the Time Warp. At worst, half the audience was stoned and the other half inebriated, but the scene was anarchy fraught with innocence to counteract the (very little) depravity on screen.

So how did a cult musical become mainstream theatre over the next decade? Did the show change, or did the audience? Or perhaps the whole world changed and has never stopped since.

“It’s just a jump to the left, and then a step to the right...”

That’s all it really took.

The world, and Australia in particular, took a huge jump to the

Deirdre Khoo as Janet and Ethan Jones as Brad.

Photo: Daniel Boud. Myf Warhurst as The Narrator.

Photo: Daniel Boud.

Below: The ensemble cast of The Rocky Horror Show

Photo: Daniel Boud.

We asked Jason Donovan...

Stage Whispers: Is The Rocky Horror Show now just fun entertainment or does it still have the power to shock?

Jason Donovan: This show broke boundaries in 1973 from a creative perspective and of course from a social perspective. The songs are cracking rock songs that have stood the test of time and still resonate with people 50 years on so there is definitely a magic in that nostalgia for people. Absolutely this show is pure entertainment and we can see that clearly in every performances as audiences come along dressed up and are up out of their seats and ready to have a great time!

SW: Are younger audiences coming to the show or do you expect the audience to be the older fans who have always loved it?

JD: I love the fact that yes we can see younger people in the audience with whom the show is resonating the story and of course the music. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that the show continues to be injected into pop culture coming through in various ways on social media and also TV shows like Glee who celebrate all aspects of the show and have exposed it to the current younger generations. Ultimately its incredible to see such a wide age range in the fans of this show and that again is a testament to its message and its musical power.

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left. Instead of a somewhat rigid PM, we had a ridgey-didge all-drinking, all -swearing, all-womanising leader in Bob Hawke (and Britain had Tony Blair).

Australia was finding its own identity with a more “live and let live” approach to life. State by state homosexuality was decriminalised and we were beginning to understand gender diversity as well as sexuality.

Frank N Furter was now not the only bisexual person we had ever heard of. Rocky Horror wasn’t so shocking anymore. It was a new world in which we were encouraged to believe anything was possible.

Then sci-fi in general took a step to the right. No longer schlock horror movies new filming technology gave us thought provoking films about what was out there, and we were no longer afraid of it. Star Wars changed our way of thinking about sci-fi movies. They were now respectable and even award-winning; part of the mainstream.

The Rocky Horror Show took that same step to the right, and stopped being about fine actors of a certain persuasion. Daniel Abineri, a film actor and singer with a large fan base,

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Jason Donovan as Frank N Furter.

Photo: Daniel Boud.

Meet the cast of The Rocky Horror Show in the rehearsal room.

gave a very respectable impersonation of Tim Curry’s Frank across several productions. Then there was an Elvis Impersonator, Joe Daniels (super macho but sang up a storm), Adam Rennie, who played quite safe, and then (counterculture forbids even saying his name these days) a soap and recording star, Craig McLachlan, at age 28, grabbed the role of Frank and took it to places that outburlesqued burlesque.

Audiences who came to see a singing soap star left as die-hard Rocky Horror fans, and a whole new audience was converted to live theatre. This time they were large mainstream theatres, necessary to pay the salaries of household names and stars in the lead role, and that was to be the future of the show.

But it was a different soap star who next put his stamp on the role. There were some raised eyebrows in 1998 when it was announced that Jason Donovan would be Frank for the 25th anniversary production. Jason had been a beloved character in Neighbours, reached superstar status on two continents, sold millions of records and was a household name. He was also the epitome of squeaky clean, boy-next-door goodness. Now he was adding depravity to his repertoire.

A Trip Down Memory Lane

Max Phipps in the 1975 Melbourne production: youtu.be/JVsYiDuz73w Reg Livermore in the 1984 Brisbane production: youtu.be/ZFB-GLtGShc Daniel Abineri in the 1988 Melbourne production: youtu.be/RFbqU8ZKox4

The Rocky Horror Show

Now playing at Theatre Royal, Sydney.

The show travels to Adelaide, playing at Festival Theatre in April, then to Melbourne, opening in May at the Athanaeum Theatre ahead of an expected season in Brisbane. rockyhorror.com.au

What people forgot was that Jason is part of an acting family. He knows his stuff, and he always has. He was just a victim of type casting the downside of being seen as a “Pretty Boy” when you are actually a serious artist.

It was a turning point in his career, and he nailed it. Though Frank isn’t a paradigm for a serious role, it does best with a serious actor. And Jason Donovan knows his craft and is so good he can make a role whatever he chooses. That’s why he’s able to go from slipping off his Technicolor Dreamcoat to donning tights and a corset in the blink of an eye. Now he’s back to celebrate the 50th anniversary of perhaps the most spectacular anomaly in the history of theatre. It’s not schlock anymore...it’s pure (but sleazy) entertainment that

no-one should ever be offended by. In 50 years, it has played to 30 million people in 30 countries and been performed in 20 different languages.

With a stellar cast of local talent including Spicks and Specks’ Myf Warhurst as the narrator the show has already opened in Sydney and will play Adelaide and Melbourne (fingers crossed for Brisbane). The world keeps changing, and so does The Rocky Horror Show. The world has caught up to Richard O’Brien’s strange but much-loved vision. We who love it are older too.

It’s 25 years since JD last donned the tights and platform shoes. I wonder if he has a sense of déjà vu or if this is a whole new experience? There’s only one way to find out.

“Let’s do the Time Warp again.”

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Reg Livermore (1974).

Daniel Abineri (1988).

Max Phipps (1975).

From Tiny Stables Stage To London And Now Broadway

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She doesn’t brag about it, but Suzie Miller finally earns more as a playwright than she did as a lawyer. And it’s about time. Her hit play Prima Facie, with Killing Eve star Jodie Comer as a sassy lawyer suddenly turned sexual assault victim, won over London last year and opens next month on Broadway. Last month it collected three What’s On Stage Awards in London, including Best Play.

Prima Facie began at Sydney’s tiny Griffin Theatre in 2019 with an astounding Sheridan Harbridge in the role, in a Lee Lewis production which is now running in Melbourne, and a new production opens next month in Adelaide. And Miller’s newest play, about another lawyer, the firebrand feminist and late US Supreme Court judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a life of RBG so beautifully created by actor Heather Mitchell, is a sublime mix of tenderness, wit and legal research.

RBG: Of Many, One is certain to have a long life, and overseas productions of Prima Facie, translated

and adapted to each country’s law on sexual assault, are this year sprouting like mushrooms. Budding playwrights take note: one woman plays with a large social canvas have a good economic head start in getting up; especially when so well timed as Miller’s are to the zeitgeist today of violence to women.

So yes, all that should be worth a few dollars more than being a lawyer, to say nothing of Miller’s avalanche of other projects her completed novel of Prima Facie and expected screenplay; an Aussie feminist romcom; and a further screenplay about historic corruption in Northern Ireland; and a new play opens at Griffin in July, Jailbaby, this time about sexual violence against young men in prisons.

Born almost 60 years ago in Melbourne’s St Kilda, “before it was cool to live there”, from a modest background, Miller’s near manic output and drive to achieve started early. She’s always had jobs, big and small, and at her Catholic school she

excelled in science and maths, partly to please her strict and remote father.

The careers advisor at school gave her just one option.

“She said, I hear you’re good at chemistry, at art and at talking,” Miller remembers. “So she looked up her big book and came up with hairdressing! You can choose the colours, she said, mix the chemicals and talk to the clients. An inspired choice actually, and at that stage almost half the class had left school at the age of 15 to become hairdressers.”

Instead, Miller became the first in her wider family to go to university, graduating from Monash as an immunologist, a science and habit of research which reappears in her playwriting. But in the quiet laboratory she soon realised that she was too much a talker. So she turned to the law, graduating from the University of NSW. She was happy to cover her tracks from Melbourne and, in preparation for dealing with Sydney’s legal elite, make herself classless.

Heather Mitchell in STC’s RBG, Of Many, One (2022)

Photo: Prudence Upton.

Playwright Suzie Miller’s unique blend of legal nous, firebrand feminism and great story-telling has seen her works performed on the world’s smallest and greatest stages. Martin Portus spoke to the Australian playwright ahead of her Broadway debut.

The director and star of RBG, Of Many, One discuss the show on ABC’s 7:30

“In Sydney suddenly the sun came out,” she says. “I do have a chip on my shoulder about class which you can see in my plays, and at Monash everyone was educated in private schools and I suddenly saw how different I was.”

In Prima Facie, Miller’s feeling of being an underprivileged outsider vitally informs the role of Tessa, as the ambitious lawyer struggles up in an elite male world. Later the courtroom turns against her.

Playing the role In the London production, Jodie Comer relished this class contempt and coming from playing the Russian spy in Killing Eve

returned to her own strong Liverpudlian accent. As Tessa she opened the play so brash and fearless in her contempt that some Brits in the audience found it too much.

Suzie Miller herself started working in corporate law but with, she says, “a burning desire to change the world”, she moved quickly to the Public Interest Advocacy Centre. It promotes achieving social justice through changing the law just as she would later chart Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s

career similarly achieving feminist advances through changing laws in the US. Her future husband was also at the Centre, now NSW Supreme Court judge Robert Beech-Jones. Miller says his “posh” double-barrelled name belies a poor Welsh ancestry and Tasmanian childhood.

“He did it tough and for the first time in my legal career I met someone who was like me; I could be who I was, I didn’t have to hide my background, or tiptoe around issues. It was someone who really got me.”

Still a lawyer but “drawn to do more with words”, Miller was soon back at the University of NSW doing another degree, a Masters in Theatre and Film, and later across the road at NIDA doing the Playwrighting Course. Her first major play was Cross Sections at the Old Fitzroy Theatre in 2004. It drew powerfully on the nearby stories of the street kids, sex workers and homeless of Kings Cross, who Miller represented during her years as advocate solicitor with the Shopfront Youth Legal Service.

“It was the most crisis driven place you could ever work in. I became very

anxious and terrified for the safety of my own two children. I thought this was the real world until a counsellor said, no this isn’t the real world, it’s simply the worst ever day in somebody else’s life. And you just happen to be present, tomorrow will be better and they’ll be laughing.

“I think I just fell in love with my characters, as my clients, and had the chance in the theatre to write those stories, just as my job was to tell their stories in court to try to keep them out of prison.”

Cross Sections was picked up by the Sydney Opera House, and the playwright was off. After the 2005 Cronulla riots, and legally representing rioters from both sides, Miller then explored how the strength of mateship across cultures was destroyed by tribal loyalties. Her extroverted ability to make new connections led her to a mentorship with the late esteemed US playwright Edward Albee while writing the script; luckily he liked it.

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Sheridan Harbridge discusses reprising her role in Prima Facie for MTC.

Sheridan Harbridge in Griffin Theatre’s Prima Facie (2019)

Photo: Brett Boardman.

In Sold she dramatised Sydney’s obsession with real estate, characteristically conducting extensive interviews with the agents. And in Reasonable Doubt Miller put the courtroom on stage with two jurors in a relationship agreeing to vote against the others, before reasonable doubts then emerge about their relationship.

Miller claims she wrote this play as an experiment, making it inexpensive to stage, a two-hander set in a hotel room, and sent it to every theatre company in Australia. At the time, she says, all artistic directors were male. Not one replied; she thinks no one even read it.

“I remember this talk then of theatre companies not picking up women writers. I was shocked coming from the law which I thought was the most conservative area, and the arts were very social justice orientated and aware. But in law if you got good grades, you were employed, but not the arts. They say, oh it’s not about gender, it’s about taste, merit and good writing. With it not being about a grade, you couldn’t argue with that.”

It was a lesson on how patriarchal prejudices and opinions are encoded

as unarguable, objective truths. Miller returns to this frequently, especially in her courtroom plays, and notably in how the evidence of female victims is treated in sexual assault charges. The bright spark lawyer of Prima Facie, so slick in defending men against such charges, is thwarted in court when having to bring those charges after her own rape.

“The system of law is a construct, we’ve created it by human minds and the dominant culture of those minds, as to how we decide what is fair and whether someone is to be held accountable or not. Its laughable how lawyers try to make out something is objective and scientific in its processes. It’s not. If you don’t fit the model, you may not get justice.

“Say you’re Aboriginal, and you’re in front of a white, middle class male heterosexual judge, who only mixes with those of his own background, and he says that’s not relevant to the story. It’s very hard to contextualise a certain thing if you’re the only person there who can speak to it.”

Meanwhile, ignored at home, Reasonable Doubt was staged at the 2008 Edinburgh Festival and in New York, where it won a best play award. Miller turned down the offer to be a magistrate, upped stumps, and

herded Robert and the kids off to London.

Somehow, she had won a one-year residency at the National Theatre, where she developed her play about a married man who at the age of ten had murdered a toddler. Transparency drew on Miller’s huge legal experience of rehabilitation processes, and where to seek responsibility for such a murder, a boy not yet adult or the “wider village”.

In freezing London, she and the kids rode bikes and “lived on a pound a day”; but after 18 months they returned to Sydney (from where Miller continues commuting to London). In her bag was a play, also developed with the National Theatre, which Griffin premiered in 2015.

An abstract tale, Caress/Ache is about human touch, its power, pleasure and betrayal. With definitions of touch projected on the set, some were critical of the play’s clinical, science class style, of it being more a thesis than a play. It’s a feature of Miller’s writing and reaction which would be repeated.

Central to Suzie Miller’s successful career is that she never stays home long. She has a relentless capacity to build connections and then collaborations with directors, festivals and companies, big but often small, and say yes to every offer of a residency around the world.

At a residency in Toronto she wrote a play about a local mine disaster; two residencies in Scotland produced In the Heart of Danby Park and for the Edinburgh Fringe an historic crime thriller with a magician detective. She’s well-known in Scotland, Northern Ireland and parts of France and Britain, and now of course in London and beyond.

Back home, in Perth she’s developed a number of plays, notably Dust in 2014 with Black Swan, about a catastrophic red dust storm. Barking Gecko and the Perth Festival also commissioned Miller to develop two different works about the private thoughts and fears of young people.

So Miller again took to comprehensive, intimate research recording heartfelt anxieties in the

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Sheridan Harbridge and Suzie Miller at opening night of MTC’s Prima Facie

Photo: Heath Warwick.

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Suzie Miller and Jodie Comer lead a roundtable discussion of Prima Facie. youtu.be/-gSOazhMuH0

schools, homes, skateparks and wheatfields of WA.

Brisbane in particular likes having her around. A favourite play of hers, The Mathematics of Longing, was premiered by La Boite Theatre in 2017. With tales of first love, family tragedy and human defiance, each scene begins with a new maths theorem chalked onto the floor as a way to define behaviours. It was part homage to Miller’s maths-loving Dad, who had recently died, and is almost religious in its science.

“It was the elegance of maths I wanted to share, its beauty, without

using the word, maths. The play is about how insignificant we are in in this immense universe, and yet how significant we are in our life.”

Queensland University of Technology gave her a generous scholarship. She wrote a PhD on the process of writing the play, and finding a way to talk about maths in the theatre and decode complex ideas.

“So yes, I became a doctor. But I only use it on my frequent flyers, in case I can get an upgrade.”

Miller is thrilled this month at the Adelaide Writers Festival to be interviewed with the famed British writer Sir Tom Stoppard whose own plays about maths and science have had a huge impact on her.

Other commissions came her way in Brisbane and now flow in from other places. The National Theatre wants a sequel to Prima Facia which will explore teenage masculinity in a family setting. And then there’s the films she wants to talk about.

Jodie Comer in National Theatre’s Prima Facie (2022)

Photo: Helen Murray.

Suzie Miller spoke to Martin Portus for the State Library of NSW oral history collection on leaders in the performing arts; the full interview is on the Library’s website amplify.gov.au

Stage Whispers: What sort of response has Rolling Thunder Vietnam had from Vietnam Veterans?

Bryce Hallett: It’s struck a chord with veterans and their families, not just the familiar songs that played on the radio in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s but the authentic nature of the piece. Many times, after a performance, Veterans open up and share their experiences of the war, and it’s been heartening that the production can serve as a catalyst and a tonic. During the encore, the actors salute our Veterans and immediately you can tell it means a lot to them, and to the entire audience.

SW: What is the bedrock of the show?

BH: The stories and the way the show is structured: conscription, combat, protest, homecoming. The storytelling springs from face-to-face interviews with the Vets, lots of

research and reams of letters penned by young soldiers and their loved ones especially their mothers back home.

SW: The rock drama is unusual in that it brings renowned musicians including those from the John Farnham Band together with young singers and actors, some of whom are just starting out. How do they work together?

BH: Having the different generations is among the production’s most appealing aspects. To do justice to these great, enduring rock songs we have experienced, masterful musicians, who have worked previously with John Farnham and Jon Stevens. Generally, the cast needs to be young, or at least exude youthfulness, to convey the sacrifice, the waste, the tragic loss of young lives in war.

SW: Tom Oliver has been with Rolling Thunder Vietnam since the beginning. He plays the country boy Johnny who joins the army for some adventure. To what extent has Tom made the role his own?

BH: Tom came to notice on The Voice when Kylie Minogue picked him for her team. He’s a natural in the role of Johnny, not just the larking but his energy and charisma on stage. Tom’s done two national tours and his performance has deepened. He really puts his heart and soul on the line. Audiences genuinely come to care about the character and his plight.

SW: And you have some new cast members.

BH: The charismatic Christian Charisiou, recently seen in The Wedding Singer, is Andy. The multitalented Brittanie Shipway is Sarah.

SW: The Vietnam War, described by some as “the rock ‘n’ roll war”,

Depicting the Vietnam War from a uniquely Australian perspective, the rock drama Rolling Thunder Vietnam returns from April for an extended national tour of 14 cities. Based on letters written by Vietnam Veterans, Rolling Thunder Vietnam fuses a live band, audio visuals and a dialogue with the audience. First staged in 2014, a planned 2020 revival was derailed by COVID-19 after just a handful of performances in Geelong. The show’s writer Bryce Hallett discusses the new production.

fueled numerous classic rock and protest songs. Rolling Thunder features about 20 of these. How did you pick the songs?

BH: It was challenging as the ‘60s and ‘70s were such a fertile time for songwriters and musicians. A number of the songs were in the script from the first draft ‘Fortunate Son’, ‘All Along The Watchtower’, ‘The Letter’, ‘People Get Ready’, ‘Killing Me Softly With His Song’ and ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’. The director David Berthold, ever the dramaturg, would say, “Yes, that’s a good song but...has it earned its place in the show?” It soon became apparent that the song choices were dictated by the

storytelling. The magic of it all is that the songs serve the drama and viseversa.

SW: What do you think are some of the show’s musical highlights?

BH: There’s a blistering ‘All Along The Watchtower’, performed with great energy by both the cast and musicians, including a guitar solo that’s out of this world. The end of the first act is aching and beautiful, one of the best renditions of ‘Help Me Make It Through The Night’ that you’ll ever hear. Then there’s Marvin Gaye’s soulful and searching ‘What’s Going On?’, the potent ‘Paint It Black’ and a rousing version of ‘We’ve Gotta Get Out of This Place’ a song that became akin to an anthem for the Veterans.

SW: What are audiences moved by?

BH: When the soldiers arrive in such an alien landscape as the jungles of Vietnam, amid danger and peril, there’s a restless energy and a palpable sense of dread that makes you think and wonder. The love story between Johnny and Sarah is keenly felt through the shared intimacies of their letter exchanges. ‘Help Me Make It Through The Night’ is a cliff-hanger in which characters are taken to a precipice of not knowing what the future holds. In the second act, the speech of Martin Luther King is spinetingling; the seduction and release of ‘Black Magic Woman’ is both humorous and surreal, and the scene featuring ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’ is emotional, given how the conflict has upended lives.

SW: The Vietnam War was the world’s first televised war. The images on TV and in newspapers were stark and graphic. What effect did that have?

BH: It brought the horror of war straight into people’s living rooms. The politicians could say one thing, but ordinary Australians and Americans were able to see and judge

for themselves. The confronting images inspired songwriters and musicians, it influenced the swelling protest movement and the crusaders and civil rights’ leaders who sought an end to the oppression and violence.

SW: How relevant is the show to today’s audiences?

BH: What’s that saying, “history keeps repeating...” The anti-war songs in the show are communal and stirring, and universal. They speak as much to past generations as they do to the present. Songs such as ‘War’ and ‘Eve of Destruction’ are vivid and forceful, they don’t hold back. The war in the Ukraine, combined with the challenges and uncertainties of today’s world, makes Rolling Thunder Vietnam not only relevant but perhaps more urgent that ever. Ultimately, the show is a plea for peace.

SW: How have audiences responded?

BH: They seem to be thoroughly immersed in the show. They laugh, they cry and sometimes sit in stunned silence. It’s a very moving experience and, for many, the songs provide a chance to almost relive the excitement, passion, and discovery of that era. By the end, everyone’s up on their feet having a rollicking good time.

