Make Nice launched in 2016 and was born from the desire to push back against the “boys club” which exists within creative industries (most industries, let’s be honest) and show creative women they don’t have to be competitive to get ahead. Women can “make nice” and still be successful. In fact, when creative women join…
Michael Ralph is one of Australia’s leading choreographers, always striving to create work that is ground-breaking, fresh and relevant. As part of this year’s Melbourne Fringe Festival, Ralph has gifted audiences with a 60-minute dance piece that explores every facet of an artist’s psyche. It is appropriately titled SELF, and stars none other than musical theatre heart-throb,…
If you enjoyed Jersey Boys then you’re sure to love the latest jukebox musical to hit Aussie shores: Beautiful – The Carole King Musical. Starring the sublime Esther Hannaford and featuring an incredible collection of hits, Beautiful is slickly produced and expertly performed. It’s a guaranteed good night out for all. Billed as a musical…
Learn how to play the fascinating, awe-inspiring taiko! Play Taiko will leave you with a unique group experience that will energise, stimulate and excite. Taiko playing requires great energy and teamwork, as well as total integration of one’s mind, body and spirit; the rhythm of the taiko pulsates through your body – its expression is…
Until the Lions is derived from a tale in the Mahabharata about Amba and Shikhandi. Director Akram Khan has a long history with the Mahabhrata, having performed in Peter Brook’s version in 2005. In this dance piece, Khan brings to life the story of Amba, who on her wedding day is abducted by Bheeshma as…
Sondheim, as always, has to make things difficult. If it’s not in his chords then it’s the subject matter of his musicals. However Assassins, one of the more rarely performed of the Sondheim repertoire, finds itself locked and loaded in good hands with Dean Bryant at this latest production at the Hayes. Superb casting all…
I Just Came To Say Goodbye is more than a farewell to bad relationships, bad childhoods and bad dreams. It’s a stupendous sound off of every emotion you’ve spent, every moment you’d traded off and every secret you’ve denied. Worth the lining up, and the extra red from the La Boite’s house bar, the cacophony…
Edith Podesta truly writes from all the world’s perspective. The parts of the world that are crying, the parts that are growing, even the parts that are howling. A modest plot that even we feel potentially gives too much away in the blurb seems innocent, heartwarming perhaps. Very David Williamson in design, but not even…
How can you resist a show named Terror? But don’t be fooled, it’s a quiet terror. It creeps up on you long before you realise its there. But once you see it, what’s most terrifying is asking yourself would you do it? At first, it seemed risky to have a court drama. Many a time…
Ahead of Make Nice: Un-conference for Creative Women, which kicks off tomorrow in Sydney, we caught up with the event’s Keynote speaker Ann Friedman, an acclaimed freelance journalist who writes about (among other things) gender, media, technology, and culture. How did you start out as a writer? What were some of your first jobs? I am one…
The most irreverent and eclectic music and art festival, MONA FOMA (MOFO), is coming back to Australia in January 2018. The festival will return to Hobart, as well as launching an exciting Mini Mofo addition in Launceston. The full festival line up is not expected to be released until Friday 13 October 2017, but organisers…
A few days ago our beloved Amy Winehouse would have turned 34 years old. It’s still so hard to think that this world no longer has such a soul gifting us with her talents. All is not lost however, as an exhibition in her honour is so close to opening thanks to the Jewish Museum…
Melbourne artist Elyse De Valle has been announced as this year’s winner of the Australia Glenfiddich Artists in Residence Program. Now in its fifteenth year, the program offers Australian and New Zealand artists the chance to win a prize worth over 20K, including a three-month residence to live and work at The Glenfiddich Distillery near…
Brisbane, you are killing me this time of year! Last week I had BIGSOUND and interviews with artists, I moderated two panels for Brisbane Writers Festival, I launched Access Arts brilliant festival Undercover Artist Festival and then the Brisbane Festival kicked off as well! My pick of the Brisbane festival so far is Laser Beak Man presented…
The Never Ending Story did end. No actual “Wolf” on Wall Street. Not even a small metallic-looking coat in Full Metal Jacket. Why don’t we keep our promises? This as well as other important questions will not be answered – nor asked – in the premier of Willem Richards’s new off-the- wall one man sketch…
