The first thing you will notice about The Importance of Being Earnest at the Sydney Theatre Company is the stage. Impressive seems an inadequate description for such an elaborate set design. Created by Charles Davis, the audience is transported to another world, a world of excess, decadence and extremely high ceilings. With incredible attention to…
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Adelaide’s Space Theatre has been wonderfully transformed into Emerson’s Bar and Grill. With moody dark lighting, café seating near the stage and a three-piece jazz band, the audience is transported back to the 1920s. Kym Purling plays the part of pianist Jimmy Powers, who introduces us to the band, with Victor Rounds on Double Bass…
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Boy meets girl. Then meets again. And again, and again across various states of time and space in numerous dimensions. Some meetings see a failure to launch, others bloom, with the couple going through a number of relationships across the multiverse, with only minor alterations making, in this case, literal worlds of difference. Ian Michael…
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Directed by Simon Phillips, Divas is a captivating journey through time, exploring the (often quite short) lives of the biggest music stars to ever grace stage and screen. There are ten, in fact, each with their own unique personality, connection to music, and outlook on life and love. Unbelievably, there is one star who brings…
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Do you believe in ghosts? Keep an open mind and uncover the truth in 2:22 A Ghost Story – a supernatural thriller play that’s transformed Melbourne’s Her Majesty’s Theatre into the innards of a potentially haunted house. Belief and skepticism clash when Jenny (Gemma Ward) senses a strange presence in her home, but her husband…
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If the end of the world was upon you, how would you respond? Hopeful optimism? Or perhaps defiant acceptance? It’s a question that has found its way into social consciousness a lot over the last few years, and it forms an integral part of Sydney Theatre Company’s On the Beach. Directed by Kip Williams and…
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Romeo & Juliet is a classic love story. It has inspired many different adaptations over the years including Baz Luhrmann’s famous film and the stage musical & Juliet, which ponders what could have happened if Juliet didn’t die. Unfair Verona is another new interpretation, in a style largely cut from the same cloth as The…
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At the tender age of five, my life took a remarkable turn as my family migrated to this sunburnt Australian land from Northern China. Little did I know that this journey would shape the very core of my identity, transforming it forever from the days of my humble industrial neighbourhood in Shenyang. As the years…
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Tick, Tick… Boom! is the semi-autobiographical story of playwright Jonathon Larson, who was most notable for creating the musical RENT. This story focuses on his time as a struggling writer, living in New York, writing his first musical, Superbia. The story opens with the sound of ticking, the sound that becomes louder and louder in…
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Direct from the West End, Disney’s classic Beauty and the Beast has arrived in Sydney at the Capitol Theatre. This reimagined production brings together the original creative team: Broadway’s Matt West as director/choreographer, Alan Menken as composer, Tim Rice & Howard Ashman as lyricists. Alongside them are Natasha Katz (lighting designer) and Ann Hould-Ward (costume…
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The Poison of Polygamy at the Sydney Theatre Company will take you on a journey. From China’s Qing dynasty to Victoria’s nineteenth-century goldfields, and the colourful landscape of Melbourne’s Chinatown, the play seamlessly shifts focus. Based on the novel by Wong Shee Ping and adapted for the stage by Anchuli Felicia King, The Poison of…
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Known around the world as the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin is one of the most iconic singers of all time. During her impressive career, she won 18 Grammy awards and sold over 75 million records. Her incredible life and the songs defining her career form the heart of the stage production, ARETHA: A Love…
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It’s an exciting time for the Australian arts when we get to see an ambitious, personal, and original Australian musical take the stage. Driftwood the Musical presents a captivating tale of hope and perseverance which delves into poignant themes involving the Holocaust, inter-generational trauma, sacrifices in times of war, and the perseverance of art. Created,…
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Climate change, global warming, greenhouse effect, carbon emissions – there are many words to describe it and even more emotions associated with its impacts. Scenes from the Climate Era at Belvoir explores our complicated and tumultuous relationship with climate change. Presenting over fifty stories which delve into climate science, activism, and denial, it doesn’t pull…
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MAMMA MIA! The Musical boasts a coverage of 22 of ABBA’s greatest hits, loved by multiple generations since the super group first stepped on stage in the 1970s. This stage musical, first coming to life in London in the 1990s, has gone on to perform in over 20 languages around the world. It also turned…
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From the big screen to the stage, the story of Once has struck a chord with audiences all around the world since its inception in 2007, evoking tears of laughter, tears of joy and tears of sadness. Making its long-awaited return to Melbourne, this award-winning production from Darlinghurst Theatre Company is a truly enchanting musical…
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Trigger warning: this review/play covers the topic of abortion, if that’s triggering for you please give it a miss. For many, the idea of being trapped in an elevator is the stuff of nightmares. Throw in an ex-partner and it suddenly becomes the last place you want to be in the world. Unfortunately for the…
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Come From Away is a hit musical based on the true story events of the September 11 WTC tragedy. It tells the incredible story of how 38 planes were diverted from North American airspace to a remote town in Newfoundland, Canada. The locals opened their hearts and homes to almost 7000 scared and confused passengers….