SW: What is your pitch to teachers and students?

BH: Its major themes of social disruption, courage, mateship and resilience provide valuable insights for students and school groups about the nature of war and its relevance to the uncertainty of modern times, particularly the ongoing RussiaUkraine war and its devastation and loss. Young people today can easily identify with the sentiments of the conscripted digger Andy: “I don’t hate anybody; what has any of this got to do with me?”

Rolling Thunder Vietnam

The cast of Rolling Thunder Vietnam (2016)

Photo: Jeff Busby.

Behind The Scenes

With Debora Krizak

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Can’t make Debora’s next sailing? Enjoy her cruise reel without leaving home!

youtu.be/SHuT_w4eZac

All Aboard!

As international tourism restarts, cruising is back. Debora Krizak takes us behind the scenes of entertainment on the high seas.

When it comes to making a living as a performing artist, the grand dream may be to “make it” on the international stage or screen, yet there are many artists who have successful careers without being household names. I’ve enjoyed a varied career, from touring in rock bands, to television presenting, musicals, commercials, voice overs, corporate entertainment, cabaret and even the odd MC job. Then there’s the less glamourous side like teaching and working as an “extra” on set. As the saying goes, “A smooth sea never made a skilled sailor”.

I left my hometown of Adelaide with a bucket list. I wanted to work in professional musical theatre and land a job in TV. While one of those dreams came true and the other remains a work in progress, the

pathway to working consistently and creatively is rocky. There’s the contracts that get cancelled, the “on holds” that never eventuate and sometimes it’s just being in the right place at the wrong time. For whatever reason, the master plan falters, and you’re left with the prospect of either waiting on tables, going back to study or doing what you know how to do well: get creative.

A few years ago, I decided to dip my toe into cabaret. After debuting my one woman show Laugh Be A Lady at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival in 2016, I realised that the prospect of a life after this run was looking slim. I needed a producer, a publicist, a venue, a tour manager, a musical director and a band. All of this requires substantial financial

commitment and time. Oh, and a lot of, let’s call it “networking”.

Instead, I decided to put together a showreel of some of my work and sent it to a couple of cruise ship agents. The stigma surrounding cruise ship artists hasn’t always been encouraging. I’ve been advised not to share any posts of my work on the high seas for fear of being branded as yet another entertainer past their expiry date, thrown into the ocean to retire.

On the contrary, I’ve seen some of the most well-honed cabaret artists on the ships and have learnt so much about my own craft in the process. These artists come from all over the world and are anything from comedians to impressionists, instrumentalists, vocalists and physical performers.

The theatres are world-class and can seat anywhere from 800 to 1500 guests. It’s not a gig for an amateur.

You need to be able to hold an audience on a theatre size stage for 45 minutes, and have perfectly timed banter, as well as charts that can be rehearsed and performed confidently after meeting the band, often with only an hour to rehearse your entire show. This brings me to this month’s ‘behind the scenes’ column, as I highlight a day in the life of a headline entertainer on a cruise ship.

Fast forward from 2016 and I have established a cruise agent in Florida with the added bonus of also having an Australian manager. After investing thousands of dollars in band charts and costumes, I have learnt (through trial and error) what works on the ships.

Most of my cruise engagements are off-shore, so I fly to a destination the day before, where I am accommodated in a hotel close to the ship’s embarkation port. Upon joining the ship, I am required to take a mandatory COVID-19 test, provide immunisation documentation and am shown my cabin.

On port days, it’s futile to try and find the entertainment or cruise director. Staff are usually enjoying some well earned time off on land. I am provided with a letter from guest services which outlines the dates for my show as well as any other on board activities that I am required to attend.

Contractually, I am only required to perform up to 2 x 45-minute shows. On most ships, I only do the one show, repeated twice on the same night. Depending on the cruise liner, I might also have to perform a 20-minute variety show with another guest entertainer or be asked to host a dinner with VIP guests. The key is to be prepared for anything and be willing to adapt. It isn’t always smooth sailing, so to speak. There’s been occasions where luggage hasn’t arrived, musicians have gone down with COVID-19 so you have to adapt your entire show, the ship gets diverted due to rough weather or

you’re simply never invited back again!

When I wrote this column, I was on a world cruise where most of the passengers had been sailing for five months. The average age is 70 and these passengers are tough cruise critics. They’ve done a lot of world cruising and expect it to be done well. I embarked in Auckland and will stay on the ship until it docks in Sydney a week later.

My show is scheduled for the following evening, and I am only required to perform the one show. I organise my band charts and drop them off at the entertainment office so they can be distributed to the onboard band ahead of the show. I then contact the production manager and finalise rehearsal times along with all of my audio-visual requirements.

I meet the band two hours before my show, and we are given an hour to rehearse ten songs with cues and lighting. I write everyone’s names down so I can thank them in my show later. It’s an adrenalin pumped hour and as a guest entertainer, I can only hope that the band are proficient and can work quickly.

After rehearsal, I have an hour before the commencement of my first show at 7pm. The show goes well with only a couple of musical glitches and we talk these through before the commencement of the next show at 9pm. By 10pm, my feet are usually killing me and I’m ready to take the band out for a post-show celebratory cocktail!

One of the best things about working as a guest entertainer is meeting new people and hoping that you’ll have the opportunity of crossing paths again. My band were all from Canada and they have a good laugh at my Aussie accent as I brief

them all about their upcoming visit to Sydney Harbour.

The next day, it is impossible to walk around the ship unrecognised. I am stopped four or five times on the way to grab a coffee and am invited to dinner by various guests. Handwritten notes and gifts are left outside my cabin and there is a genuine appreciation for providing the guests with an hour of entertainment on board.

I spend the next four days at my leisure as the ship makes it way to Sydney where I will disembark. It’s a lovely break from the mayhem of Sydney and I never take the opportunity to have a few days to myself for granted.

The cruise director invites me to a “cocktail chat” where I’m asked questions about my life and I get to interact on a more personal level with the guests. I also find myself jamming with the resident lounge band, which is advertised on board as a “special guest appearance”.

All of this is designed to enhance the guests’ onboard experience and although I am only on the ship for seven days, every aspect of my involvement is scrutinised.

At the end of the week, a report will be sent through to the booking agents on my show and how the guests rated their experience. The guests will also rate me in their feedback forms. All of this will dictate whether I will be invited back on the liner. I liken it to a week-long audition with several call backs and being placed on-hold until the next contract comes through.

For now, it’s time to enjoy my last day of sailing on the Tasman Sea before returning home to pack my bags for my next sea contract: Singapore to Vietnam, where another new adventure awaits.

Awards

Shepherd’s Purse Theatre Company’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, winner of the Platinum Palm award at the Golden Palm Awards.

Photo: Duke Albada.

Adrian Barnes (sitting) winner of the ACColades Individual Award - Amateur or Community Theatre with Lyn Wilson, Brant Eustice and Nigel Tripodi in Red Phoenix Theatre’s Festen

Photo: Richard Parkhill.

Amy Kowalczuk (framed), winner of The Ovation award for Best Director for Alchemy Artistic’s The Boys

Amy Ansemli, winner of Best Director Of A Drama Production at The Victorian Drama League Awards 2022 for Smart Artz Theatre’s The Laramie Project

Photo: Dave Swann.

Koorliny Arts Centre’s Curtains, winner of Best Musical at the Robert Finley Awards.

Photo: Christian Ingram.

Australia’s Best Theatre

For the first time in three years professional, independent and community theatres have been able to celebrate their seasons at in-person awards nights. David Spicer reviews the results and trends at the annual awards in all mainland states.

New South Wales Sydney Theatre Awards

The Sydney Theatre Awards, adjudicated by critics and the industry, have a growing reputation for special awards ceremony entertainment. This year’s presentation at the Seymour Centre included a spectacular reunion of past casts of Les Misérables and a preview of the Australian musical The Dismissal

Moulin Rouge! The Musical continued its golden run at theatre awards, adding Best Musical at the Sydney Theatre Awards to its swag of Tonys.

Belvoir Street Theatre’s hit play The Jungle and the Sea set during the Sri Lankan civil war won 4 awards including Best Mainstage Production.

The awards also honour Independent theatre, with Albion a sweeping family saga about Brexit-era Britain taking out best production.

The Sydney Theatre Awards no longer have best female or male categories, making all individual categories gender neutral. One of the awards’ founders Dianna Simmonds has resigned in protest.

“There didn’t appear to be a good reason to make only one award, not

least because Sydney theatre is woefully short on public recognition and prizes anyway,” she wrote on her website Stage Noise.

Organisers say they have more nominations in the individual categories and are open to having two winners.

The full list of winners can be found at bit.ly/3S3wdpV

Read Dianna Simmonds column at bit.ly/3lymrQe

South Australia ACColades

Members of the Adelaide Critics Circle (ACC) vote for the winners of their awards, the ‘ACColades’.

The winners of the 25th Adelaide Critics Circle awards were announced at the Goodwood Theatre and Studios on Monday, 5 December, 2022.

The Individual Award - Amateur or Community Theatre went to actor Adrian Barnes for Festen (Red Phoenix Theatre). His performance as the tyrannical, manipulative head of a prosperous family, whose dark secrets are stunningly exposed at a family celebration, was described by judges as astounding.

“The 2022 production of Festen was stunning, a chilling exposé of hypocrisy, abuse, complicity and racism disguised by the pomp and ceremony of social elites,” the judges wrote.

Actor Stefanie Rossi received the Individual Award - Professional Theatre for a body of work. “Stefanie Rossi is one of Adelaide’s triple threats a singer, dancer and actor who can turn her hand to almost anything.”

The Bakehouse Theatre Company’s A Streetcar Named Desire and the Adelaide Festival production of Watershed: The Death of Dr Duncan were joint winners of the Group Award - Professional Theatre.

Of A Streetcar Named Desire, the judges said, “The valedictory production for the Bakehouse Theatre was a triumphant if bittersweet success, as Adelaide bids farewell to one of its most important venues.” Of Watershed: The Death of Dr Duncan, they commented, “The exquisite music from Joe Twist, the evocative libretto from Alana Valentine and Christos Tsiolkas, and the superb and sensitive staging by Neil Armfield, and the performances from principals and chorus made this one of the most remarkable events in local stage history.”

adelaidecriticscircle.com

Western Australia Robert Finley Awards

The Independent Theatre Association of WA co-ordinated the 47th Annual Robert Finley Awards with 27 community theatre and two school

(Continued on page 22)

Online extras!

Check out the entertainment from the Sydney Theatre Awards. Scan or visit youtu.be/kN5Eoik2qis

Sydney Theatre Awards.

A Little Town In Love With Shakespeare

Solar Chapel describes his role as the Artistic Director of the Shepherd’s Purse Theatre Company, Platinum Palm winners at the Gold Palm Awards.

“We perform at (the picturesque) Flutterbies Cottage Cafe in the village of Tyalgum, NSW. Our productions are always immersive dinner theatre events, presented as a theme night. The audience attends in costume in Elizabethan or a Medieval theme.

“Our cast and crew are 95% located in Tyalgum and surrounding areas. We do from time to time engage one or two professionals.

“We were heavily impacted by the February/March 2022 floods, and we still are! Tyalgum Road, our main road in and out of the village, is still closed; a major crack in the road and major landslip alongside it have meant that trade and business to all of the Tyalgum businesses and enterprises have gone down by 60% this past year.

“The flow of visitors and tourists to the area is showing small signs of returning, but things are not yet back to normal.

“For our 2022 season of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, we worked closely with many local

(Continued from page 21)

theatre companies predominantly in the Perth/Peel region taking part.

Volunteer adjudicators undertook overnight trips to Kalgoorlie (over 600km from Perth) via car or train, and Albany 400km away in the other direction.

The ITA’s most remote member club, the Esperance Theatre Guild (about 700km by road from Perth), did not enter this time.

ITA President and Stage Whispers correspondent Kimberley Shaw said in her address that few would have thought that 2022 would still see COVID-19 wreak havoc on community theatre. It was, however she said, the year that the pandemic properly hit Western Australia, and in doing so claimed its fair share of performances

people who have a great deal of skill and talent, from set design and construction to artwork and image design, to costuming and stagehands.

“Many of these people, just like me as Director, also work at the restaurant, so we are also seen as waiters, floor staff, stagehands and much more. Everyone is inspired to chip in and offer many areas of help.

and even a production or two.

Kimberley quipped that 2022 was the ‘Year of the Swing’, with community theatres calling on cast, crew and creatives even from outside their production to step into a role at short notice.

Of Melville Theatre Company’s award-winning production of the play Things I Know to Be True, senior adjudicator Kent Acott noted, “The acting was quite outstanding, with each character being well-developed and well-realised in layered performances that mirrored the complexities of the unfolding events.”

Best Musical went to the Koorliny Arts Centre for its production of the musical Curtains, with Mr Acott saying, “It was a bright and bubbly offering wrapped in a creative fabric woven by experienced director

“As a result of the devastation to Tyalgum Road from the March 2022 floods, I was searching for ways in which we could help boost interest in Tyalgum and get more people coming out to support our businesses and our enterprises here.

“I knew that the amateur rights to the stage version of Shakespeare In Love had always been unavailable in Australia, so I wrote to the license holders, Disney Theatrical based in New York.

“I included in my letter newspaper articles about the floods and Tyalgum Road, plus photos and short clips of our past productions. I asked for special permission to perform the Australian community theatre premiere of Shakespeare In Love

“Fast track about two months later, my letter made its way up the chain at Disney to the right person in charge of international licensing, and we got approved for staging the play in 2023.”

Victoria Music Theatre Guild of Victoria Awards

After three bleak years, community music theatre companies and schools in Victoria celebrated a welcome return to the theatre at their annual awards, which included performance highlights from across the state.

Open section judges saw 38 individual productions, a 90% increase compared to the combined 20202021 seasons. This included 19 regional shows and 19 metropolitan shows, as far afield as Warrnambool, Horsham, Traralgon and Albury.

Musical Production of the year was In The Heights, staged by the Old Carey Performing Arts Club.

Kimberley Shaw and her talented cast and accomplished crew.” ita.org.au

Shepherd’s Purse Theatre Company’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Photo: Duke Albada.

PEP Production picked up three awards for its season of The Great American Trailer Park Musical.

The Junior Panel saw 45 school and youth productions a 450% increase on recent years.

Junior Production of the year went to Anastasia, staged by Emmaus College.

For only the fifth time in the Guild’s history, a special award was presented for outstanding service to nonprofessional musical theatre. Brett Wingfield was honoured for single handily running the annual night of celebrations for 15 years and decades of service to PLOS Musical Productions.

“Brett is also well known in the theatre world for his amazing costumes, having received six Guild nominations for Wardrobe, and has also run the costume store for PLOS,” said Mitchell Brusamarello, Chair and Administrator.

musictheatreguildvic.org

Victorian Drama League Awards

Member companies of the Victorian Drama League attended their annual black-tie dinner to toast the best drama groups in the state.

There were two winners of Best Comedy Production. Sharing the trophy donated by the late Charles ‘Bud’ Tingwell were the Geelong Repertory Theatre Company for its season of Dirk Gently’s Holistic

Detective Agency and Off the Leash Theatre for Così.

The Best Drama Award went to the Smart Artz Theatre Company for its season of The Laramie Project.

Judges noted that “The Victorian Drama League’s member companies embraced the opportunity to get back on stage in 2022, while still coping with some inevitable disruptions to rehearsals and seasons caused by COVID-19.

“Some companies elected to stage fewer seasons, or to delay re-opening, some shows had to substitute actors at the last minute or alter season dates in response to illness.

“Audience numbers remain somewhat lower than pre-COVID for many companies and some of our smaller groups have found it harder to ride out the storm. Overall, the delight in ‘being back’ is palpable.” vdl.org.au

Queensland and Northern NSW Gold Palm Awards

Community theatres and schools came together in Surfers Paradise for a black-tie celebration of the 2022 Gold Palm Awards.

Outstanding community theatre production of the year went to the Gold Coast Little Theatre for its production of Jekyll and Hyde

The Gold Palm Award for most overall wins went to the Spotlight

Theatre Company for its season of Little Shop of Horrors.

The Platinum Palm Award was won by the Shepherd’s Purse Theatre Company from the northern NSW town of Tyalgum (population 545) for its season of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Judges said it showed the true meaning of Community Theatre, through the involvement of so many people in the Tyalgum community gcareatheatreawards.com.au

Regional New South Wales CONDA Awards

The City of Newcastle Dramatic Association adjudicated 71 productions from 39 schools and theatre companies, culminating in a gala night at the Newcastle City Hall, co-hosted by Newcastle expat and Hollywood star Geraldine Viswanathan and gospel singer France Bell.

Start-up company Her Productions picked up three CONDAs including Best Dramatic Production for its season of Uncle Vanya.

Winning eight CONDAs including Best Musical was Jersey Boys, by the aptly named The Very Popular Theatre Company. Its founder, Daniel Stoddart, also scored the CONDA for Outstanding Achievement & Contribution To Theatre.

(Continued on page 24)

MC and CAT Award judge Andy Bell with Coralie Wood OAM at the CATs Interrupted! ‘Best in Show’ 2022 awards ceremony.

Elise Cavallo & Olivia Cavallo, Music Theatre Guild Of Victoria Junior Production and Junior Direction award winners for Emmaus College’s Anastasia

Awards

The citation noted Daniel has been a stalwart of Newcastle Theatre for many years.

“With the establishment of Hunter Drama, countless numbers of young people have benefited from the quality learning experiences and employment opportunities. The establishment of The Very Popular Theatre Company has seen the same opportunities to work with industry professionals be extended to adult performers in the region.

“Daniel has also created the Stoddart Playwriting Award. He has worn many hats over the years as performer, director, tutor, designer and producer. Each task he has completed has been achieved with a commitment to excellence.” conda.com.au

A.C.T. Ovation Awards

The Ovations new awards for community and independent theatre in Canberra and Queanbeyan held its inaugural presentation at the Hellenic Club in February 2023. Categories include performers, directors, designers and others involved in areas such as sound, lighting and costumes. Nominations cover musical theatre, theatre, youth and dance.

The community theatre company Dramatic Productions swept the field,

winning 13 awards for its season of School of Rock

The Best Play award went to the Canberra Youth Theatre for its World Premiere commission of How to Vote, described as an outrageously funny new play that delved into the cutthroat world of Student Politics a world of mud-slinging, doublecrossing, back-stabbing megalomaniacs that could teach a thing or two to pollies on Capital Hill.

The inaugural standing ovation award went to David Tricks for outstanding work managing radio microphones. ovations.org.au

CAT Awards

Prior to COVID-19, the CAT Awards (Canberra Area Theatre Awards) hosted an annual spectacular night of entertainment celebrating community theatre and schools in Canberra and regional New South Wales, presided over by the charismatic chief CAT

Queensland Matilda Awards - Nominations

Queensland’s premier awards for Performing Arts were due to be announced in late February, after this magazine went to press.

Matilda Awards Chair Jan Irvine said acting categories were now gender-inclusive for artists in lead and supporting roles across mainstage and independent productions.

“We’ve also introduced two new categories this year: Best Ensemble acknowledges outstanding whole-of-cast performances and a Judges Award honours work that pushes artistic boundaries.”

With seven nominations, Batshit, a solo production by Leah Shelton led the field. Interrogating the myths and

the bright red-headed publicist Coralie Wood.

In 2022, as COVID-19 continued to wreak havoc with theatre, 54 productions were judged about half the usual number with an awards ceremony taking place in December 2022 at the Canberra Repertory Theatre.

Instead of recognising excellence in long-established award categories, judges instead noted memorable moments, stand-out performances, productions which achieved excellence against the odds and contributions made above and beyond the norm within COVID-19 restrictions.

Nine Commendations and 58 Recognition of Excellence certificates were awarded to companies or schools from Canberra, Bathurst, Wagga, Wollongong, Moruya, Batemans Bay, Nowra, Albury, Casula, Campbelltown, Bowral, Parkes, Queanbeyan and Orange.

cat-awards.com.au

fears of female madness, it played at Metro Arts during the Brisbane Festival.

Queensland Theatre’s tri-lingual adaptation of Othello for Brisbane Festival and Bunker, a high-intensity physical theatre work staged at Metro Arts, received six nominations apiece.

Queensland Theatre’s The Almighty Sometimes was nominated in five categories, with QPAC and Shake & Stir Theatre Co’s The Twits and Fourteen, and the Counterpilot / Metro Arts co-production of Adrift nominated for four awards each.

Vying for Best Mainstage Production were Fourteen, Othello, Slow Boat, The Almighty Sometimes and The Twits.

matildaawards.com.au

The Very Popular Theatre Company’s Daniel Stoddart. Photo: Joerg Lehmann.