In a Sydney-exclusive, Melbourne Theatre Company’s critically acclaimed musical What Rhymes with Cars and Girls will be presented by Riverside Theatres from 11th to 14th October as part of its national tour. An intimate musical gem, What Rhymes with Cars and Girls weaves together the poetic songs from the ARIA award-winning debut solo album by…
Melbourne Fringe Festival is an opportunity for theatre lovers and theatre novices to open their minds up to the many creative minds this great country of ours has. Presented by Darebin Arts Speakeasy and Fabricated Rooms, The Sky Is Well Designed is a two-person, 60-minute exploration into the soundscape of our atmosphere, and how certain tests can…
Set in the early 1990s, at the height of televangelism, Miracle City tells the story of the Truswells, a family with a dream to build a religious theme park, and the extreme lengths the patriarch, Ricky Truswell, will go to in order to make their dream a reality. A brand new production of Nick Enright…
Over thirty years old, Diving for Pearls still has resonance for today’s audience. It paints a bleak picture of the future of manufacturing in Australia, which has been on a steady decline since the 1980s and 90s, when this play was written. It is a very Australian story, and the images the text and set…
It takes courage to stand in front of a room full of people and tell a story. It takes even more courage to do so in your underwear. But to stand in front of a room full of people, in your underwear, and tell stories about your own personal experience with sexual assault… that takes…
A female comedian, dressed as a male comedian, dressed as a silent Gaulier clown trying not to offend anyone. That is the premise of Zoe Coombs Marr’s award-winning show Trigger Warning, and it promises to have you in stitches. After a successful run last year that saw the Australian comedian win a Barry Award, Zoe…
Several years ago, a virus came to Sicily. It stalked the adults, picking them off one by one, until all that remained was handful of children. Struggling to protect her younger brother, Astor, Anna knows her days are numbered. When she reaches adolescence, the disease will come for her too. Falling in with a boy…
“We’re in church” said one fellow audience member as we walked into the basement theatrette of the Butterfly Club. Rows of recycled pews and framed Elizabethan portraiture sit inside this quirky performance space, but what followed was far from biblical. An hour of clowning, astronaut-themed burlesque and bubble-gum art. Now, that’s the kind of religion…
If you’re a lover of cinema and history, Deborah Pearson has you covered! In a unique performance that uses audio and memory, History History History transports audiences back to October 23, 1956 and recreates a film that was supposed to screen at the Corvin Cinema the night the Hungarians rose up against the Soviets. Making her…
The New Chinese are the Chinese people born on mainland China after 1949. The book of the same name is intended for Australian readers who don’t know a lot about China, but who are eager to learn; either for business or pleasure. Australia has become a hotspot for Chinese immigrants, your next hire or business…
Night festivals are a chance for cities to showcase their prowess in a way that glitters. The Singapore Night Festival (SNF) is always evolving and in its tenth year they pulled out all the stops. For 10 balmy nights young and old were out of the house and hitting the streets in what was a celebration of…
Australians let us all rejoice for we are a nation full of self-deprecating individuals with a great wit and a keen sense of humour. Never has this been more apparent than in the book, The Wisdom of Oz. This should be required reading for every true blue Aussie (forget the citizenship test) because it’s chock…
In the five years since I left Singapore (my home for two years) I was amazed to go back and learn how much the government has invested into developing, nurturing and showcasing arts and culture in Singapore. Whether it be giving locals a platform to share their works, or inviting international legends to exhibit on…
Bram Stoker’s Dracula has been interpreted many times over the years on stage and screen. This time, Queensland based Shake and Stir Theatre Company have breathed new life into the ageless classic. A single lit window on a darkened stage is the only clue to what is to come. There are shocks a plenty –…
As part of the National Theatre Live broadcasts, we have been privy to some of the West End’s most prestigious plays from playwrights that span far and wide. However, Tony Kushner’s multi-award winning two-part play Angels in America is something else. You will never see anything like this in your life. Ever. Directed by Olivier and Tony award winner…