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Debuting on Broadway in 2010, American Idiot (based on the Green Day album of the same name that defined a generation) has become a beloved production that went on to win two Tony awards. It was developed by bandmates Michael Mayer and Billie Joe Armstrong and has finally come to Melbourne’s Chapel off Chapel thanks…
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Described as a “coming-of-age comedy-drama”, COLLAPSIBLE, at the Old Fitz Theatre in Sydney’s Woolloomooloo, explores identity and that all too familiar feeling of being completely lost. Written by Margaret Perry and directed By Zoë Hollyoak and Morgan Moroney, this one woman play centres on Essie (Janet Anderson). She’s lost her job, her girlfriend and, as…
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Ari Arari is a musical based on a 600-year-old Korean folk song. “Arirang” is surmised to mean “my beautiful one,” and the story is set in the Gangwon Province of Korea. Symbolic of the enduring bond between North and South Korea, it is a sweeping epic story of a daughter’s search for her carpenter father…
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A man sits reading in a room, surrounded by artefacts of a past era; a record player, an unfinished abstract oil painting; a rotary telephone. He’s a counsellor (Cha Hyun-suk, who also wrote and directed the play) and he is expecting a patient. His patient (Taesik Shim) is to be his last before he retires…
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You know the classic ‘boy meets girl’ tale – now witness the remix that flips the script on the conventional and gives Juliet the opportunity to be the leading lady of her own life’s story. What if Romeo & Juliet didn’t end with Juliet taking her own life? What if she embarked on a journey…
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Adelaide Arts Theatre is hosting the first ever Korean season for the Adelaide Fringe. AtoBiz and Global Cultural Exchange Committee have hand picked a small selection of physical theatre and music shows. The story Hello the Hell: Othello is a play by Creative Jakhwa, a young team that started with the meaning of “flowering a…
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Calling all budding detectives! There’s been a murder in London and we need your expertise to find the killer before they claim their next victim. Put your wits to the test and feast your eyes on the world’s longest-running play, The Mousetrap. Born from the incredible mind of Agatha Christie, this genre-defining murder-mystery has astonished…
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i am root begins with a traditional Acknowledgement of Country, before Canadian-born Olenka Toroshenko calls upon her own ancestors to join her performance. From fleeing war and settling in Canada, to following love to Australia, what follows is a personal and eclectic mix of Ukrainian poetry, storytelling, dance, comedy and even cooking. There are tragic…
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If you can believe it, it’s been 50 glorious years of Rocky Horror, across stage and screen. It all started in a small 63-seater in London on the evening of 19 June 1973. Since, it has been performed worldwide in over thirty countries and has been translated into more than twenty languages. Of course, there…
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Created by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber over half a century ago, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat has returned to Oz for the 2022/23 tour. It was this musical that gave Rice and Lloyd Webber the start in their illustrious careers which continued with theatrical collaborations including Jesus Christ Superstar and Evita. For…
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Every now and then, there’s a show that reminds you how truly transformative theatre can be. A performance that has you holding your breath, unmoving, entranced, until the final moment. For me, one of these shows was Eddy Brimson’s one-man play, Naughty Boy, at Fringe World. In the dark theatre space of the Belgian Beer…
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When sitting down to review Liz Kingsman’s critically acclaimed One Woman Show at the Sydney Opera House, the real challenge is trying not to reveal too much while simultaneously describing one of the funniest comedic performances you’ll see this year. Written and performed by Kingsman and directed by Adam Brace, One Woman Show uses self-deprecating,…
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