Barry Hill OAM

Stage Whispers readers outside South Australia will mainly know Barry Hill as a reviewer, occasionally also reviewed for his direction, or for his stage performances. A stalwart of Adelaide theatre, we congratulate Barry, who was honoured with the Order of Australia Medal on Australia Day, thanking him for his lengthy, passionate ‘service to the Performing Arts’. We asked Barry to share some of his theatrical highlights.

In my 54 years of theatre in Adelaide, there have been many memorable moments. They tend to fall into two categories: memorable for the right reasons and for the wrong reasons.

I have been fortunate in my life to work/train with some wonderful people. In the 1980s I worked with Betty Quin who, with her husband Don, began the Q Theatre in Adelaide, dedicated to the performance of Australian works. Betty was also a script writer for a number of TV series.

In the 1990s I co-directed and choregraphed the late, great June Bronhill in La Vie Parisienne. It was the start of a friendship, lasting many years, which necessitated my flying regularly to Sydney. I would stay with June in Kings Cross and be treated to a private concert every night!

I also directed SA luminaries John Edmund, Marjorie Irving and Russell Starkey OAM in The Kingfisher and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof respectively. The wonderful thing about working with masters of their craft is that not only the play benefits immensely, but everybody benefits from their knowledge and insight into the text.

The magic moments I have had as an actor occur when you are in the follow spot and everything else disappears. It is a sacred time. This has happened many times but the most memorable are playing the Dame in pantomimes, Norman in The Dresser, Sir Joseph Porter in HMS Pinafore, Roger DeBris in The Producers and Noël Coward in Noël and Gertie.

Of course, there are the other

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memorable moments: missing props, forgotten lines, characters not appearing on stage, characters leaving early, costume malfunctions, and in Les Misérables I went on in the wrong scene. Fortunately, I knew the lyrics so sang along until I could gradually creep off!

I believe the sum of these experiences, good and not so good, has made me a better actor/director and I have enjoyed every minute of it!

Only An Oprhan Girl.

The Producers.

HMS Pinafore.

In The Spotlight

The Golden Age Of Musical Theatre

Music, we see very little of the great shows.

I have just seen a rather magical production of La Cage Aux Folles, the wonderfully rich gay themed Jerry Herman musical that won the Tony Award back in 1984.

Strangely, the musical version of the story has never been made into a movie. It was made as a French film, then the musical, then adapted as a non-musical with the name The Birdcage, but never a musical movie, which it cries out to become.

This was the first professional production in Sydney of the show since the reproduction of the original Broadway production back in 1985 starring Keith Michell, Jon Ewart and Gerry Sont.

Even against the backdrop of the AIDS crisis in the mid-eighties, it was a huge commercial hit. The show was revived briefly in Melbourne by The Production Company, starring Simon Burke and Todd McKenney, about ten years ago.

The lovely little production I saw in Sydney at the Concourse Theatre in Chatswood ran for only six

performances. It is, for some reason, hard to get Sydney theatregoers to come over the bridge (so silly) and the show would have done much better somewhere like the Darlinghurst Theatre or even, with a few adjustments, at the Hayes Theatre.

The fact it was produced at all says much about the good faith of producer David Hawkins. It did, however, get me thinking of all the Broadway musicals we don’t see revived in a large commercial way in Australia.

La Cage was at the tail end of what could be called the Golden Age of the Broadway Musical, which started around the time Oklahoma! opened in 1943 and ended in the late 80s, when a new breed of more pop musicals and (God help us) the oftendreaded jukebox musicals seemed to take the stage some good, many awful.

It also got me thinking as to why we don’t see so many musicals from that great era revived. Once we go past Grease, Annie and The Sound of

Jerry Herman’s shows have been particularly neglected Hello, Dolly! and Mame would be great for some of our major female music theatre stars and even some of his lesserknown shows such as The Grand Tour and Dear World would work well in small productions.

When musicals of this ilk do arrive, it is usually as a result of a hit revival in London or New York, or both. So, these come with a team of the creatives of that particular production. As a result, what we get is a carbon copy of that revival. It seems it is only when an older musical becomes a hit overseas that local producers feel they have the faith to restage it here.

This is a shame, as we have some incredible creative talents in this country, many of whom take older musicals and give them remarkable new productions in very small theatres. The Hayes has become renowned for these rebirthed musicals shows like Gypsy, Sweet Charity, Jekyll and Hyde and Merrily We Roll Along, all of which have a highly stylised and smartly revisionist rebirth,

Showtune Productions’ La Cage Aux Folles

Photo: John MacRae.

Theatrical agent Les Solomon pines for large scale commercial revivals of musicals from the 1940s to the 1980s.

With Les Solomon

bringing older shows up to date in style and content.

Yet rarely, if ever, do we see a new production of a Golden Age musical get a full-scale commercial rendering in any of our big theatres. If we do get old shows in this forum, they look much as they have always looked. The thinking behind them is that they are safe and give a particular type of audience the safety of a tried-and-true product.

How wonderful it would be to see Opera Australia bring in a smart new Australian team and revive Carousel, with some new thinking to bring the show into our world of today.

Sometimes these shows can be dated (Carousel features one line which upsets people, which can easily be dropped). When we had South Pacific a few years ago it was a blowby-blow reproduction of the recent Broadway revival of the time.

I can think of a whole basket of great musicals that could do with a fresh coat of all Australian creative “paint”: the Jerry Herman shows mentioned, also Gypsy, Oklahoma!, The Most Happy Fella (great for OA audiences with an opera star in the lead), Guys and Dolls, Follies, and Sunday in the Park with George.

It must be noted here how great it is to see Belvoir and the Hayes stage a new production (not the recent Broadway revival copy) of Into the Woods but only at Belvoir St, again a small audience and only for Sydney at least for the moment.

Of course there are some musicals that are really almost unrevivable: The King and I (inherent racism), Kiss Me,

Kate (sexism), How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying and A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (a leering dated sexuality), but for each of these there are many more including La Cage. This new production proved the show is as fresh as a daisy, its politics are warm, loving and inclusive, and Michael Cormack and Paul Caspis are two leads who could easily put bums on seats, without needing gimmick casting in supporting roles.

As La Cage says, “The Best of Times is Now,” and of course, there are also some new fresh musicals which have a certain solid style that is in keeping with the Golden Age Some Like it Hot, the new version now on Broadway, and New York, New York (if it’s as good as the current trailer for it) are new shows, but with more than a nod to the Golden Age. Who knows, we may see these here in the not-too-distant future.

But it’s giving local creatives a chance to direct a classic on a grand scale I would like to see we wait and we wait!

Speaking of the Golden Age of musical theatre, I was very sad to see the passing (just short of 99 years) of Carole Cook. I wonder how many people remember she was Australia’s original Dolly in Hello, Dolly! In the fifties and sixties, Australia had all sorts of second-rate ensemble people who were dragged out here as Broadway “stars” to play leads in Australian versions of Broadway hits, but Carole was the real deal when she played Dolly.

As a stagestruck teenager, I took my mother and we ended up going back several times because she wanted to take cookies to Carole. Carole went on to an illustrious career including a lead in the original Broadway company of 42nd Street. I have seen many “Dollies”, including an ageing Carol Channing, and a somewhat miscast Bette Midler, but Carole was the one who really “got” Dolly right.

One of the musical highlights for me in 2023 was on a screen.

I was thrilled to finally see the movie version of Matilda. After sitting and watching it again, I am convinced it’s the best movie musical in years. Ignored by the film crits awards so far, in much the same way as The Wizard of Oz and It’s a Wonderful Life were ignored when first released, it’s way ahead of its time in its psychotic, psychedelic style.

I hope Netflix has the foresight to release it on DVD to help preserve it for generations to come. I’m pleased it’s only playing in cinemas in the UK till mid-year it really is too good to be rushed onto streaming. It makes more sense of the original story than the stage show ever could; it is really a ‘movie’, not a film of a stage show. A masterwork for the ages. It’s a shame so many of the movie awards are dictated by how much publicity is thrown at the product beforehand. Netflix failed in that regard. I think Netflix was too busy promoting the less interesting Glass Onion Matilda is my favourite movie of the year so far by a mile.

Alisha Weir (Matilda) and Lashana Lynch (Miss Honey) in Roald Dahl’s Matilda The Musical.

Photo: Sony Pictures UK & Tristar.

Carole Cook in Hello, Dolly!

La Cage Aux Folles is expected to tour with dates to be announced at lacage.com.au

Nosferatu

New from Currency Press is Keziah Warner’s scintillating gothic drama based on the iconic 1922 silent film Nosferatu. Set in a mining town in Tasmania, locals, desperate to restore the town to its glory days, put their faith in a mysterious investor with a green thumb and an appetite for blood. The World Premiere was staged at Melbourne’s Malthouse Theatre.

Scene Five

[Night. ELLEN asleep on the sofa. She’s having a nightmare. Her phone rings. It goes to voicemail.]

VOICEMAIL: Message received: ninetwenty-five p.m.

TOM: Hey it’s me, I finally landed in Sydney. I’m on like two percent so I might cut out. We sat on the tarmac for five hours because of weather. And I don’t have a number to let this guy know I’m late so, fuck, hopefully he’s still awake when I...

[Message cuts out.]

VOICEMAIL: Message received: elevenforty-two p.m.

TOM: Hey babe, I’m charging my phone in a pub. So apparently this mansion is in some sort of taxi blackout or something. I got a train, then a bus and I’m still half an hour away so I asked in this pub if there was anywhere I could get a cab and swear to god they looked at me like I was out of my mind when I said where I was going. Some bloke at the bar has said he could give me a lift to the bottom of the hill but not to the house itself. I thought I was going to the big city but apparently, I’ve gone back in time. Okay I love you. I’ll let you know when I get there. Unless I’m dead. Okay bye.

[End of message.]

VOICEMAIL: Message received: twelvethirty-one a.m.

TOM: I’m walking up a fucking hill now. The driver guy crossed himself. Like actually...

[He crosses himself.]

TOM: What the fuck? And fleeced me for like a month’s rent. I could see the house before but there are trees now, I don’t remember

seeing them when I was, like a forest. And there’s a lot of cloud or mist or something and what the...I’ve definitely...okay there’s a signpost, like a ye olde...I swear I’ve passed that already. I’m walking in fucking circles here.

[Howling.]

TOM: What on...babe, do they have dingoes in Sydney?

[Howling gets louder. ORLOK appears behind TOM. He’s grey-haired, hunched over, desiccated.]

TOM: Okay this place is creepy as...

ORLOK: Hello Tom.

TOM: Fuck! Oh Jesus Christ I...

[TOM drops the phone.]

ORLOK: I’ve startled you.

TOM: Sorry. I didn’t see you.

[TOM picks the phone up. Sees it’s hung up.]

Shit. Sorry. I’m yes I’m Tom. You must be...

ORLOK: Count Orlok.

[ORLOK puts his hand out. TOM takes it.]

TOM: Sorry it’s so late wow you’ve got cold hands.

ORLOK: It’s not late.

TOM: It’s after midnight

ORLOK: You must be hungry. Come in.

[The door to the house materialises.]

TOM: God, the door’s right there. I could have sworn...

[The door opens. ORLOK motions inside.]

ORLOK: Please, enter freely and of your own will.

[TOM hesitates, then goes through the door into a grand, cavernous room. A table is laid with food. Far more food than one person could ever eat.]

ORLOK: The servants are asleep now but they...

TOM: Servants?

ORLOK: ...prepared you something. Eat. Drink.

[TOM starts putting food on his plate. ORLOK watches. Through the following ORLOK passes TOM plates of food, encouraging him to eat.]

TOM: You’re not eating?

ORLOK: I’m practising self-restraint. You’ve been to the land of thieves and phantoms before?

TOM: The...?

ORLOK: Sydney.

TOM: Oh. Yes, a couple of times. Thank you for agreeing to meet with me.

ORLOK: Do you play with your food, Tom?

TOM: ...No?

ORLOK: I do. Nasty habit.

TOM: ...

ORLOK: So. Tell me about Bluewater.

TOM: Of course. It’s...a great place. We really think it has a lot of...

ORLOK: The name?

TOM: There’s a small lake, the tarn. It’s...

ORLOK: Blue?

TOM: Right.

ORLOK: I like small towns.

TOM: It has a lot of potential. We think there’s opportunity in many different industries

ORLOK: Not to live, but to visit.

TOM: Tourism is definitely an untapped market.

ORLOK: You like the house?

TOM: Yes, it’s...big.

ORLOK: How embarrassing.

TOM: Is it just you?

ORLOK: It is now.

[Beat.]

TOM: How long have you lived here?

ORLOK: Hundred, hundred and fifty years.

TOM: Your family?

ORLOK: You want to know how I choose my investments. It’s very simple. I hear of places, people in need. I write to them, offer them money, invite them into my home.

TOM: How did you hear about us?

ORLOK: I have certain...networks.

TOM: Like, philanthropic...?

ORLOK: Do you like fishing?

TOM: Fishing? I...It’s okay.

ORLOK: Doesn’t quite have the thrill of the hunt. But there is a certain joy in waiting to see what you can reel in. Philanthropically speaking.

TOM: It’s very generous.

ORLOK: You’ve always lived in Bluewater?

TOM: Mostly. Melbourne for a few years, but.

ORLOK: What drew you back?

TOM: I wanted to be closer to my family.

ORLOK: There are others like you?

TOM: Others?

ORLOK: Brothers, sisters.

TOM: Just my parents. I had a younger brother. There was a collapse at the mine and he died.

ORLOK: I’ve experienced death myself.

TOM: I’m sorry.

ORLOK: We turn to our work, don’t we?

TOM: Yes.

ORLOK: I’ve been on something of a sabbatical, but I do love my calling. The drive for more, for better. The hunger.

TOM: You’re...ambitious.

ORLOK: I’ve been hoping to expand my family.

TOM: You have children?

ORLOK: An apprentice. Someone ruthless, insatiable, someone ambitious, like you say. Who not only craves more but yearns for it. You’re not like that.

TOM: Well, I...

ORLOK: It wasn’t a question. The right person just refuses to present themselves.

TOM: There’s a skills shortage.

ORLOK: Isn’t there? What about the earth? In Bluewater.

TOM: The...landscape?

ORLOK: The soil, Tom. Keep up.

TOM: Sorry, yes...the land isn’t suitable for agriculture. Right now. But we think with time that...

ORLOK: So nothing grows.

TOM: Not nothing. We’ve just discovered a species of iris has adapted to eat insects so we think...

ORLOK: A carnivore.

TOM: Right. So we think that with some time and investment it could be

ORLOK: These trees weren’t always here. I planted them.

TOM: You...?

ORLOK: I like to be in the forest. Reminds me of home.

TOM: Where are you...?

ORLOK: My earth is very special. Very strong. Have you ever stood on a battlefield?

TOM: ...I uh...No.

ORLOK: I have. I’ve commanded armies. Men have died here.

TOM: Are you talking about...frontier wars?

ORLOK: This land is enriched with their blood.

TOM: You can’t say that.

ORLOK: You have a soldier’s heart.

TOM: I...do?

ORLOK: The land must be fed, you can’t just take from it. Do you see?

TOM: Of course, I...

ORLOK: You’re desperate.

TOM: I wouldn’t say that we’re

ORLOK: You’d do anything. To save the town.

TOM: I...Yes. I would.

[Beat.]

Script Extract

ORLOK: No more business tonight. Try the bread, it’s very fresh.

TOM: If you have any more questions, I...

ORLOK: It’s time to eat.

TOM: I have to leave, in the morning, so...

ORLOK: You’ll stay.

TOM: Tonight, of course.

ORLOK: A week or so.

TOM: A week?

ORLOK: Or so.

TOM: No I...

ORLOK: You should write to your girlfriend, tell her you’ll be delayed.

TOM: I really can’t stay that long.

ORLOK: I have a pen and paper here.

TOM: Did I say that I had a girlfriend?

ORLOK: Tell her you love her. Eat the bread.

[ORLOK passes TOM a knife. TOM blindly takes it and starts cutting a slice of bread.]

TOM: All this business. I’m famished. [TOM cuts his hand with the knife. It’s bleeding.]

TOM: Shit.

ORLOK: Your blood.

[TOM picks up a napkin and goes to wipe the blood away. ORLOK rushes to him and grabs his hand. He moves quicker than seems possible.]

ORLOK: Don’t waste it!

[TOM freezes. ORLOK licks the blood from TOM’s hand.]

Grand Opera Grand Drama

What stories can an old theatre programme tell? Plenty according to Susan Mills, an archivist with the Seaborn, Broughton & Walford Foundation. She turns the page back to 1860 and the performance of Il Trovatore at the doomed Prince of Wales Theatre.

Every theatre programme has a story behind it, with often as much drama behind the scenes as on stage. Let’s take a look at the oldest programme in the S,B&W Foundation archive for the performance of Il Trovatore which opened at the Prince of Wales Theatre in Sydney on the 29th of May, 1860.

This souvenir program containing the Italian and English words to Verdi’s Il Trovatore could be purchased for one shilling. It was published at the ‘Caxton’ printing office in George Street, Sydney.

The Prince of Wales Theatre, on the corner of Sydney’s Castlereagh and King Streets, had been opened by former haberdasher Joseph Wyatt in 1855.

In 1859, Samuel Colville was the new lessee and manager of the Prince of Wales Theatre, and he sought to put on an unprecedented and ambitious season of Italian opera.

On the 18th of June 1859 a ‘Preliminary Announcement’ was

printed in the Sydney Morning Herald urging readers to join the subscription list for ‘Opera Upon A Grand Scale’.

Signora and Signore Bianchi (Giovanna and Eugenio Bianchi) were to be the stars. The pair were Italian born and trained, including having studied under Puccini, and had just wowed America, so were billed as being ‘from California’.

Arriving in Melbourne in late December of 1859, their performances at the Theatre Royal had been much praised, before they embarked on a tour of the Victorian goldfields as the Italian Opera Company.

When the Bianchis arrived in Sydney in early May of 1860 the newspapers were abuzz, hoping that it would be a step towards the “anxious expectation” of Sydney theatre-goers for “the establishment of an operatic company”.

They were quickly engaged by the Prince of Wales Theatre’s Mr Colville for a Grand Operatic Season.

On the 16th of May 1860, it was advertised in Empire that Mr Colville had, “at very great expense”, secured the Bianchis for a six-opera season “in a style of grandeur never before attempted in Australia”. Signore Cesare Cutolo, a pianist originally from Naples, was to be the conductor.

The preparations for the onemonth season of Il Trovatore, Lucrezia Borgia, Ernani, Nabucco, Norma, and La Traviata were fraught.

On 22nd of May 1860, a published letter by Signore Cesare Cutolo sparked a very public war of words in the newspapers between the conductor and seemingly everyone else.

It culminated in a protest published by the opera company members against Sig. Cutolo, whom they felt was “from inexperience, unable to wield the baton as conductor”. In the end, the performances were conducted by Mons. Jacques Paltzer.

The price of admission also caused a small stir, being somewhat higher than usual (running from 1 shilling for

’The Bianchis ‘ : Signore Giovanna Bianchi and Signora Eugenio Bianchi

a gallery spot, to £3 to £4 for a dress circle box), due to the large expenses of the season.

At the first preview, The Sydney Morning Herald reported that many seats remained “disengaged” and assured the public not to be deterred by fears of overcrowding on opening night.

The free list had been suspended (apart from the press) and ‘Children in arms’ were not to be admitted. Sydney was also at the start of the influenza epidemic of 1860-61.

However, the following day the Sydney Morning Herald reported that the theatre was “crowded in every part”, with applause by the enthusiastic audience which “literally overwhelmed the opera with demonstrations of satisfaction”. The singing and acting of the Bianchis and the company, the music, and the settings and costumes, and the whole spectacle, were all roundly praised.

A few months after this season of grand opera, the Prince of Wales Theatre would burn down. It reopened with the same name, run by R. Fitzgerald, until it again burned down in 1872.

Like a phoenix rising from the ashes, a theatre again arose on this spot, run by Sam Lazar, who instead chose a different name: the Theatre Royal. Another fire in 1892 resulted in a remodelling, and the theatre ran until 1972, when it was felled, this time by ‘progress’.

Developers tore down the theatre and opened the MLC Centre on this spot, but the public outcry was loud and they were persuaded to add a

theatre into the design again the Theatre Royal. More recently, in 2016, this spot was in danger of being theatre-less but again the public outcry resulted in an upgraded Theatre Royal opening in 2021.

Signore and Signora Bianchi’s Grand Italian Opera Company went on to tour around New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia in 1860 and 1861. More drama followed: Eugenio Bianchi sued a South Australian newspaper for libel for claiming the company name was false advertising with only two Italians. The Bianchis left Australia for San Fransisco in January 1862, having given Australia a taste of grand beauty and drama. All that remains is a printed program.

The 1860 programme of Il Trovatore held in the Seaborn, Broughton & Walford Foundation.

The Good Audition Guides

By Paul Harvard

Wouldn’t it be great to have a director and musical director on hand when preparing the song on which your next audition depends? One of these books could well be the next best thing.

Before beginning to break down some great musical theatre songs from various eras and sub-genres as audition pieces, performer, director, composer and drama school educator Paul Harvard devotes 75 pages to probing the audition process, from who and what you are planning to audition for, through era appropriate song choices, to the dramatic and musical terminology and a series of targeted exercises, then on to the actual audition process. And amongst the tips, he also highlights some pitfalls.

Two separate books for men and women share very similar introductory sections before

diverging into gender and vocal range based repertoires. For men the split is tenor/high baritone and baritone/bass, while for women soprano/mezzo choices are distinguished from alto songs. Choices for each voice range are divided into four sections classical musical theatre songs (1925 to 1965), contemporary musical theatre choices (post 1965) divided into ballads and up-tempo choices, and a selection of comedy/character songs. There’s a good mix of well-known songs, balanced with a strong selection of lesser-known choices. The discussion of each song begins with concise reasoning for

selecting it. The Given Circumstances of the character and the song follow the who, when and where, a detailed look at what has led up to the song in context, who else is on stage and who is being sung to. It’s a great starting point if you haven’t had a chance to go one better and read the script or seen a production.

A thorough textual breakdown of each song is followed by a list of key moments and ‘top tips’. The vocal and musical analysis includes suggested recordings to listen to, along with details of range, original key and accent suggestions.

A segment on vocal set-up and musical tips provides some very precise notes for the vocal delivery of each song and their significant musical moments.

Finally, there’s a link to obtain the correct sheet music, of course assuming you don’t already have it in in one of those brilliant anthologies of musical theatre songs compiled for your voice range.

Although you will no doubt layer your audition piece with personal choices, these books provide fantastic stimuli and starting points for you to interpret a broad musical theatre repertoire for yourself.

As a director, teacher and performer, these books were triply intriguing and insightful, with great take-aways for directors, musical directors and cast members alike, not to mention music theatre aficionados bent on picking apart performances of a great showstopper or two.

Neil Litchfield

When Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical of complex romantic entanglements, Aspects of Love, returns to the West End on May 12 at the Lyric Theatre, 34 years after its premiere, original star Michael Ball also returns, not as the young lover Alex who he played in 1989, but in the mature role of George. Ball’s hit 1989 recording of the show’s “Love Changes Everything” reached Number Two on the UK singles charts (a hit he later eclipsed when he teamed with Captain Tom Moore on “You’ll Never Walk Alone”, which entered the UK singles chart at Number 1). The role George was originated in London by Australian Kevin Colson, replacing Roger Moore two weeks before opening night. West End leads including Ball and Colson repeated their roles on Broadway, where Colson was nominated for a Tony Award.

Jordan Luke Gage and Frances Mayli McCann star in the musical Bonnie & Clyde at the Garrick Theatre from March 4 to May 20. A sell-out concert version at the Theatre Royal in 2022 paved the way for this production.

Six young Black men share what it means to live in modern Britain in Ryan Calais Cameron’s For Black Boys Who Have Considered Suicide When The Hue Gets Too Heavy, which plays a six week West End transfer season at the Apollo Theatre from March 25 to May 7, following its sold out runs at New Diorama and the Royal Court Theatre.

Tom Hollander plays billionaire Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky in Patriots by Peter Morgan (The Crown), set against the political intrigue and drama of post-Soviet Russia, at the Noël Coward Theatre from May 26 to August 19, transferring to the West End following its premiere at the Almeida.

Ivo van Hove directs the English language premiere of Hanya Yanigahara’s A Little Life, which follows the lives of four college friends in New York, at the Harold Pinter Theatre from March 25 to June 18.

Liv Hennessey adapts a week’s worth of court transcripts into a shocking courtroom drama in Vardy vs. Rooney: The Wagatha Christie

Trial, playing at the Ambassadors Theatre from April 6 to May 20.

Maureen Lipman stars in Rose, a one-woman play about a Jewish woman who flees Nazi Europe to live in the United States, at the Ambassadors Theatre from May 23 to June 18.

West End favourite Sheridan Smith stars in February’s West End return of Shirley Valentine, Willy Russell’s onewoman play about a Liverpudlian housewife who dreams of something more.

The Motown sounds of the Temptations hit the West End at the Prince Edward Theatre from March 31 in Broadway jukebox musical Ain’t Too Proud - The Life and Times of the Temptations, charting the life and times of the rock ‘n’ roll icons with their greatest hits including “My Girl” and “Papa Was a Rolling Stone”.

Yoohoo, dearies! Mrs. Doubtfire arrives at the London’s Shaftesbury Theatre on May 12. Based on the classic Robin Williams film, Mrs. Doubtfire arrives in London after runs on Broadway and in Manchester, with Gabriel Vick in the title role.

From May 20, the Olivier Award winning musical adaptation of the classic Bill Murray film Groundhog Day (with music and lyrics by Tim Minchin) returns to London’s Old Vic Theatre, where it had its World Premiere in 2016. Andy Karl repeats his Olivier, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle award winning performance as Phil Connors.

Charlie Stemp, Carly Anderson and Tom Edden will star in the Chichester Festival Theatre transfer of the Gershwin hit Crazy For You, when the

musical returns to the West End at the Gillian Lynne Theatre from June 24.

A new production of the musical 42nd Street arrives at Sadler’s Wells from June 7 to July 2, after premiering at the Curve, Leicester from May 17 to June 3, ahead of a UK tour. Jonathan Church directs, with choreography by Bill Deamer and designs by Rob Jones. Other summer revivals include Queen musical We Will Rock You at the London Coliseum from June 2 to 26. Dorothy and Toto will be on the yellow brick road in The Wizard of Oz at the London Palladium from June 23 to September 3. Families will be headed to Bikini Bottom (aka the Queen Elizabeth Hall) from July 26 to August 27 to visit the coolest pineapple under the sea in The SpongeBob Musical Grease will once again be ‘the word’ at the Dominion Theatre from June 2 to October 28. And the lights will be on over at the Frankenstein place (also known as London’s Peacock Theatre) as the UK national tour of The Rocky Horror Show drops in from May 10 to June 10

Popular Australian leading man Josh Piterman joins the West End cast of Les Misérables on March 27 at London’s Sondheim Theatre, playing the role of Jean Valjean. Josh has just concluded the Arts Centre Melbourne and Sydney Opera House seasons in the title role of The Phantom of the Opera, the role in which he also made his West End debut in 2019. Josh’s Australian performances include Tony (West Side Story), Gerry Goffin (Beautiful) and Bustopher Jones/Gus/ Growltiger (Cats) for which he received a Green Room Award.

London Calling The West End cast of Ain’t Too Proud Photo: Craig Sugden.

Online extras!

Australian playwright Suzie Miller’s one-woman drama Prima Facie opens on April 23 at Golden Theatre, starring Jodie Comer (Killing Eve) repeating her West End role as Tessa, a young defence barrister forced to explore how patriarchal power over the law, burden of proof, and morals diverge after she becomes the victim of a crime Directed by Justin Martin.

David Harris recently joined the Broadway cast of Moulin Rouge! The Musical as the Duke of Monroth, after playing the role in the first national tour. The popular Australian musical theatre star is now based in New York.

After years of what now seem like auditions for the role by her character on Glee, Broadway’s replacement Fanny Brice Lea Michelle has not only turned around the fortunes of the revival of Funny Girl, which now regularly plays to capacity houses, she also recorded the role on the revival Broadway cast recording of the show.

Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler’s Sweeney Todd returns to Broadway with a full 26-person orchestra playing Jonathan Tunick’s

original orchestrations, and Josh Groban and Annaleigh Ashford in the leads, as the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre becomes home to Todd’s grizzly barber shop and Mrs. Lovett’s meat pie shop, with opening night on March 26

Bad Cinderella, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s latest musical, a modern makeover of the classic fairy tale, with lyrics by David Zippel and a book by Emerald Fennell, began Broadway previews on February 17, ahead of a March 23 opening at the Imperial Theatre. Linedy Genao and Jordan Dobson lead the cast. It previously played the West End, titled simply Cinderella

Bob Fosse’s Dancin’, celebrating the choreographer behind hits including Chicago, Cabaret, and Pippin, directed by original Dancin’ cast member Wayne Cilento, will preserve Fosse’s choreography from the show’s 1978 premiere when it opens on March 19 at the Music Box Theatre.

Sharr White’s adaptation of Larry Sultan’s 1992 autobiographical photo memoir Pictures from Home, starring

Nathan Lane, Danny Burstein, and Zoë Wanamaker, and directed by Bartlett Sher, opened for a limited engagement at Studio 54 on February 9. It tracks a mother, father, and the son who photographs their lives as they journey from Brooklyn to the San Fernando Valley, and the family secrets and truths he uncovered when he interviewed and took photos of his parents.

Jessica Chastain returns to Broadway after a 19 year absence to star in Amy Herzog’s adaptation of Ibsen’s A Doll’s House, opening on Mar 9 at the Hudson Theatre, the play’s first Broadway revival since 1997, directed by Jamie Lloyd.

Sean Hayes (Jack McFarland on Will & Grace) plays Oscar Levant: Hollywood actor, concert pianist, and subversive Golden Age TV wit in Good Night, Oscar by Doug Wright, opening Apr 23 at the Belasco Theatre. Direction is by Lisa Peterson. Best known for his wit after his TV appearances, the play is set on the night Levant made his first TV appearance, making audiences laugh, censors work overtime, and

Broadway Buzz

Watch Jodie Comer make her West End debut as Tessa in Prima Facie

Jodie Comer in National Theatre’s Prima Facie (2022)

Photo: Helen Murray.

America rethink what flies on television.

The Olivier Award-winning adaptation of the novel Life of Pi arrives March 30 at Gerard Schoenfeld Theatre from London’s West End. The sole human survivor of a shipwreck and the four wild animals who also made it out fight against time to survive.

Peter Pan Goes Wrong flies (or fails to fly, as the case may be) into the Barrymore Theatre on April 19 as the ‘Cornley Drama Society’ battle technical hitches, flying mishaps and cast disputes as they attempt to present J.M Barrie’s much-loved tale.

Laura Linney and Jessica Hecht star in David Auburn’s Summer, 1976, opening on April 25 at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre. Originally planned to open Off-Broadway, Linney’s star power sent it straight to Broadway

As the Bicentennial is celebrated across America, two young women navigate motherhood, ambition, and intimacy, and help each other discover their own independence.

A play with music, Room, Emma Donoghue’s adaptation of her 2010 best-selling novel, also a four-time Oscar-nominated film, opens on April 17 at the James Earl Jones Theatre after productions in London, Dublin, and Ontario. Directed by Cora Bissett, who also wrote the music and lyrics, along with Kathryn Joseph, Room stars Tony winner Adrienne Warren as Ma, a young woman kidnapped as a teenager who must escape her single room with her young son, who knows nothing of the outside world.

Shucked, a new musical comedy with music & lyrics Brandy Clark and Shane McAnally (writers of country hits for Kacey Musgraves, Sheryl Crow, and more), and a book by Robert Horn, opens on April 4 at the Nederlander Theatre. What do you get when you pair a semi-neurotic, New York comedy writer with two music superstars from Nashville? A farm-to-fable musical about the one thing Americans everywhere can’t get enough of: corn.

Black college student Juicy wonders whether violence is the only way to get justice for his father’s

murder in James Ijames’ Pulitzer Prizewinning 90-minute comedy adaptation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Fat Ham, which arrives on April 12 at the American Airlines Theatre, following its sold-out Off-Broadway premiere. Directed by Saheem Ali.

Lerner & Loewe’s Camelot returns to Broadway, opening on April 13 at the Lincoln Center Theatre, with a book reimagined for the 21st century by Aaron Sorkin, and starring Andrew Burnap, Phillipa Soo, and Jordan Donica. Barlett Sher directs. All the classic songs remain, as does the central story: a love triangle between King Arthur, Queen Guenevere, and Lancelot.

Larissa FastHorse becomes the first Indigenous female Broadway playwright with The Thanksgiving Play, which follows a well-meaning, all-white theatre troupe as they try to devise a culturally sensitive, inoffensive Thanksgiving pageant to perform for elementary schoolers that finally gives a voice to Native Americans Finding said Native Americans...isn’t so simple. And that’s when things start to get absurd. Opening April 20 at the Hayes Theatre, directed by Rachel Chavkin.

Loosely based on Martin Scorsese’s 1977 movie, the musical New York, New York, which opens on April 26 at the St. James Theatre, will mix John Kander & Fred Ebb’s songs, with new

songs by Kander & Lin-Manuel Miranda, to depict a post-WWII New York in recovery. Susan Stroman directs a cast featuring Colton Ryan and Anna Uzele.

The 2023-24 Broadway season is set to begin with Once Upon a One More Time - Britney Spears, opening at the Marquis Theatre on June 22. With a score of Britney Spears’ charttopping hits, a book by Jon Hartmere, and directed by Keone & Mari Madrid, the show promises “a heart-warming and uproarious musical adventure about claiming your own happily ever after”. Cinderella, Rapunzel, and more fairytale princesses realise there’s more to life than princes and true love’s kiss after reading Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique

Other productions in the wings for the 2023-24 Broadway season include Back to the Future, High Noon, Pal Joey, Sing Street, Merrily We Roll Along, Jaja’s African Hair Braiding, Here Lies Love, Purlie Victorious, and, after 70 years in the West End, the New York debut of Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap.

La Jolla Playhouse in California has announced two World Premiere musicals in its 2023-24 season: The Untitled Unauthorised Hunter S Thompson Musical by Joe Iconis and Gregory S. Moss, and Redwood by Tina Landau and Kate Diaz, which will star Idina Menzel.

Online extras!

Watch the Broadway cast perform “Bad Cinderella”. Scan the QR code or visit fb.watch/iLS0KUyGup

Linedy Genao as Bad Cinderella.

Photo: Matthew Murphy.

All The World’s Their Stage

The long-awaited resumption of overseas Performing Arts excursions for students marks a return to normalcy, where teachers can provide opportunities for students to reconnect with their passions and to explore new cultural experiences. Shane Bransdon from Travel Gang reports.

For young performers, overseas excursions provide a platform to showcase their talents and to receive feedback from professional artists and industry experts. This exposure can help to further their careers and to establish new connections within the industry.

Drama students from Mackillop Catholic College, Warnervale, located on the Central Coast of NSW, are preparing for a tour to Los Angeles where they will participate in the Disney Imagination Campus performing arts program. The highly anticipated event is bringing with it a sense of hope and renewal after the devastating impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Teacher Sharon Baird said, “after the challenges of remote learning and the halt to extracurricular activities, this tour provides a much-needed chance for our students to re-engage while growing as artists and performers.”

Recognising the benefits of overseas drama tours to provide opportunities for students to see world-class performances and to learn

from the techniques and styles of professional artists, Chantel Monro, Head Teacher of Drama at Cranbrook School, will be taking her students to Japan and England in September. “The Drama tour we have planned will be an invaluable, hands-on experience, offering students a unique insight into the performing arts and helping to build their skills and confidence,” explained Ms Monro. “Our students better understand the curriculum content through a lived experience.”

Sydney based youth theatre academy Fantasia Showstoppers has a Musical Theatre tour planned for students and their families to London and Paris, where they will undertake workshops with West End performers and acting classes at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre.

Group director David Catterall said, “Our young performers are looking forward to the chance to learn new techniques and styles, enriching their own artistic practice.” Similarly, Tahnae Luke, who is chaperoning 40 students from Newcastle to New York

in April, acknowledged, “Overseas performing arts excursions offer a chance to experience new and diverse forms of artistic expression.” This exposure to new cultures and ways of life can broaden perspectives and help to foster greater understanding and appreciation between different communities.

Youth theatre tour specialist Travel Gang has heralded the return of overseas excursions as a time for celebration. Daniel Stoddart from Travel Gang said, “It’s time for the arts to reclaim their place at the forefront of our cultural lives. Let us embrace this opportunity to inspire our students and open their eyes to the world.”

Whether you want your students to experience Broadway or undertake workshops in the techniques of Frantic Assembly or Complicité, the team at Travel Gang can use their connections with teaching artists around the world and custom design a Performing Arts tour for your students.

When I speak to audiences of nontheatre folks, I often find myself making the distinction that theatre is a collaborative art form. The painter or poet can work solo, but the theatre maker requires a team of creative people all working towards one single storytelling mission. The director of the production holds the responsibility of keeping all of the brilliant creative minds working on the show pointing in the same direction.

So, how does a director work to ensure that the audience member is seeing one unified artistic voice, not a whole bunch of disparate viewpoints? The director must establish the “True North” of the play or musical. This is not the staging or the casting or the couch upstage right, but is the overarching, driving concept that will keep all of the collaborators working towards the same vision.

“True North” can be thought of as the central storytelling idea that the director is bringing to the script. The script and music are supplying the storyline and characters, but how you

tell that particular story is the director’s decision. The director of a production has a curatorial obligation to interpret the story that the playwright has written with a lens that brings out something new and interesting for the audience.

In a pre-production process, it is this vision that unites the team and begins the task of using the creative superpowers of each individual theatre artist in their area of expertise to make sure that the final production all lives in one world. The director’s role is to be an adept and agile communicator, using many different forms of communication to bring along the entire team. Visuals, written word, spoken word, audio whatever tools the director can find will be helpful because all of the different designers are likely different types of learners. A set designer likely is a visual storyteller and visual processor of information, where a dramaturg is more likely to connect deeply to words. The director has to be fluent in multiple languages of artistic communication.

One easy version of getting everyone to understand the “True North” of a show is a Pinterest board with images and links to audio. For instance, when I directed the premiere of the TYA version of the musical James and the Giant Peach with book by Timothy Allen McDonald and music and lyrics by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, I used images that captured the overall feeling of the production that I wanted to present colour, texture, era, tone but also, specific costume silhouettes that spoke to me.

I also put in ideas that didn’t yet have a full resolution, but that I was playing with in my head. I found an image of an umbrella that inspired me to present the seagulls. As we worked together as a team, it became clear that seagulls out of umbrellas were not going to work, but we ended up using umbrellas parasol size, midsize and patio size as the peach itself.

The joy of the “True North” collaboration is it allows for divergent thinking, which is one of the primary strengths of the creative mind. All ideas can flow and be out there to grow. The director is not saying, “This is how it must be.” Instead, the

Award winning Director Nina Meehan explores the process of setting the stage for a production involving young people.

Bay Area Childrens’ Theatre’s James And The Giant Peach

Online extras!

See the results of the staging choices for James And The Giant Peach youtu.be/J3iMNnLpQIk

director is using the concepts presented as an invitation to allow each artist to bring their own brilliant creative ideas into the production.

All of this is lovely and great, but for most of us in the theatre world, we are working with resource constraints. Maybe you are working in a black box theatre and there is no room for big set pieces or you have a limited budget and have to costume the show based only on what can be found in the storage room. These constraints are completely normal in our world. The good news is that it’s these constraints that can actually make the job of the director, and therefore the collaborators, easier!

The “True North” concept can be daunting without any limits. It would have been great in my production of James and the Giant Peach to have a full skyscraper to grow from a trap in the stage and meet a giant flying peach, but the space I was working in at that time had no trap and no fly system. These constraints led me to my “Anchor Point” for the production, or the element of the design or production element that is fixed and therefore the thing you build everything else off of.

Another example. In a recent production of the Jungle Book I was working on, the show was being performed in a theatre where set pieces were not an option. I decided to use pre-created projections from

Broadway Media to bring settings to life with visual storytelling. As a result, the “Anchor Point” became those projections. The colour palette and tone were all set, but there was still a “True North” that I created that focussed on the vibrancy of the world and the jazzy style of the music. But, the hard work was done because I had settled on an “Anchor Point” early on in the process. My job as a director was actually simpler, but still artistically relevant and fulfilling.

The key to all of this is to communicate early and often. And

then communicate more. The director’s voice brings the team together and while for some people it can feel intimidating to be the leadership voice in the room, particularly in a collaborative process, the more clear and defined the director is early on, the more creative room the design team will have later in the process. The director is not in charge of managing and deciding every detail, but instead, setting the table with all the tools that the designers need to cook an exquisite storytelling meal.

Nina Meehan is the Founder and former CEO of Bay Area Children’s Theatre, the largest TYA company in California. She was an invited guest speaker at the Australia Junior Theatre Festival in 2022.

Kids do it effortlessly, they make and they believe. Adults can so easily forget the value of both. Theatre is all about making and thrives only on believing.

After the tumultuousness of the last couple of years, felt deeply in all schools, 2023 is a chance to come

together and celebrate the joy of theatre. So, what’s on?

A killer new production of Macbeth which wowed audiences in 2022 with its detail, spectacle, great performances and thrilling fights returns, playing a 4-week season at Seymour and Riverside. Macbeth: make a better world, set the time

free, silence the dark heart of tyranny. And Tyrants...careful what you believe! The world can prove a riddle.

The moving Romeo & Juliet returns. It has been hailed as one of Jove’s best productions visually divine, provocatively staged, a transporting world and honesty that deeply affected audiences. Romeo & Juliet: make friends, turn hate to love, soar above a common bound. Believe in your children, hear their voices, set them free.

And it’s finally a double bill of history plays that Artistic Director, Damien Ryan has always wanted to bring to the stage for students and teachers Henry IV, Part I and Richard III. Politics is always personal and chaos is contagious in that mad place called merry England!

Henry IV, Part I: make something of yourself, make sense of it all before it’s too late. Believe in yourself, underdogs bark loudest.

Richard III: make it up as you go along...that’s politics in the big, bad world. Believe there is another way, believe the past will haunt the future.

Sport for Jove wants to deliver quality productions that are committed to the authentic transformation of a text to stage and ensure that teachers attending will have the support they need.

Accompanying each production is a detailed (and free!) Teacher Resource Kit. It comprises an analysis of the play, a guide to the production, lesson activities, videos, photos and design materials. These materials are available for all shows and appropriate for multiple year levels from Stages 4-6.

Sport For Jove’s 2023 Education Season

Henry IV, Part 1: 1880 Hall, Feb 20 to 25

Richard III: 1880 Hall, Feb 27 to Mar 4; Orange Civic Theatre, Mar 8

Macbeth: Riverside Theatres, May 11 to 19; Seymour Centre, May 24 to Jun 2

Romeo & Juliet: Riverside Theatres, Jun 28 to 30; Seymour Centre, Aug 2 to 18;

HOTA QLD, Jul 20 to 21

sportforjove.com.au/educationseason2023

Sport For Jove theatre company previews their 2023 season in New South Wales, Queensland and beyond.

Sport For Jove’s Romeo & Juliet Photo: Seiya Taguchi.

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Damien Ryan has compiled the report drawing on his extensive professional theatre career, work as a High School teacher, a lecturer at tertiary level, and two decades of creating work with young artists.

“Teaching these texts in high schools is easily the most rewarding professional experience I’ve had and it was also the central reason to build a theatre company for me, to give students unforgettable experiences of these works,” Ryan says.

Sport for Jove has other extracurricular opportunities for students. The Shakespeare Carnival is a statewide performance competition for students; the Shakespeare Residency is a week-long, in-school program; and their Youth Workshops are an opportunity for young performers in acting training outside of school hours. They can also tailor courses or experiences.

Finally, if you are a regional school, or unable to get students out on an excursion or have an incursion, Sport for Jove have a library full of digital offerings of their productions and symposiums.

Sport for Jove is back in 2023 with one of their best seasons ever and looking forward to coming together and making believe with you again in theatres, schools and backstage.

Online extras!

Check out the thrilling and atmospheric trailer for Sport For Jove’s Macbeth fb.watch/iM2PRI43HM

Sport For Jove’s Macbeth

Photo: Kate Williams.

HSC Plays At ACA

Actors Centre Australia has established a new education arm that will present four plays in its inaugural year at the company’s own theatre at Leichardt, in inner-western Sydney.

“We are thrilled to welcome HSC students for an immersive experience, exploring the challenging works that form part of their HSC English Curriculum,” said Actors Centre Australia’s Head of Acting, Adam Cook.

“Students will experience top class performances by professional actors (our very own ACA alumni), and an opportunity to discuss the rich and relevant content, with some of our industry’s best.”

For two of the plays, the performance will include an exclusive pre-recorded Q&A with the Australian

playwrights David Williamson and Joanna Murray-Smith.

“There will also be a session at the conclusion of each performance, hosted by the actors and/or the director, giving students and teachers the opportunity to engage directly with the creative team.”

The inaugural season comprises:

The Laramie Project (May 23 - 26). Moisés Kaufman and the Tectonic Theatre Project’s searing play about a gay bashing in the US town of Laramie.

The Removalists (May 30 - Jun 2). David Williamson’s iconic play set in a

Discover more about ACA’s upcoming The Laramie Project and their entire 2023 range of school programs at actorscentreaustralia.com.au/education

crime-ridden inner suburb of Melbourne where a seasoned police Sergeant and a raw recruit are drawn into the lives of two women dealing with domestic violence and abuse.

The Female of the Species (Sep 58). Joanna Murray-Smith’s farce of switching allegiances. A hilarious riposte to the received idea that feminism and feminists are not funny.

The Shape of Things (Sep 12 - 15). Neil LaBute’s play pits gentle, awkward Adam against experienced, analytical, amoral Evelyn, a graduate student in art.

Performances are during the day, with one at night.

In other ACA news, the Bachelor of Performing Arts (Stage & Screen) has an extra two spaces available each year, with the intake lifting to 30. The degree now also accepts international students, building further on the diversity and inclusion of ACA.

Online extras!

Hear from graduate Oliver Crawford what makes ACA a great choice fb.watch/iPaT2-brFR

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Twelfth Night

Photo: Clare Hawley.

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I Wanna Be Yours

The experience of a young modern love in a big multicultural city is the subject of Melbourne Theatre Company’s May production I Wanna Be Yours, which is also part of the Company’s Education and Families Program. One of the stars, Oz Malik, explains why he believes it is a must see for students and the general public.

What is I Wanna Be Yours about?

I Wanna Be Yours is about two people falling in love and navigating their intercultural relationship. It’s about the political context that influences our subconscious. The difficulties, happiness, complexities all wrapped into one.

What were your thoughts when you first read the script?

I first thought, this is somebody I know. I connected with it straightaway because I had similar thoughts growing up when I was in relationships. The story of a young person dating in a multicultural city like London, is a lot like me. I was also drawn to how authentic the nature of the writing is, it’s so real.

What excites you most about bringing this play to audiences?

People are probably looking forward to a different experience when it comes to acting and theatre and shows, and this is a story that is relevant to Melbourne culture. I think a lot of diaspora in the South Asian community as well will love it. Students will love it and I hope it will get new audiences through the door.

How would you have felt if you had seen this play when you were a student?

If I saw this play when I was a student, I would’ve felt so

proud. But also, seen. And I know that’s what people hear a lot now I want to be seen in theatre, I want to be seen on screen. And I think if this was out when I was a kid, it would have made life much easier.

It would have made my life seem normal and regular, seeing people like me having relationships. It would have made me realise I’m not alone in feeling like this. So my character of Haseeb is many, many people. And this is true of the other character in the play Ella is many, many people as well.

What are you most looking forward to about working on this show?

I can’t wait to work with the Director Tasnim Hossain. I’m also looking forward to working in the institution of Melbourne Theatre Company and the great team we have assembled. I think it’s a historical company and just to be able to perform and bring this story to students and people in Melbourne and across Victoria is massive.

The fact that these sort of stories are being told means a lot to me. And I know it means a lot to many other people as well. I’m very proud to put this story out there and I feel very lucky and fortunate to be telling a story that many young people and young people of colour have experienced.

I Wanna Be Yours

On the VCE Theatre Studies playlist, it is also suitable for school years 9 to 12. Playing at Southbank Theatre, The Lawler from May 11 to 27 before hitting the road for a regional tour. School bookings are now open. mtc.com.au

Online extras!

Oz Malik discusses the attraction of I Wanna Be Yours to a young audience. youtu.be/GCKUP45bMRM

Above: Oz Malik.

Photo: Jo Duck.

Shows For Schools In Sydney’s North

Glen Street Theatre on Sydney’s upper North Shore welcomes student groups and excursions to experience the magic of a live theatre performance.

For some children, visiting Glen Street Theatre may be their first experience of the performing arts. A trip to the theatre exposes students to new ideas, inspires their creativity and challenges them to think critically. It can also be a tool for cultivating important life skills in young people such as empathy and confidence.

The theatre in Belrose is proud to present a variety of shows that cater

to the very young all the way through to high school-aged students, with strong links to curriculum to enhance learning outcomes.

In 2023 the venue is taking the little ones and primary-schoolers to see Roald Dahl’ two very nasty individuals, The Twits, as well as going on a fabulous road trip across Australia with Are We There Yet? and the beloved Possum Magic

High-schoolers can experience acclaimed dramas like The Sunshine Club, set in the late 1940s in Brisbane, and Tim, based on the controversial novel of the same name by Colleen McCullough and adapted for the stage by Tim McGarry (most recently known for his stage adaptation of Trent Dalton’s Boy Swallows Universe).

Teachers are invited to stay up to date with what Glen Street Theatre has on offer for schools at glenstreet.com.au/education

Online extras!

Take a road trip around Australia with CDP Kids’ Are We There Yet?

youtu.be/CUXdTqLPxr0

SPARK 2023

Opposite page: CDP Kid’s Are We There Yet?

Main: Shake & Stir’s The Twits

Photo: Morgan Roberts.

Photo: Heidrun Lohr.

Brainstorming And Creating For 40 Years

Now, more than ever, educators are searching for ways to engage their students in meaningful conversations around issues like mental health, bullying and online relationships. Live theatre is the perfect vehicle for stimulating discussions around these complex and often sensitive topics.

For 40 years in-school performances by Brainstorm Productions have been both delighting young audiences and empowering them to make positive changes.

The company’s team of creatives, educators and mental health professionals have developed shows that capture the imagination of students.

Clinical Psychologist Dr Ameika Johnson, a member of the team since 2017, said: “We know the best learning happens when students feel emotionally connected. When they see young performers being vulnerable, it helps them to be vulnerable themselves.

“We have a big emphasis on helpseeking and peer support. We want students to be moved by the stories

and inspired by the characters’ journeys. We hope they’ll feel empowered to open up and seek support.”

With simple sets and costumes, Brainstorm is an accessible option for educators. Students are drawn in by the relatable characters, emotive soundscapes and professional young actors. The key is to preserve the integrity of the narrative. “We don’t let the messages get in the way of a good story,” says Ameika. “Our first priority is to create a compelling piece of theatre.”

Central to the company’s success is the ability to adapt to the changing needs of students, while continuing

to address universal themes such as emotional resilience, empathy, respect and responsibility. All the shows are original Australian works and the company is independent and unfunded. Brainstorm nurtures longterm relationships with their clients, with many schools booking annually for upwards of 15 years.

Brainstorm Productions perform shows for primary and high schools in New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia and the ACT. Each performance is supported by a Q&A and a suite of curriculumaligned classroom resources, designed to complement each school’s existing wellbeing frameworks. The company is an official R U OK? school partner and endorsed by the eSafety Commissioner as a Trusted eSafety Provider.

Online

Discover what educators have said about Brainstorm Productions’ shows. vimeo.com/304479961

Brainstorm Productions is now taking bookings for 2023. Discover more at brainstormproductions.edu.au

Brainstorm Productions’ Cyberia

Aussie Students Take Home Junior Theatre Festival Award

The Aussie All-Stars performance group, composed of students who had auditioned from towns across Australia, received a top youth theatre award at the USA Junior Theatre Festival in Atlanta. The fifty-three Aussie students, aged eleven to eighteen, won the Freddie G Inspiration Award, an accolade for their outstanding performance, named after Music Theatre International Co-Chairman, Freddie Gershon.

The Aussie All-Stars travelled to New York City in January, where they spent four days creating their performance for adjudication under the music direction of Broadway composers Daniel J Mertzlufft (Ratatouille the Musical) and Rob Rokicki (The Lightning Thief: The Percy Jackson Musical). A VIP performance was held in New York City for staff at Music Theatre International and I Heart Radio Broadway. Stuart Hendricks, who sponsors the program on behalf of MTI said, “This is a hugely impressive program, really showcasing the cream of Australian stage talent.”

The students then joined 6,800 like-minded performers in Atlanta for the three-day Junior Theatre Festival, where they performed excerpts from Sister Act JR. and Shrek The Musical JR. for industry professionals.

Adjudicator Holly Stanfield said, “Their commitment to exaggerated, and honest characterization made the story engaging and fun for the audience.” Adjudicator Lotte Wakeham added, “Their accent work was spot on, as was their inventive staging. I commend them on their comic skills and acting, singing and dancing abilities.”

While competing at the festival, the Aussie All-Star students performed on the main stage for the launch of the new musical Dot and the Kangaroo JR, created by Australian book writer Daniel Stoddart.

Recalling her experience on the main stage, Layla Schillert said, “Performing ‘On Our Way’ from Dot and the Kangaroo JR. in front of over 6,000 people was a highlight.”

The first Australian title to appear in the Broadway JR collection of musicals by Music Theatre International (MTI), Dot and the Kangaroo JR. is an adaptation based on the 1899 novel by Ethel C. Pedley. The story features a young and rambunctious girl who longs for an adventure. When she finds herself lost and afraid in the darkening Australian bush, Dot befriends a wise mother Kangaroo who enlists the help of Australia’s favourite bush creatures to help her get home.

The All-Stars program is a partnership between youth performance tour operator Travel Gang and the Junior Theatre Festivals worldwide. It allows students to represent their country and travel to the five festivals:

Layla Schillert performs “On Our Way” from Dot and the Kangaroo JR

Photo: Marcus Woollen.

Online extras!

Watch students perform numbers from Dot And The Kangaroo JR at JTF2023.

youtu.be/NEjPl9K0lXM

Atlanta, Sacramento, Birmingham (UK), Auckland (NZ) and Newcastle (Australia).

Each January, students also attend Broadway shows, musical theatre workshops and talkbacks with Broadway performers. They also participate in the Disneyland Performing Arts workshop program and are put through mock audition processes by Disney talent directors.

Shane Bransdon, co-producer of the Junior Theatre Festival Australia, said students have an experience they will remember fondly for the rest of their lives. “In addition to the amazing performing arts opportunities, this program embodies the power of theatre to build bridges, connect people with common goals, build friendships and relationships, and make you feel empathy.”

Students interested in the Aussie All-Stars program should follow the social media accounts for the Junior Theatre Festival Australia.

@jtfaustralia

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Photo: Rachael Monteleone.

Choosing A Show

Rights holders give their tips about new and classic musicals for schools.

Music Theatre International Australasia

mtishows.com.au

Finding Nemo JR

Disney’s Finding Nemo JR. is a 60 -minute musical adaptation of the beloved 2003 Pixar movie Finding Nemo, with new music by award-winning song writing team Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez. Marlin, an anxious and over-protective clownfish, lives in the Great Barrier Reef with his kid Nemo, who longs to explore the world beyond their anemone home. But when Nemo is captured and taken to Sydney, Marlin faces his fears and sets off on an epic adventure across the ocean. bit.ly/3ScX7vD

Alice By Heart

From the Tony winning team of Spring Awakening and the book writer of Waitress, Alice by Heart is refreshing spin on Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

In the rubble of the London Blitz of World War II, Alice Spencer’s budding teen life is turned upside down, when she and her dear friend Alfred are forced to take shelter in an underground tube station. When the ailing Alfred is quarantined, Alice encourages him to escape with her into their cherished book and journey down the rabbit hole to Wonderland. Available for a limited release in early Spring 2023. bit.ly/3IiSVpr

The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940

By John Bishop

A fast-paced play, set in a mansion with numerous secret doors and passageways. A comedy with a cast of five men and five women.

“An ingenious and wildly comic romp which enjoyed a long and critically hailed run both on and Off-Broadway. Poking antic fun at the more ridiculous aspects of “show biz” and the corny thrillers of Hollywood’s heyday, the play is a nonstop barrage of laughter as those assembled (or at least those who aren’t killed off) untangle the mystery of the ‘Stage Door Slasher.’” - NY Times.

Origin Theatrical origintheatrical.com.au

Shakespeare In Love (High School Edition)

NEW! Now available to licence! Based on the Academy Awardwinning movie, this romantic stage play reimagines William Shakespeare’s creative process and explores his inspiration as he writes Romeo and Juliet

There are two versions of this play available to perform: the full-length play and the full-length High School Edition.

bit.ly/3EpPWup

Monty Python’s Edukational Show

The only authorised collection of Monty Python sketches and songs available for performance. This brandnew show is the genius of Monty Python in a hilarious 80 minute musical revue, written for performance by young actors, grades 8 through college. Primary schools, high schools and universities can license this show.

bit.ly/3Ihq0lM

Head Over Heels (High School Edition)

The bold new musical comedy from the team that created Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Avenue Q and Spring Awakening

This laugh-out-loud love story is set to the music of the iconic 1980’s allfemale rock band The Go-Go’s, including the hit songs “We Got the Beat”, “Our Lips Are Sealed”, “Vacation”, Belinda Carlisle’s “Heaven is a Place on Earth” and “Mad About You”.

There are two versions available to perform: the full-length musical and the full-length High School Edition. bit.ly/3XViIdi

CATS (Young Actors Edition)

This is a new one-hour adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s hit musical, specially tailored for young actors. The materials have been prepared to help your school or organisation mount the best possible production and to give your young cast and crew an exciting and rewarding experience.

bit.ly/3IjZurF

Rocktopus

When a band of squishy invertebrates try to make it big in the undersea music business, they find that fame, fortune and stardom ain’t all they’re cut out to be. A starry eyed octopus rocker yearns to make it in “Shell City”, the number one city in the underwater music scene. With Turtles, Stingrays and Sharks, and a fun 50s rock’n’roll score!

bit.ly/3YLn6wl

An Egyptian Whodunnit

Perfect for 8 to 15 year olds, An Egyptian Whodunnit is a comedy mystery musical that takes the audience back in time to discover the real reason behind Tutankhamun’s untimely death. There are wonderful opportunities for dance, colour, and humour to flourish as well as a narrative that sticks closely to the history books. bit.ly/3KpPQqq

Man Of Steel

An actionpacked parody of the most famous comic book superhero and a spectacular show of heroically super proportions! A comic musical that centres on the entertaining battle of our superhero (and his heroine) triumphing over the evil Countess Olga and her motley henchmen. If only he could get it right occasionally...why are tights so hard to wear?

bit.ly/3kc96gn

Binary

Tonight is Brynn’s first night out, as herself. For years they have questioned their thoughts and feelings, knowing that they are different, but unable to identify why. Not knowing if they were a he or a she, a him or a her, a son or a daughter. What pronoun does one use when they are born male but identify as female? bit.ly/3XONLHA

David Spicer Productions davidspicer.com.au

DSP’s most popular school musicals remain the jukebox classics Back to the 80’s, Popstars the 90’s musical, The Great Australian Rock Musical and Disco Inferno bit.ly/3EkCOGz

Back To The 80s

The Australian written musical by Neil Gooding, set in in the graduating year of William Ocean High, recently celebrated its 20th anniversary production and has had more than 500 seasons in Australia and N.Z. bit.ly/3YNUrae

Australian Junior Musicals Collection

DSP has recently released the Australian Junior Musicals collection comprising musicals for high schools and primary schools which have superb CD backing tracks. bit.ly/3IFNX7B

Norman Lindsay’s The Magic Pudding

Written and illustrated by Norman Lindsay, in 1918 The Magic Pudding quickly became one of Australia’s most loved children’s

Choosing A Show

books. In 2010 playwright Andrew James and award-winning composer Sarah de Jong were commissioned by the Marian Street Theatre for Young People to create this large cast adaptation. bit.ly/3xCq3U7

Price Check! The Supermarket Musical Music and Lyrics by Sean Weatherly. Book and lyrics by Cerise De Gelder. The world’s first post-COVID-19 musical, set in a supermarket the year after the pandemic. A colourful cast of quirky characters fight to keep the independent business afloat against a major chain store. They all do their best to make meaningful connections in a world full of differences, whilst suffering the pressures of their own lives. bit.ly/3behXW5

On Stage

A.C.T.

Downtown - The Mod Musical by Philip George and David Lowenstein. Queanbeyan Players. Until Mar 5. Belconnen Community Theatre. queanbeyanplayers.com

Cats. Music by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Lyrics based on “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats” by T. S. Eliot. Additional material by Trevor Nunn and Richard Stilgoe. Canberra Philharmonic Society (Philo). Mar 2 - 18. Erindale Theatre, Wanniassa. philo.org.au

Love Letters by A. R. Gurney. Canberra Rep. Mar 15 - 26. canberrarep.org.au

Julia by Joanna Murray-Smith. Sydney Theatre Company. Mar 18 - 25. The Playhouse, Canberra Theatre Centre. canberratheatrecentre.com.au

Choir Boy by Tarell Alvin McCraney. National Theatre of Parramatta. Mar 29 - Apr 2. The Playhouse, Canberra Theatre Centre. canberratheatrecentre.com.au

Boop by Statera Circus. Mar 30 & 31. The Q, Queanbeyan. theq.net.au

Macbeth by William Shakespeare. Bell Shakespeare. Apr 14 - 22. The Playhouse, Canberra Theatre Centre. canberratheatrecentre.com.au

Prima Facie by Suzie Miller. Griffin Theatre Company. Apr 19. The Q, Queanbeyan. theq.net.au

Crimes of the Heart by Beth Henley. Canberra Rep. Apr 27May 13. canberrarep.org.au

New South Wales

Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. Ongoing. Capitol Theatre, Sydney. josephthemusical.com.au

Hairspray. Book by Mark O’Donnell & Thomas Meehan. Music by Marc Shaiman. Lyrics by Scott Wittman & Marc Shaiman. Based upon the New

A.C.T. & New South Wales

COVID-19 Update

Readers are advised to monitor public health advice in their jurisdiction and check with the relevant theatre group, venue or ticket outlet for specific performance impacts, cancellation or rescheduling information.

Line Cinema film written & directed by John Waters. Crossroads Live. Ongoing. Sydney Lyric Theatre. sydneylyric.com.au

The Rocky Horror Show by Richard O’Brien. Until Apr 1. Theatre Royal, Sydney. theatreroyalsydney.com

La Bohème by Puccini. Opera Australia. Until Mar 11. Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House. opera.org.au

Blessed Union by Maeve Marsden. Belvoir, in association with Sydney WorldPride2023. Until Mar 12. Belvoir Street Upstairs. belvoir.com.au

Chorus! Opera Australia. Until Mar 10. Sydney Opera House. opera.org.au

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Music by Jule Styne. Lyrics by Leo Robin. Book by Anita Loos and Joseph Fields, based on the novel by Anita Loos. Hayes Theatre Co. Until Mar 18. hayestheatre.com.au

The Mirror. Gravity & Other Myths. Until Mar 11. Drama Theatre, Sydney Opera House. sydneyoperahouse.com

Choir Boy by Tarell Alvin McCraney. Riverside’s National Theatre of Parramatta / Sydney WorldPride Until Mar 11. Riverside Theatres Parramatta. riversideparramatta.com.au

The Resistance by Kip Chapman. ATYP / Auckland Theatre Company. Until Mar 11. The Rebel Theatre. atyp.com.au

Julia by Joanna Murray-Smith. Sydney Theatre Company. Until May 13. Drama Theatre, Sydney Opera House. sydneytheatre.com.au

Sex Magick by Nicholas Brown. Griffin Theatre Company. Until

Mar 25. SBW Stables Theatre. griffintheatre.com.au

Dead White Males by David Williamson. Arts Theatre Cronulla. Until Mar 25. artstheatrecronulla.com.au

Adriana Lecouvreur by Francesco Cilea. Opera Australia. Until Mar 7. Sydney Opera House. opera.org.au

Rapture by Joanna MurraySmith. Pymble Players. Until Mar 19. Pymble Players Theatre, cnr Mona Vale Rd and Bromley Ave. pymbleplayers.com.au

Party Piece by Richard Harris. Woy Woy Little Theatre. Until Mar 12. Peninsula Theatre, Woy Woy. woywoylt.com

Così by Louis Nowra. Wollongong Workshop Theatre. Until Mar 11. Workshop Theatre, Gwynneville. wollongongworkshoptheatre.com.au

Get Smart by Christopher Sergel. Based on the series by Mel Brooks and Buck Henry. The Players Theatre, Port Macquarie. Until Mar 12. playerstheatre.org.au

Macbeth by William Shakespeare. Bell Shakespeare. Until Apr 2. Playhouse, Sydney Opera House. bellshakespeare.com.au

Look Look by Michael Frayn. The Guild Theatre, Rockdale Until Mar 11. guildtheatre.com.au

Mr Burns - A Post-Electric Play by Anne Washburn. Lieder Theatre Company. Mar 1 - 19. Lieder Theatre, Goulburn. theliedertheatre.com

The Goat or, Who is Sylvia? by Edward Albee. Sydney Theatre Company. Mar 2 - 25. Roslyn

Packer Theatre sydneytheatre.com.au

Rent by Jonathan Larson. Gosford Musical Society. Mar 3 -18. Laycock Street Community Theatre, North Gosford. gosfordmusicalsociety.com

The Vicar of Dibley by Ian Cower and Paul Carpenter adapted from the TV series by Richard Curtis and Paul Mayhew-Archer. The Henry Lawson Theatre. Mar 3 - 18. hltheatre.com.au

Kinky Boots by Harvey Fierstein and Cyndi Lauper. Noteable Theatre Company. Mar 3 - 18. The Concourse, Chatswood. noteabletheatrecompany.com

Newsies Jr Music by Alan Menken. Lyrics by Jack Feldman. Book by Harvey Fierstein. The Regals Musical Society. Mar 8 - 11. Rockdale Town Hall. theregals.com.au

Collapsible by Margaret Perry. essential workers / Red Line Productions. Mar 9 - Apr 1. Old Fitz Theatre. redlineproductions.com.au

Macbeth by William Shakespeare. Murwillumbah Theatre Company. Mar 10Apr 2. Murwillumbah Civic Centre.

murwillumbahtheatrecompany.com.au

Rhinestone Rex and Miss Monica by David Williamson. Ensemble Theatre. Mar 10Apr 29. ensemble.com.au

One Man Two Guvnors by Richard Bean. New Theatre. Mar 14 - Apr 15. newtheatre.org.au

12 Angry Men by Reginald Rose. Metropolitan Players Inc. Mar 15 - 25. Civic Playhouse, Newcastle. metropolitanplayers.com.au

Just $50 a month to reach thousands of theatre goers. Contact Stage Whispers for details.

On Stage

Shane Jacobson and Todd McKenney shake and shimmy it the best that they can in Hairspray The Musical. Now playing at Lyric Theatre, Sydney. hairspraymusical.com.au

Photo: Jeff Busby.

Online extras!

Stage Whispers TV joined in the toetapping fun of Hairspray The Musical youtu.be/uFXFVJcpWsY

New South Wales

On Stage New South Wales

Roberto Devereaux in Concert Opera Australia. Mar 16 - 18. Sydney Opera House. opera.org.au

The Wharf Revue: Looking for Albanese by Jonathan Biggins, Drew Forsythe and Phillip Scott. Mar 16 - 18, Riverside Theatre, Parramatta, riversideparramatta.com.au; Mar 21 - Apr 2, Glen Street Theatre, Belrose, glenstreet.com.au

The Diary of Anne Frank by Frances Goodrich & Albert Hackett adapted by Wendy Kesselman. Nowra Players. Mar 17 - Apr 1. Nowra Players Theatre, Bomaderry. nowraplayers.com.au

Heathers The Musical by Lawrence O’Keefe and Kevin Murphy based on the film by Daniel Walters. Campbelltown Theatre Group. Mar 17 - Apr 1. Campbelltown Town Hall Theatre. ctgi.org.au

The Dog Logs by C. J. Johnson. Hunters Hill Theatre Inc. Mar 17 - Apr 2. Club Ryde. huntershilltheatre.com.au

Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, adapted by William Glennon. Tamworth Dramatic Society. Mar 17 - 25. Capitol Theatre, Tamworth. tds.org.au

Dial M For Murder by Frederick Knott. Newcastle Theatre Company. Mar 18 - Apr 1. Newcastle Theatre, Lambton. newcastletheatrecompany.com.au

Into The Woods. Music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim. Book by James Lapine. Belvoir, co-produced by Hayes Theatre Co. Mar 18 - Apr 23. Belvoir Street Upstairs. belvoir.com.au

Philip Quast: The Road I Took. With Philip Quast and AnneMaree McDonald. Ensemble Theatre. Mar 19 - 29. ensemble.com.au

Rent by Jonathan Larson. Miranda Musical Theatre Company. Mar 22 - 26. The Pavilion Performing Arts Centre, Sutherland. mirandamusicalsociety.com.au

Maureen: Harbinger of Death by Jonny Hawkins. Mar 2325. Lennox Theatre, Riverside Theatres, Parramatta. riversideparramatta.com.au

Disney Aladdin Jr Music by Alan Menken. Lyrics by Howard Ashman & Tim Rice. Book adapted & additional lyrics by Jim Luigs. Music adapted and arranged by Brian Louiselle. Based on the screenplay by Ron Clements and John Musker, Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio North Shore Theatre Company. Mar 24 - Apr 1. Zenith Theatre, Chatswood. northshoretheatrecompany.org

The Pirates of Penzance by Gilbert and Sullivan. Roo Theatre Company (Shellharbour). Mar 24 - Apr 1. roo-theatre.com.au

Play On by Rick Abbott. Ballina Players. Mar 24 - Apr 2. ballinaplayers.com.au

Madama Butterfly on Sydney Harbour Opera Australia. Mar 24 - Apr 23. opera.org.au

Fences by August Wilson. Sydney Theatre Company. Mar 25 - May 6. Wharf 1 Theatre. sydneytheatre.com.au

The Snail and the Whale. Inspired by the book by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler. CDP Kids and Tall Stories. Mar 29 - 30. Riverside Theatre,

Parramatta. riversideparramatta.com.au

The Divine Miss Bette. Catherine Alcorn. Tenacious C Presents, Neil Gooding Productions and The Harbour Agency. Mar 29 - Apr 1 Darlinghurst Theatre Company. darlinghursttheatre.com

Collision. Casus Creations and Cluster Arts. Mar 30 - 31. Lennox Theatre, Riverside Theatres, Parramatta. riversideparramatta.com.au

Funny Money by Ray Cooney. Castle Hill Players. Mar 31 - Apr 22. Pavilion Theatre, Castle Hill Showground. paviliontheatre.org.au

360 Allstars. Onyx. Apr 1114, Riverside Theatre, Parramatta, riversideparramatta.com.au; Apr 15 - 16, Glen Street Theatre, Belrose, glenstreet.com.au

The Wedding Singer. Music by Matthew Sklar. Lyrics by Chad Beguelin. Book by Chad Beguelin and Tim Herlihy. Hunter Drama. Apr 13 - 23. Civic Playhouse, Newcastle. hunterdrama.com.au

Strictly Ballroom The Musical. Created by Baz Luhrmann. Book by Baz Luhrmann & Craig Pearce. So Popera (Wollongong). Apr 13 - 16.

WIN Entertainment Centre. sopoperaproductions.com

Blithe Spirit by Noël Coward

The Theatre on Chester. Apr 14 - May 6. The Theatre, cnr Chester and Oxford Streets, Epping. theatreonchester.com.au

Richmond Players...This is Your Life. 70th Anniversary Gala. Apr 15 - 29. Richmond School of Arts.

richmondplayers.com.au

UFO by Kirby Medway and Solomon Thomas. Griffin Lookout. Apr 18 - 29. SBW Stables Theatre. griffintheatre.com.au

Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr Fox. Adapted for the stage by shake & stir theatre co. Adapter: Nick Skubij. Sydney Theatre Company. Apr 19 - 30. Roslyn Packer Theatre.

sydneytheatre.com.au

Youth Theatre Showcase. Lieder Theatre Company. Apr 19 - 22. Lieder Theatre, Goulburn. theliedertheatre.com tick, tick...BOOM! by Jonathan Larson. Storeyboard Entertainment. Apr 20 - 23. Lyric Theatre, Sydney. ticktickboomthemusical.com.au

Green Day’s American Idiot. By Billie Joe Armstrong and Michael Mayer. Music by Green

Stage Whispers Just $50 a month to reach thousands of theatre goers. Contact Stage Whispers for details.

On Stage

Day. Hornsby Musical Society. Apr 20 - 23. Hornsby RSL. bit.ly/americanidiot-tickets

Metropolis by Julia Robertson and Zara Stanton. Little Eggs Collective in association with Hayes Theatre Co. From Apr 21. Hayes Theatre. hayestheatre.com.au

Ladies Day by Amanda Whittington. Wyong Drama Group. Apr 21 - 29. Red Tree Theatre, Tuggerah. wyongdramagroup.com.au

The Pirates of Penzance by Gilbert & Sullivan. New Musical Arrangement by Jim Coyle. Mosman Musical Society. Apr 21 - 29. Zenith Theatre, Chatswood. mosmanmusicalsociety.com.au

Change of Heart by Joy Weidersatz Wollongong Workshop Theatre. Apr 2129. Workshop Theatre, Gwynneville. wollongongworkshoptheatre.com.au

Cracks in the Mirror. Script and lyrics by Lyn Townsend & music by Gail Smith. Parkes Musical & Dramatic Society. Apr 22 - May

7. The Little Theatre. parkesmandd.com.au

A New Version of The Pirates of Penzance. By Gilbert & Sullivan. Bankstown Theatre Company.

Apr 22 - 30. Bryan Brown Theatre, Bankstown. bankstowntheatrecompany.com

All My Sons by Arthur Miller. New Theatre. Apr 25 - May 27. newtheatre.org.au

Rumors by Neil Simon. Maitland Repertory Theatre.

Apr 26 - May 14. Repertory Theatre, Maitland. mrt.org.au

Possum Magic. Based on the book by Mem Fox and Julie Vivas Monkey Baa Theatre. Apr 26 - 29. Glen Street Theatre, Belrose. glenstreet.com.au

Ferruccio Furlanetto in Concert Opera Australia. Apr 27. City Recital Hall. opera.org.au

New South Wales & Queensland

Queensland

Hamilton Book, music and lyrics by Lin-Manuel Miranda. Inspired by the book Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow. Michael Cassel Group. Continuing. Lyric Theatre, QPAC. hamiltonmusical.com.au

Chicago. Music: John Kander. Lyrics: Fred Ebb. Book: Fred Ebb & Bob Fosse based on the play by Maurine Dallas Watkins. Spotlight Theatrical Company, Benowa. Until Mar 18. spotlighttheatre.com.au

The Thin Man - a Lux Radio Play. New Farm Nash Theatre. Until Mar 11. The Brunswick Room, Merthyr Rd Uniting Church, New Farm. nashtheatre.com

Kid Stakes by Ray Lawler. Centenary Theatre Group. Until Mar 11. Chelmer Community Centre. centenarytheatre.com.au

tick, tick...BOOM! By Jonathan Larson. StoreyBoard

Entertainment. Mar 1 - 5. Playhouse, QPAC. ticktickboomthemusical.com.au

Jukebox. Tweed Heads Theatre

Co. Mar 3 - 19. Tweed Heads Civic Centre Auditorium. tweedtheatre.com.au

Anything Goes. Music and Lyrics by Cole Porter Original Book by P.G. Wodehouse, Guy Bolton, Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse. New Book by Timothy Crouse and John Weidman. Phoenix Ensemble, Beenleigh. Mar 3 - 25. phoenixensemble.com.au

The Sweet Delilah Swim Club by Jessie Jones, Nicholas Hope and Jamie Wooten. Villanova Players. Mar 4 - 19. villanovaplayers.com

The Ladies Foursome by Norm Foster. Ipswich Little Theatre. Mar 4 - 18. ilt.org.au

Girl in Tan Boots by Tahli Corin. Cairns Little Theatre / Rondo Theatre. Mar 9 - 18. therondo.com.au

On Stage Queensland & Victoria

Steel Magnolias by Robert Harling. St Luke’s Theatre Society. Mar 10 - 25. Christ Church Hall, Yeronga. stlukestheatre.asn.au

Cinderella by Matthew Whittet. Javeenbah Theatre. Mar 1025. javeenbah.org.au

Drizzle Boy by Ryan Ennis. Queensland Theatre. Mar 1125. Billie Brown Theatre. queenslandtheatre.com.au

Macbeth by Verdi. Opera Queensland. Mar 9 - 11. Concert Hall QPAC. oq.com.au

The Mystery of the Valkyrie by Michael Futcher. Mar 11 - 19. Playhouse, QPAC. qpac.com.au

Choir Boy by Tarell Alvin McCraney. Riverside’s National Theatre of Parramatta. Mar 15 - 18. Cremorne Theatre, QPAC. qpac.com.au

The Boy From Oz. Music and Lyrics by Peter Allen. Book by Nick Enright. Empire Theatre, Toowoomba. Mar 17 - 26. empiretheatre.com.au

Chess The Musical by Benny Andersson and Bjšrn Ulvaeus, and Tim Rice. North Queensland Opera and Music Theatre. Mar 29 - Apr 1. Townsville Civic Centre. nqomt.com.au

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. Noosa Arts Theatre. Apr 5 - 9. noosaartstheatre.org.au

Exit by James Hall. The Spotlight Theatrical Company. Apr 13 - 29. The Basement Theatre, Benowa. spotlighttheatre.com.au

The Box Show. Junkyard Beats. Apr 13 - 16. Brisbane Powerhouse. brisbanepowerhouse.org

Les Femmes Sur La Mer. Coolum Theatre Players. Apr 14 - 23. coolumtheatre.com.au

As You Like It by William Shakespeare. Queensland Theatre. Apr 15 - May 13. Bille Brown Theatre. queenslandtheatre.com.au

Rolling Thunder Vietnam. Blake Entertainment. Apr 15, The Star Theatre, Gold Coast; Apr 18, Empire Theatre, Toowoomba; Apr 21 & 22, QPAC, Brisbane; Apr 26, Brolga Theatre, Maryborough; Apr 29, Events Centre, Caloundra. rollingthundervietnam.com

Guys and Dolls. Music and lyrics by Frank Loesser. Book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows. Gold Coast Little Theatre. Apr 15 - May 6. gclt.com.au

Very Still & Hard to See by Steve Yockey. Villanova Players. Apr 19 - 23. villanovaplayers.com

And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie. Sunnybank Theatre Group. Apr 21 - May 6. sunnybanktheatre.com.au

Così by Louis Nowra. Redcliffe Musical Theatre. Apr 21 - 30. Theatre 102, Redcliffe. redcliffemusicaltheatre.com

Four Days in Dallas by Ken Cotterill. Cairns Little Theatre /

Rondo Theatre. Apr 28 - May 6. therondo.com.au

Victoria

J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Cursed Child by Jack Thorne, based on an original new story by J.K. Rowling. Reimagined one-part production. Until Jul 9. Princess Theatre, Melbourne. au.harrypottertheplay.com & Juliet. Music: Max Martin. Book: David West Read. Ongoing. Regent Theatre, Melbourne. andjuliet.com.au

Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap. John Frost for Crossroads Live Australia. Until Mar 26. Comedy Theatre, Melbourne. themousetrap.com.au

The 39 Steps by John Buchan. The Mount Players. Until Mar 12. Mountview Theatre, Macedon. themountplayers.com

Made in China 2.0 by Wang Chong. Malthouse Theatre.

60 Stage Whispers

Just $50 a month to reach thousands of theatre goers. Contact Stage Whispers for details.

On Stage Victoria

Kate Mulvany takes on the role of celebrated French stage actor Sarah Bernhardt in Bernhardt/Hamlet by Theresa Rebeck a brilliant comedy about a woman ahead of her time. Directed by Anne-Louise Sarks, the show plays at Southbank Theatre, The Sumner until April 15. mtc.com.au

Photo: Jo Duck.

Online extras!

Kate Mulvany reveals the unexpected comedy of MTC’s Bernhardt/Hamlet youtu.be/AehDJN4eMkM

Until May 19. Beckett Theatre. malthousetheatre.com.au

Prima Facie by Suzie Miller. Melbourne Theatre Company. Until Mar 18. Fairfax Studio, Arts Centre Melbourne. mtc.com.au

Radioactive Cockroach by Judy Dalziel. La Mama Theatre HQ. Mar 1 - 12. lamama.com.au

School of Rock by Andrew Lloyd Webber, Mike White, Julian Fellowes and Glen Slater. Wonthaggi Theatrical Group. Mar 3 - 18. Wonthaggi Union Community Arts Centre. wtg.org.au

Bernhardt/Hamlet by Theresa Rebeck. Melbourne Theatre Company. Mar 4 - Apr 15. Southbank Theatre, The Sumner. mtc.com.au

Naked at My Age by Charla Hathaway. The Butterfly Club. Mar 6 - 11. thebutterflyclub.com

Puffs by Matt Cox. Beaumaris Theatre Group. Mar 10 - 25.

Beaumaris Theatre. beaumaristheatre.com.au

The Laramie Project: Ten Years Later by Moisés Kaufman, Leigh Fondakowski, Greg Pierotti, Andy Paris and Stephen Belber Off The Leash Theatre. Mar 14 - 18. West Gippsland Arts Centre. offtheleashtheatre.com.au

Silly Little Things by Laura Knaggs. The Butterfly Club. Mar 14 - 18. thebutterflyclub.com

Flesh Disease by Dianne Stubbings. La Mama Theatre HQ. Mar 15 - 25. lamama.com.au

The Other Place by Sharr

White. Torquay Theatre Troupe Inc. Mar 16 - 25. Shoestring Playhouse @ The MAC, Torquay. ttt.org.au

Cut by Duncan Graham. Talking Walls Theatre. Mar 1626. fortyfivedownstairs, Melbourne. fortyfivedownstairs.com

Ladies in Black. Book by Carolyn Burns. Music and Lyrics by Tim Finn. NOVA Music Theatre. Mar 17 - 26. Kel Watson Theatre, Forest Hill College, Burwood East. novamusictheatre.com.au

A Gentleman’s Guide to Love & Murder. Book and lyrics by Robert L. Freedman, music and lyrics by Steven Lutvak. SLAMS. Mar 17 - 25. The Knox Community Arts Centre, Bayswater. slams.org.au

The Saboteur. The Butterfly Club. Mar 20 - 25. thebutterflyclub.com

Way by Sally McKenzie. La Mama Courthouse. Mar 22Apr 2. lamama.com.au

Melbourne, Cheremushki. Dmitri Shostakovich, Vladimir Mass and Mikhail Chervinsky. Victorian Opera. Mar 22 - 25. Playhouse, Arts Centre Melbourne. victorianopera.com.au

Puffs, or Seven Increasingly Eventful Years at a Certain

School of Magic and Magic by Matt Cox. Essendon Theatre Company. Mar 23 - Apr 1. essendontheatrecompany.com.au

Next to Normal by Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey. Grover Theatre Company. Mar 23 - 25. St Martin’s Youth Theatre. grovertheatrecompany.com

The Shoe-Horn Sonata by John Misto. The 1812 Theatre, Upper Ferntree Gully. Mar 23Apr 22. 1812theatre.com.au

Things I Know to be True by Andrew Bovell. Frankston Theatre Group. Mar 25 - Apr 2. The Shed, Overport Park, Frankston South. frankstontheatregroup.org.au

Gillian Cosgriff - actually, good. The Butterfly Club. Mar 27Apr 23. thebutterflyclub.com

Business Women’s Luncheon: Your Ticket to Financial Freedom by Sarah Bartolo and Lauren Edwards. The Butterfly Club. Mar 27 - Apr 2. thebutterflyclub.com

On Stage

Elyce Phillips Pretends To Be On Tropical Holiday for 50 Minutes (Definitely Not a Scam). The Butterfly Club. Mar 27 - Apr 7. thebutterflyclub.com

Melbourne International Comedy Festival - Mar 29 - Apr 3 comedyfestival.com.au/2023

My Fair Lady by Lerner and Loewe. GSOV. Mar 30 - Apr 2. The Alexander Theatre, Monash University, Clayton gsov.org.au

Reuben Kaye: Live and Intimidating. Mar 30 - Apr 23. Fairfax Studio, Arts Centre Melbourne. artscentremelbourne.com.au

Hello, Who Is It? Steph Teitelbaum. The Butterfly Club. Apr 3 - 13. thebutterflyclub.com

Murder Village - An Improvised Whodunnit. The Butterfly Club. Apr 3 - 13. thebutterflyclub.com

Dust and Ruin by Alexandra Meerbach. Ballarat National Theatre. Apr 14 - 22. Mount Rowan School Theatre, Wendouree. bnt.org.au

62 Stage Whispers

Sense and Sensibility. Adapted by Kate Hamill, based on the novel by Jane Austen. CPP Community Theatre. Apr 1422. Boronia K-12 College, Performing Arts Centre. cppcommunitytheatre.com.au

Legally Blonde by Laurence O’Keefe, Nell Benjamin and Heather Hach. Waterdale. Apr 14 - 22. St Bernard’s College, Essendon. waterdale.org.au

Six Characters in Search of an Author by Luigi Pirandello. Wangaratta Players. Apr 1423. The Stage Door Studio. Pretty & Witty & Gay. The Harry Morrissey Official. The Butterfly Club. Apr 14 - 23. thebutterflyclub.com

Joy by Daisy Webb. The Butterfly Club. Apr 14 - 23. thebutterflyclub.com

Octopus Prime: Primo Octopus. The Butterfly Club. Apr 14 - 23. thebutterflyclub.com

Jumpers for Goalposts by Tom Wells. Williamstown Little Theatre. Apr 19 - May 6. Williamstown Little Theatre. wlt.org.au

Victoria & Tasmania

Selling Kabul by Sylvia Khoury. Red Stich. Apr 22 - May 21. redstitch.net

PosseVision. Rasputin’s Wet Posse. The Butterfly Club. Apr 26 - 29. thebutterflyclub.com

Macbeth by William Shakespeare. Bell Shakespeare. Apr 27 - May 14. Fairfax Studio, Arts Centre Melbourne. bellshakespeare.com.au

It’s Only a Play by Terence McNally. Mordialloc Theatre Company Inc. Apr 28 - May 13. Shirley Burke Theatre, Parkdale. mordialloctheatre.com

Happy Days by Samuel Beckett. Melbourne Theatre Company. May 1 - Jun 10. Southbank Theatre, The Sumner. mtc.com.au

Tasmania

Ten Days on the Island. Mar 10 - 19. tendays.org.au

True West by Sam Shepard. HSTheatre. Apr 19 - May 7. fortyfivedownstairs, Melbourne. fortyfivedownstairs.com

Same Time Next Year by Bernard Slade. Basin Theatre Group. Apr 20 - 30. The Basin Theatre. thebasintheatre.org.au

Barefoot in the Park by Neil Simon. Lilydale Athenaeum Theatre Co. Inc. Apr 20 - May 6. lilydaleatc.com

Extremities by William Mastrosimone. Geelong Repertory Theatre Company. Apr 21 - May 6. Woodbin Theatre, Geelong West. geelongartscentre.org.au

Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare. Eltham Little Theatre. Apr 21 - May 3. Eltham Performing Arts Centre, Research. elthamlittletheatre.org.au

Deathtrap by Ira Levin. Malvern Theatre Company Inc. Apr 21May 6. malverntheatre.com.au

Molly Sweeney by Brian Friel. Heidelberg Theatre Co. Apr 21 - May 6. Heidelberg Theatre, Rosanna. htc.org.au

Women of Troy. Based on the play by Euripides, adapted by Barrie Kosky and Tom Wright. Archipelago Productions and Ten Days on The Island. Mar 812. Theatre Royal, Hobart. theatreroyal.com.au

Red. Dancenorth Australia. Ten Days on The Island. Mar 10 & 11. Studio Theatre, Theatre Royal, Hobart. theatreroyal.com.au

Priscilla Queen of the Desertthe Musical. Book by Stephan Elliott and Allan Scott. Based on the Latent Image/Specific Films Motion Picture Distributed by Metro-GoldwynMayer Inc. Encore Theatre Company. Mar 17 - Apr 1. Princess Theatre, Launceston. theatrenorth.com.au

Velvet Rewired. Organised Pandemonium. Mar 22 - Apr 9. Theatre Royal, Hobart. theatreroyal.com.au

Prima Facie by Suzie Miller. Griffin Theatre Co. Apr 4 - 6. Studio Theatre, Theatre Royal, Hobart. theatreroyal.com.au

Anne of Green Gables: The Musical. Book by Donald Harron. Music by Norman

Just $50 a month to reach thousands of theatre goers. Contact Stage Whispers for details.

Duncan Macmillan’s acclaimed interactive comedy Every Brilliant Thing about family, love, loss and hope has delighted and moved audiences across the globe and heads to Adelaide in a new production helmed by Yasmin Gurreeboo and starring Jimi Bani. It will play at Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre from April 28 to May 13. statetheatrecompany.com.au

On Stage

Campbell. Hobart Rep. Apr 12 - 23. The Playhouse Theatre. playhouse.org.au

The Carbon Neutral Adventures of the Indefatigable Enviroteens by First Dog on the Moon Archipelago Productions. Apr 19 - 29. Studio Theatre, Theatre Royal, Hobart. theatreroyal.com.au South Australia

Adelaide Festival Mar 3 - 19. adelaidefestival.com.au

Adelaide Fringe Until Mar 19. adelaidefringe.com.au

Hans and Gret by Lally Katz. Windmill Theatre Company / Adelaide Festival. Mar 3 - 12. Queens Theatre, Adelaide. adelaidefestival.com.au

Disney Freaky Friday. Book by Bridget Carpenter Music by Tom Kitt Lyrics by Brian Yorkey. Based on the novel by Mary Rodgers. Zest Theatre Group. Mar 17 - 26. Victor Harbor Town Hall. trybooking.com/CDQZM

A Theatrical Threesome. Three one act plays. Venture Theatre Company. Mar 17 - 25.

Catch Me If You Can. Book by Terrance McNally. Lyrics by Marc Shaiman. Music by Scott Whittman and Marc Shaiman. Northern Light Theatre Company. Mar 17 - Apr 1. Shedley Theatre, Playford Civic Centre, Elizabeth. northernlight.org.au

Speaking in Tongues by Andrew Bovell. The Stirling Players. Mar 17 - Apr 1. Stirling Community Theatre. stirlingplayers.sct.org.au

Four Flat Whites in Italy by Roger Hall. Therry Dramatic Society. Mar 23 - Apr 3. Arts Theatre, Adelaide. therry.org.au

The Tempest by William Shakespeare. University of Adelaide Theatre Guild. Mar 24 - Apr 1. Little Theatre, The Cloisters, University of Adelaide. trybooking.com/CECWG

Tasmania, South Australia & Western Australia

Come From Away. Music, Lyrics and book by Irene Sankoff and David Hein. Rodney Rigby and Junkyard Dog Productions. Mar 28 - Apr 16. Her Majesty’s Theatre, Adelaide. comefromaway.com.au

Only an Orphan Girl by Henning Nelms. Tea Tree Players. Apr 12 - 22. teatreeplayers.com

Who’s in Bed with the Butler by Michael Parker. Adelaide Repertory Theatre. Apr 13 - 22. Arts Theatre, Adelaide. adelaiderep.com

Competitive Tenderness by Hannie Rayson. Noarlunga Theatre Company. Apr 19May 6. The Arts Centre, Port Noarlunga. noarlungatheatrecompany.com

All About Eve. Adapted from the screenplay by Joseph L. Mankiewicz by Olivia Jane Parker. St Jude’s Players. Apr 20 - 29. St Jude’s Hall, Brighton. stjudesplayers.asn.au

Kiss Me, Kate. Music and lyrics by Cole Porter. Book by Sam and Bella Spewack. Hills Musical Company. Apr 28May 13. Stirling Community Theatre. hillsmusical.org.au

Every Brilliant Thing by Duncan Macmillan. State Theatre Company South Australia. Apr 28 - May 13. Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre. statetheatrecompany.com.au

Prima Facie by Suzie Miller. State Theatre Company South Australia. Apr 28 - May 13. Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre. statetheatrecompany.com.au

Western Australia

Moulin Rouge! The Musical by John Logan and Justin Levine. Global Creatures. Until Apr 9. Crown Theatre, Perth. moulinrougemusical.com

The Golden Pathway Annual by John Harding and John Burrows. Garrick Theatre. Mar 2 - 18. (08) 9255 333. taztix.com.au

Richard III by William Shakespeare. Graduate Dramatic Society. Mar 8 - 18. New Fortune Theatre, UWA. ticketswa.com

The Greening of Grace and 150 Years of the Roman Empire in Thirty Minutes by William Zappa and Zavier Wileman. Wanneroo Repertory Club. Mar 9 - 18. Limelight Theatre, Wanneroo. (08) 9255 333. taztix.com.au

Lunenberg by Norm Foster. Harbour Theatre. Mar 10 - 26. Camelot Theatre, Mosman Park. (08) 9255 333. taztix.com.au

Behind Closed Doors by Janet Shaw. Murray Music and Drama Club. Mar 10 - 18. Pinjarra Civic Centre. mmdc.com.au

Timepieces by Siobhan Wright and Bruce Fisk. Roxy Lane Theatre. Mar 10 - 19. Roxy Lane Theatre, Maylands. (08) 9255 333. taztix.com.au

No Exit by Jean-Paul Satre. KADS. Mar 10 - 25. KADS Town Square Theatre, Kalamunda. kadstheatre.com.au

Whispers. Cabaret. Stage Left Theatre, Boulder. Mar 10 - 25. stageleft.org.au

Così by Louis Nowra. Midnite Youth Theatre. Mar 22 - Apr 1. The Blue Room Theatre, Perth Cultural Centre. blueroom.org.au

Into the Woods by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine. WA Opera. Mar 23 - Apr 1. His Majesty’s Theatre, Perth. waopera.asn.au

A Season of One Act Plays by Patrick Gabridge, Bradley Hayward and Carl L. Williams. Beverley Amateur Dramatics. Mar 30 - Apr 1. Beverley Platform Theatre. (08) 9255 333. taztix.com.au

Private Lives by Noël Coward. Old Mill Theatre. Apr 14 - 29. Old Mill Theatre. oldmilltheatre.com.au

The Mousetrap by Agatha Christie John Frost for Crossroads Live. Apr 8 - 16. His Majesty’s Theatre, Hay St, Perth. themousetrap.com.au

13 The Musical by Jason Robert -Brown. Colour Blind Theatre Company. Apr 13 - 15. Carey Baptist College Auditorium. events.humanitix.com

The Snail and the Whale by Julia Donaldson and Axel Schleff. CDP Kids. April 15 - 16. Heath Ledger Theatre, State Theatre Centre of WA. artsculturetrust.wa.gov.au

Absurd Person Singular by Alan Ayckbourn. Stirling Players. Apr 21 - May 6. Stirling Theatre, Innaloo. stirlingplayers.com.au

The Odd Couple (Female Version) by Neil Simon. Roleystone Theatre. April 28May 6. City of Gosnells Don Russell Performing Arts Centre, Thornlie. (08) 9498 9414. drpac@gosnells.wa.gov.au

Through These Lines by Cheryl Ward. Darlington Theatre Players. Apr 28 - May 13. Marloo Theatre, Greenmount. marlootheatre.com.au

Murders They Wrote. Cluedunnit. Apr 28 - 29. Downstairs at the Maj, His Majesty’s Theatre, Hay St, Perth. artsculturetrust.wa.gov.au

The Bleeding Tree by Angus Cerini. Black Swan State Theatre Company and the Blue Room. Apr 29 - May 14. Studio Underground, State Theatre Centre, WA.

artsculturetrust.wa.gov.au

Catch-22 by Amelia Sagrebb

The Blue Room Theatre Apr 11 -29 The Blue Room Theatre, Perth Cultural Centre blueroom.org.au

Not Far From the Tree by Sabrina Hafid. The Blue Room Theatre. Apr 18 - May 6. The Blue Room Theatre, Perth Cultural Centre. blueroom.org.au

Wittenoom

By Mary Anne Butler. Red Stitch Actors’ Theatre. An INK World Premiere. Red Stitch, East St Kilda. Jan 26 - Feb 19.

WITTENOOM is an intense, passionate play, sharp and evocative in its imagery, visceral in its emotions. There are brief exchanges between a fun-loving hedonist mother, Dot (Caroline Lee), and her more careful, thoughtful daughter, Pearl (Emily Goddard), but they are moments in a poetic drama that weaves together joyous life and slow death and locates both in the beautiful, deadly landscapes of Wittenoom in north-east West Australia.

Between 1943 and 1966 Wittenoom was a blue asbestos mine that became a township. The tiny fibres of asbestos lead to the incurable disease of mesothelioma. Finally, officially, closed in 2003, Wittenoom is now, according to Wikipedia, the largest ‘contaminated site’ in the southern hemisphere.

In excellent performances, Caroline Lee and Emily Goddard make a striking contrast. Lee presents a kind of glittering, heedless, take-no-prisoners persona that makes her fate all the more moving. Goddard is inherently loveable, lively, a little shy, and embarrassed by Mum, but we see her grow into a strong and angry woman.

In bringing her rich, dense text to life, Butler has been more than helped by Susie Dee, first as dramaturg and then as director able to physicalise words and emotions. A twist of a body, a scoot up a ladder, or a sad, poignant dance of mother and daughter add another layer to the words.

Rachel Burke’s lighting can change the mood and suggest the harsh light of the Pilbara with its fleeting clouds. Ian Moorhead’s sound design is subtle and disturbing. As for Dann Barber’s set, it is inspired: a crumbling, derelict structure to represent a derelict town, hollowed out bodies and dying hopes.

Michael Brindley

Scarlet Pimpernel

Music by Frank Wildhorn. Lyrics & Book by Nan Knighton. OSMaD. Geoffrey McComas Theatre, Melbourne. Dec 817.

DIRECTOR Penn Valk is very brave in choosing this relatively unknown musical. However, her knowledge of stagecraft has resulted in a dazzling, perfectly cast, beautifully conceived show. Castles, ballrooms, chandeliers, secret hideouts, luxurious gardens and even an ocean voyage are all depicted digitally on LED screens but oddly enough still feel believable. Brenton Van Vliet’s audacious set and lighting design provides a touchstone for other companies thinking of using digital scenery.

Wildhorn’s lush score was impeccably brought to life by the 25-piece orchestra under the capable baton of Musical Director Matthew Nutley.

Grace Kingsford’s vocals as heroine Marguerite are both angelic and dynamic, providing plenty of goosebump moments throughout. Mitchell Stewart, as

the Scarlet Pimpernel, handles this difficult role with seemingly little effort. His singing voice is velvety and comedic timing genius. Omar Moustafa’s 25 years experience in musical theatre is evident in his brilliant portrayal of the villainous Chauvelin.

The calibre of non-professional theatre in Melbourne continues to soar with this lavish production of The Scarlet Pimpernel. ‘Viva La OSMaD’

Jonathan Cox

ROOM

Created and Directed and Music by James Thierrée. La Compagnie du Hanneton. Sydney Festival at the Roslyn Packer Theatre, Sydney. Jan 11 - 25.

IMAGINE a room in bits and pieces the walls, the ceiling and floor, a big desk and a whole team of people injecting life and passion into bringing these pieces to vibrant, pulsating life. Got it? No, scrap that and start again...and again, and again, and again...

That’s the plot of ROOM, a complex, extremely funny and absorbing show. Created and directed by James Thierree, who was raised by a circus family and just happens to be Charlie Chaplin’s grandson pause, to let

that sink in! it’s an absolutely mesmerising piece of sheer theatricality.

Thierree is in the midst of pure madness involving a large company of immensely talented performers and backstage people. They march and dance and float and fly, representing different theatrical elements costume, music, props. Although they cavort in what seems frenetic chaos, it is clearly brilliantly choreographed.

This is a show about the artistic chaos of creation. ‘I need a narrative!’ screams the director, and he speaks directly to the audience about ‘what it all means’. But there’s no perfect answer, so he battles on to find one.

There’s no doubt about the central figure in this outstanding show: with his shock of grey hair and his bend-each-way body, Thierree takes command. But with him all the way is a brilliant company on-and-back-stage, singing (yes, Thierree has written the music as well!), playing a range of instruments, spinning on ropes, lugging scenery, always looking absolutely great.

It’s amazing how the wild speed of the performers doesn’t lead to accidental collisions. Instead we get a collection of fascinating images art in preliminary action.

Frank Hatherley

Red Stitch Theatre’s Wittenoom

Photo: Jodie Hutchinson.

Reviews

The Mirror

Gravity and Other Myths. Directed by Darcy Grant. Drama Theatre Sydney Opera House. Feb 11 - Mar 9.

GRAVITY and Other Myths (GOM) is the Adelaide based acrobatic contemporary circus troupe that is stunning the world with its creative performances. Founded in 2007, it has taken its shows around the world, winning fourteen international awards.

The Mirror, its latest production, comes fresh from performances in Europe where it was described in the Berliner Morgenpost as “contemporary circus in its purest form”. If “contemporary circus” means a combination of acrobatics, dance, music, lighting and visual art then The Mirror has all of that in a performance that is breath-taking, not only for its flips and flying feats, but for the sheer theatricality of its staging.

It combines the wonder of an amazing combination of acrobatics and dance with a humorous musical narrative that weaves around and through the production. The performers, as well as incredibly strong, athletic and imaginative gymnasts and dancers, are acutely aware of the theatrical potential of technology. In this production, under the direction of Darcy Grant, they have developed a performance that acknowledges that potential as well as ‘mirroring’ how it has influenced contemporary society.

It is no wonder this relatively young company has achieved such international recognition and this is the latest example of their clever, complex, multi-faceted works.

Carol Wimmer

Hubris & Humiliation

By Lewis Treston. Sydney Theatre Company / Sydney World Pride. Wharf 1 Theatre. Jan 20Mar 4.

PERFECT for Pride, playwright Lewis

Treston has written a very funny and camp new play about a young Brisbane man leaving his bankrupt bogan family and coming to Sydney to find a wealthy husband. Think Jane Austen.

Roman Delo is perfectly cast as our honest and unsophisticated hero, Elliot, in the campy froth and bubble of Sydney. But all Treston’s characters are equally searching for love and marriage. And

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Discover the highly expressive and conceptually ambition The Mirror vimeo.com/778867900

Gravity & Other Myths’ The Mirror

Photo: Daniel Boud.

topically, everyone has a sexual identity which swings wildly, until the last act gets all the matches right.

So Elliot kisses goodbye his secret boyhood love, Warren (Ryan Panizza), to stay in Vaucluse with his fruity gay Uncle Roland (Andrew MacFarlane), who matches Elliot to a sexy, arrogant British opera director (the handsome Panizza again). The elegant walls of Roland’s mansion are artfully reused throughout by designer Isobel Hudson.

Elliot’s sister (a forthright Melissa Kahraman) arrives, leaving her simple-hearted boyfriend (Brendon Battersby) for a Berlin-based, feminist artist (Henrietta Enyonam Amevor, who excels in three roles). Elliott’s bogan Mum then arrives with new plot twists (superbly overacted by Celia Ireland).

Dean Bryant directs an inventive, crispy paced comedy, conducting his ensemble through Treston’s witty dialogue. Some of it is garbled and there’s too much facepulling, but it’s a riot and a tender one at that. And the penultimate ball scene, a spoof with Jane Austin’s own words, is masterful.

Hudson’s character costumes are a particular delight and Alexander Berlage’s lighting and Mathew Frank’s sound give smart punctuation, especially with a disco start and climax.

Martin Portus

Blue

By Thomas Weatherall. Belvoir St Theatre Upstairs. Directed by Deborah Brown. Jan 14 - 29.

WHEN Thomas Weatherall’s agent advised him to “just start writing, Tom,” she probably realised much more vividly than Tom himself just how clearly he would be able to translate his thoughts and feelings into words.

Deborah Brown saw this on her first reading of that writing, that has become Blue.

Brown directs Weatherall himself as Mark a young man looking back on the events and people that have shaped his life thus far. He shares good things, sad

STC’s Hubris & Humiliation

Photo: Prudence Upton.

Reviews

things; moments of harsh realisation juxtaposed with beautiful moments of acceptance and love. Moments that ebb and flow like the sea that has been so central to his life, eventually settling into a rhythm that is calming and acknowledging.

Tom Weatherall has proved himself on the small screen as basketballer Malakai in the reboot of Heartbreak High, and as the empathetic teenager Darren Yates in RFDS. On the stage he is even more impressive. There’s the same sincerity, the same slight rawness, but he’s there in person, finding the depth of the character he created under the guidance of a director who realises too clearly the double talent of the young man with whom she works.

Carol Wimmer

Sun & Sea

A contemporary opera by Rugilë Barzdþiukaitë, Vaiva Grainytë & Lina Lapelytë. Sydney Festival. Sydney Town Hall. Jan 6 - 8.

I WALKED out of the rain and wind of summer, and inside, the Sydney Town Hall was transformed into the playful world of the beach.

Dozens of actors frolicked on a giant sandpit under the harsh glare of the sun. They read books, played badminton, had a picnic, rubbed in sunscreen, dried themselves off, walked around and of course sunbaked. The bodies on display included children, middle-age jelly tummies, taut teenagers and even one pet dog.

A lush and esoteric soundscape accompanied the unchoreographed frolics. You search for who the solo singer of a particular song without success.

The ushers later helpfully hand you a pamphlet with the libretto of the opera.

Sun & Sea opens with the “Sunscreen Bossa Nova”.

‘Hand it here, I need to rub my legs... Cause later they’ll peel and crack And chap Hand it I will rub you...

Otherwise you will be red as a lobster.’

Many of the songs have great titles with delicious dollops of humour including “The Wealthy Mommy’s Song”, “The Workaholic Song”, “Song of Complaint” and “The Story of the Volcano Couple”.

Sun and Sea ends with an ominous warning of a world heated up where nature is only seen as replicated by a 3D printer.

‘My mother left a 3D printer turned on And the machine began to print me out When my body dies, I will remain In an empty planet without birds, animals and corals.’

This is a fun installation by Lithuanian artists, creating an image and a message you can’t easily forget.

David Spicer

A Christmas Carol

By Hilary Bell. Songs Composed by Phillip Johnston. Ensemble Theatre, Sydney. Directed by Damien Ryan. Nov 27, 2022 - Jan 9, 2023

THIS is the result of a terrific ‘what if’. What if, Hilary Bell had wondered, A Christmas Carol was presented by the Crummles Family, the fantastic Theatrical Troupe from that other Charles Dickens masterpiece Nicholas Nickleby. You’d have Vincent Crummles playing Ebenezer Scrooge, and the rest of family doubling and trebling, including Ninetta, the Infant Phenomenon, supposedly 10 years old but actually looking 20+.

This was the bright idea behind the Christmas production at the Ensemble, which had the excellent

bonus of Hilary’s father, John Bell, playing Vincent/ Scrooge. And he gives a fine, assured performance as the great grouch, overturned in a single night, Christmas Eve, with appearances by various ghosts and visionaries.

Indeed, the bonds of place and time are often broken in Damien Ryan’s production. Bob Cratchit is paid ‘15 shillings a week’, yet works on an updated Apple iPad. And costumes vary between periods: Scrooge wears very modern ties and suits in his office. No matter: the idea of the Crummles staging a version of Dickens’ great mystic vision is a fine one.

Into the mix go songs by Phillip Johnston, mainly sung by the Infant Phenomenon herself. Emily McKnight brings joy and a good voice to these, and Daryl Wallis drives

Online extras!

Imagine a beach you within it, or better: watching from above.

youtu.be/KeCek-KVKP4

Sun & Sea

Photo: Andrej Vasilenko.

them along at the piano. McKnight also manipulates the puppet that is Tiny Tim, fragile, ready to break into pieces at any minute.

Also in the cast are Valerie Bader as a cheerful Mrs Crummles, Jay James-Moody as a put-upon Bob Cratchit, and Anthony Taufa as a large, over-the-top Christmas Present who makes one truly surprising entrance from under the stage.

Frank Hatherley

Amadeus

By Peter Shaffer. Red Line Productions. Directed by Craig Ilott. Concert Hall, Sydney Opera House. Dec 27, 2022Jan 21, 2023.

IN the Opera House’s 50th year, this production provided a tantalising glimpse into what might have been. The original plan was for the Opera Theatre to be in the larger space which became the Concert Hall.

Built for this production in the newly refurbished Concert Hall was a supersized stage frame, and behind that, stairs and platforms that went on forever.

Amadeus was written as a stage play, where normally the music interludes are taped, but this presentation had a 26-piece orchestra, in the upper reaches of the set, and real opera singers.

The live musicians were (unfortunately) often part of the narrative in the background, with the actors providing commentary over the top of them.

Amadeus is famously about the fictional account of the relationship between Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and his rival composer Antonio Salieri.

It shows Mozart’s musical genius and childlike sense of vulgarity, and the fiction of Salieri’s confession that he killed his rival.

The most delicious part of the play is when Mozart humiliates Salieri by memorising a composition from the Italian musician and effortlessly improvising the piece to make it exponentially more interesting.

Michael Sheen was commanding in the role of Salieri and got the audience through some inordinately long monologues.

Rahel Romahn was delicious as Mozart prancing between vulgarity, genius, and angst. He formed a charismatic on-stage partnership with Lily Balatincz in the role of Mozart’s wife Constanze Weber.

Coming close to stealing the show was Toby Schmitz as Emperor Joseph II.

A standout feature were the divine costumes, of which the Emperor wears the most outrageous. From the fashion house Romance Was Born, and designed by Anna Cordingley, they fuse an extraordinary array of colour and frills.

Amadeus was a triumph.

David Spicer

CAMP

By Elias Jamieson Brown. Siren Theatre Co and Seymour Centre in association with Sydney WorldPride. Feb 15Mar 4.

CAMP is set against the story of the gay and lesbian Campaign Against Moral Persecution, and reminds us all that the fight for inclusion and human rights was not all fun and glitter.

Red Line Productions’ Amadeus

Photo: Daniel Boud.

Reviews

Siren Theatre Co’s CAMP

Photo: Alex Vaughan.

MTC’s Sunday

Photo: Pia Johnson.

Playwright Elias Jamieson Brown (author of Green Park) uses a documentary format, with projected data and commentary, to chart the CAMP landmarks since 1970 from kitchen table to large protests, TV debates and eventually thousands of members across Australia.

Punctuated by lively quick tableaus of protest, Brown also tells a fictional story based around those involved, who in this history are mostly lesbians their joys, loves, arguments and feuds, their policy planning and cunning campaigning.

Kate Gaul artfully directs her ensemble of seven through short, funny and often tumultuous scenes, notably when campaigners face abuse and violent attacks. The documentary form is well matched to a drama of vivid characters, notably when we are read the list of the 50 real protesters, identified in the Sydney Morning Herald after their arrest at that first 1978 Mardi Gras.

Sandie Eldridge, Adriano Cappelletta, Anni Finsterer, Lou McInnes, Genevieve Mooy, Tamara Natt and Jane Phegan give compelling performances, often in a number of roles.

It’s confusing when actors play the older selves of characters, initially performed by others. But this layering of history, with the older selves reflecting back on their CAMP past makes interesting theatre.

Angelina Meany’s hippy period clothes are a colourful delight, and Emily Ayoub’s movement transitions with the backing of Jessica Dunn’s sound gives dramatic impact.

Martin Portus

Sunday

By Anthony Weigh. Melbourne Theatre Company.

Southbank, The Sumner. Jan 16 - Feb 18.

SUNDAY Reed (Nikki Shiels) was the patron, supporter, muse and den mother for such artists as Albert Tucker, Joy Hester, and most crucially here, Sidney Nolan at Heide, the haven, sanctuary and home established in the 1930s by Sunday and husband John Reed (Matt Day) at Bulleen.

Playwright Anthony Weigh makes the triangle Sunday, John and Sidney Nolan (Josh McConville) the focus of his play and he strips much else away. Nevertheless, the play is powerfully about the relationship between artist and patron. Sunday is critic and inspirer who nurtures Nolan and pushes him to break free and take Australian art in a new direction.

Those unfamiliar with the stories of Heide may be intrigued by the vicissitudes of this woman who refused to be constrained. Others may be rather bored by long, static dialogue scenes, wondering why they should care. Those who know the stories may be dissatisfied at Anthony Weigh’s choices. Others again will appreciate the playwright’s giving us ‘things the biographers couldn’t’.

Weigh describes his play as ‘a psychological tumult occurring in Sunday’s mind.’ But what we get are quasinaturalistic scenes, with sophisticated dialogue exchanges, and in which Sunday is always the winner until she’s

not. McConville never tries to make us like Nolan, a user, self-absorbed, the artist first and last. Matt Day lifts John Reed well above victim or doormat. It is Nikki Shiels who must maintain audience engagement with all the contradictions that are Sunday. She can be as iconoclastic as she likes, protected by her family’s money, and her indulgent, enthralled husband. She might be the rebel, but it doesn’t cost her much. Yes, she nurtured, protected, inspired and funded some of Australia’s greatest painters, but at the end of the play, she is reduced to a pathetic and deluded woman who forgot that great art is not made by patrons but by egotistical and ungrateful artists.

Michael Brindley

Joseph And The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat

Lyrics by Tim Rice. Music by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Tim Lawson in association with Michael Harrison and The Really Useful Group. Directed by Laurence Connor. Capitol Theatre, Sydney. Feb 11 - Apr 9.

WHAT a perfect week to turn the Capitol rainbow! As WorldPride gathers momentum so does the spectacular Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, taking residence in its Sydney home. Paulini, as The Narrator, leads the cast, young and old, through their paces. She sparkles and shines, letting those glorious pipes go to work. Her ability to cross through all the genres Joseph covers is as amazing as the Dreamcast itself. She plays several characters, slotting in and out of the popular Bible story of Joseph (Euan Fistrovic Doidge), who was sold into slavery by his jealous brothers and subsequently rose to glory thanks to his ability to read dreams and being the all -round good guy.

Suitable for all ages, there is enough colour and movement for everyone to love. Joseph began its own story in a school back in 1968 and has evolved into this fresh energetic 2023 version. It is a wonderful journey into theatre for first timers, especially with the mixed casting of children in traditionally adult roles. The children’s chorus opening the show with Joseph’s “Any Dream Will Do” is a beautiful hint of what they can do.

The set seemed very simple in the earlier scenes, under a constellation of stars, cleverly giving way to some of the epic set work later, matching Pharaoh’s Elvis style rock’n’roll “Song of the King’’, complete with singing, sitar strumming golden statues. Pharoah is played by Trevor Ashley, a clear crowd favourite. Ashley and the audience had a mutual love affair, enjoying encores of his energetic, cheeky performance.

Other musical highlights included Country style “One More Angel in Heaven” and the penultimate song of act one, “Close Every Door”. Audiences will happily enjoy the medley of songs from the show as the cast take their bows in the “Joseph Megamix”, as they ponder the story of family, mistakes, and forgiveness. Go Go Go!

Nicole Smith

The Mousetrap

By Agatha Christie. Her Majesty’s Theatre, Adelaide.

Touring

THIS 70th anniversary production is bringing a nostalgic perspective of 1950s England to Australian theatres. When the curtain rises on a magnificent woodpanelled room, lit in warm orange tones, there’s a rapid introduction of guest house owners Mollie and Giles Ralston, played frightfully properly by Anna O’Byrne and Alex Rathgeber. Then the guests begin to arrive. The foppish man-child Christopher Wren, the arrogant Mrs Boyle, and an enigmatic retired Major Metcalf. After these three have snorted, snooted, and muted, mysterious Miss Casewell arrives and finally, Mr Paravicini, his continental accent and attitude clearly making everyone else suspicious. It’s 1950s values with 2022 pacing.

The talented ensemble obfuscate each other with questions answering questions, until the dramatic arrival of Detective Sergeant Trotter, investigating the connection between a London murder and this guest house. Tom Conroy’s Trotter plays up the class differences with a constant smirk. Presuming his authority through his notebook and pen, he cuts through the assumed nobility of Geraldine Turner’s Boyle, who, in turn, is brilliant in ensuring everyone in the theatre dislikes her.

Director Robyn Nevin hasn’t fundamentally changed the characters, but the post-war attitudes are underplayed enough so that today’s friction doesn’t interfere with the narrative. Indeed, Laurence Boxhall’s Wren works better today his childlike behaviours much more understood as from trauma, rather than being weird or even insane. Adam Murphy as Major Metcalf creates more of an enigma than the retired military archetype; Charlotte Friels is fantastic as Miss Casewell, as tightly buttoned up as her mid-century pantsuit, revealing very little beyond her fierce comebacks.

Of course, everyone is a suspect, and Christie’s plot knows exactly how and when to twist around itself, playing on our tendency to think we’re smarter than our audience neighbours. The ‘longest running play in the world’ will continue to be a ‘must-do’ on the London tourist trail but this Australian production is a jolly marvellous show on our shores.

Mark Wickett

Paradise Or The Impermanence Of Ice Cream

By Jacob Rajan and Justin Lewis. Black Ink Theatre Company NZ. Directed by Justin Lewis. Riverside Theatres Parramatta. Jan 17 - 22.

WHEN hovering between paradise and hell, haunted by the mistakes you made in the past, you don’t expect to be attacked by a vindictive vulture. But vultures play an important part in Indian mythology and Parsee sky burial customs so it’s not surprising that playwrights Jacon Rajan and Justin Lewis conjured a belligerent, feathered scavenger to make their hero Kutisar’s final journey even more confusing and more amusing.

Jacob Rajan plays the dying Kurtisar. Accepting his fate, he begins to confront and create the characters that haunt him. Himself as a young man selling chai in Mumbai; his girlfriend Meera, in her ice cream shop; a strident Parsi religious; Rao, Meer’s aunt; and an ardent authority on vultures.

Puppet maker and puppeteer Jon Coddington manipulates the feathered creature who returns again and again to plague Kurtisar. Awkward but wiley, Coddington’s vulture swoops low and lands gracelessly, its pink neck stretching towards Kurtisar, its beak opening threateningly

Lewis directs with tight blocking that allows Rajan’s energy to be sustained through a very spirited and challenging performance. Only when confronted by the vulture does the momentum of the performance slow. It is in those moments that Kurtisar really faces his fate, and the fate of the vultures themselves.

Carol Wimmer

Castle Hill Players’ A Few Good Men

Photo: Chris Lundie.

A Few Good Men

By Aaron Sorkin. Castle Hill Players. Pavilion Theatre, Castle Hill Showgrounds. Feb 3 - 25.

A FEW Good Men held the audience on knife edge, so invested that there was spontaneous applause before the final words were spoken, the intimate space perfect for this emotionally charged drama.

Director Annette Van Roden has done a brilliant job. She notes in the program that these themes remain relevant 30 years later. Sadly, this is true. Aaron Sorkin’s script has indeed held up. The impact is intensified knowing it was based on true events surrounding institutionalised bullying, one heck of a cover up and fighting for truth and justice. She handles the material respectfully and with sensitivity, pulling out some magic from her cast.

It takes a village to put on a show, I say this a lot and it is very evident the team have put in the work. The setsimple, industrial, bare - serves well for the many scenes, present and flashbacks.

The cast is led by Dimitri Armatis as Daniel Kaffee and we see a full range of his acting ability. The transformation into a man willing to fight for something, perhaps for the first time, is a powerful watch. He is supported by Jonathan Hartley as Sam Weinberg. We see some great comedy between the two, in between the drama.

Jacqui Wilson as Jo Galloway has some strong scenes with Kaffee and is his conscience, determined to fight for justice and pull this man kicking and screaming with her, all the while fighting the boys club. Wilson holds her own in this male driven drama every bit as much as Jo Galloway.

Colonel Jessep is an iconic role, played in this show by Brendan McBride, who certainly made us hate him. By the time we arrive at THAT line and the dance is almost over, the audience have well and truly been put through the wringer and collectively exhale.

Nicole Smith

PERFORMING ARTS MAGAZINE

MAR/APR 2023. VOLUME 32, NUMBER 1

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Contributors: Cathy Bannister, Anne Blythe-Cooper, Michael Brindley, Kerry Cooper, Rose Cooper, Ken Cotterill, Bill Davies, Coral Drouyn, Jenny Fewster, Kitty Goodall, Peter Gotting, John P. Harvey, Frank Hatherley, Barry Hill, Jude Hines, Beth Keehn, Fiona Kelly, Tony Knight, Debora Krizak, Neil Litchfield, Ken Longworth, Rachel McGrath-Kerr, Mel Newton, Peter Novakovich, Peter Pinne, Martin Portus, Suzanne Sandow, Kimberley Shaw, David Spicer, Mark Wickett, Geoffrey Williams and Carol Wimmer.

More reviews can be found at stagewhispers.com.au/reviews Stage Whispers 75

Lunch With Richard O’Brien

Just on a decade ago I had lunch with Richard O’Brien, the creator of The Rocky Horror Show and here I am still dining out on it (pun intended).

In an interview for what was then the 40th anniversary of the musical, Richard O’Brien admitted to me that The Rocky Horror Show was “based on my misspent youth, a puerile adolescent journey of rock ‘n’ roll and B Grade movies.

“It was a fringe theatre event. From the moment I thought of doing it to curtain up was just six months.

“If I was one of those legal firms and added up every hour I spent on it, I’d guess about three or four weeks all up.”

So what would that make an hour? The mind boggles.

Personally, I love the first act but the second act goes over my head as it is a pastiche of references to movies I am not familiar with.

Richard admitted that “it is puerile juvenilia. It doesn’t make sense, but it works and that is delightful.”

Mr O’Brien is still going strong at the age of 80, having settled back into a quiet corner of his native New Zealand.

The Bay of Plenty Times reported that he even took to the stage in November last year to sing songs from his musical, at a concert in support of the local LGBTQIA+ community.

Richard’s return to the stage was prompted by an arson attack on an historic building which had been used as a drop-in centre for gender dynamix and rainbow youth.

Events of this kind were needed to celebrate diversity in Tauranga he said, and bring together a crowd of “kindhearted and happy” people.

“In this community, I can see the need for it. We have to stand up and fight deeply for democracy. The rainbow flag is a flag for democracy. That’s why I got involved.”

Brisbane Arts Theatre Saved

A few editions ago I reported that the much-loved Brisbane Arts Theatre was on the market, threatening the continuity of the amateur company which has been operating on the site in Petrie Street since 1961.

Great news is that independent theatre company Ad Astra run by Fiona and Dan Kennedy has purchased the site, saving it from being re-developed into an apartment block.

Under the deal, Brisbane Arts Theatre will operate as normal for the next 18 to 30 months. After that the company will share the venue with professional artists and continue to run its children’s theatre at the space.

Fiona said, “This iconic venue has been the theatrical home for so many actors, directors, designers, technicians and playwrights. Its history is central to the story of theatre in Brisbane.

“We look forward to giving our professional theatre company, Ad Astra, a permanent home and the emerging artists of Queensland the opportunity to create, produce and perform. We are unashamedly ambitious.”

The Kennedys fell in love with theatre as children says Dan.

“45 years ago on a school stage in Brisbane I first played the Judge in Toad of Toad Hall and this mesmerising girl, Fiona, played the Gaoler’s daughter. This musical started a long romance for me, both with my wife and with theatre. So I was delighted to know that the first children’s play at Brisbane Arts Theatre, once we became owners, is going to be Wind in the Willows Toad of Toad Hall was the musical version of this play.”

David Spicer

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Catch the latest in new releases from Book Nook. Scan the QR code or visit youtu.be/V825fs-1M9E

Richard O’Brien and David Spicer in 2014.

Musical Spice

New theatre owners Dan and Fiona Kennedy, Una Hollingsworth, Blake Young and Gregory J Wilken.