REVIEW: In the Next Room or The Vibrator Play (Auckland Theatre Company)

March 20, 2012

A Play In Need of Its Own Treatment [by Rosabel Tan] We live in an age of sexual liberation: where mutual attempts to disentangle emotional and physical expressions of love are treated as an act of empowerment – friends with benefits, no strings attached. But whether they can be separated is another question altogether, and this is a focal point […]

REVIEW: Birds (The Mangere Arts Centre)

March 17, 2012

Real, Raw and Revealing [by Sharu Delilkan] It was like dejavu arriving at The Mangere Arts Centre, from Avondale, only to be thrust back into the thick of my own neighbourhood. Set in Avondale, Birds incorporates the suburb’s iconic sites — Avondale Community Centre, Hollywood Cinema, Rosebank Road and Riversdale Reserve. These brilliantly selected audio-visuals, laced with witticism and whimsy, […]

REVIEW: Much Ado about Nothing (Summer Shakespeare)

March 10, 2012

Shakespeare does it again! [by James Wenley] Turns out that Much Ado about Nothing is actually much ado about quite a lot of things… In some ways a ‘greatest hits’ of Shakespeare’s devices, Much Ado’s comedy takes in bumbling authority figures, a disguised seduction, various tricks played on characters, a Shrew-like Battle of the Sexes… there’s even a sort of small boy […]

REVIEW: The Seven Funerals of Charlie Morris (Elephant Nation)

March 7, 2012

Dying of Laughter [by James Wenley] On a routine visit to the hospital after a blow to the head caused by his best friend re-enacting Fight Club, Charlie Morris is informed he has a terminal illness, and his days are numbered. Now that is a profound life changing moment; too big to even begin to understand for people outside of […]

REVIEW: The Last Five Years (Last Tapes)

March 4, 2012

A show to fall in, and out of love.. [by James Wenley] In the middle of Musical The Last Five Years, Jamie and Cathy pledge their loves and their lives in the song The Next Ten Minutes, which  features both a tender proposal (“Will you share your life with me / For the next ten minutes? / …. And if […]

REVIEW: Play Me Deadly (Rebels and Robots)

March 2, 2012

B-Theatre Fun: So bad its good [by James Wenley] Bela Lugosi’s career was rock bottom by the time he was working with infamously bad film director Ed Wood. After gaining success as Dracula in the 1930 film, Lugosi became a regular in horror films. By the 1950s however, he was washed up and irrelevant until Ed Wood bought him out […]

REVIEW: His Mother’s Son (Pacific Fringe)

March 1, 2012

Pacific Stories, Pacific People [by Sharu Delilkan] I have to admit that I’ve not been privileged enough to have see the previous two incarnations of Samoan playwright Leilani Unasa’s critically acclaimed play His Mother’s Son. Originally from Mangere, Unasa bringing His Mother’s Son to the Mangere Arts Centre could not have been more appropriate. The story is a tale of […]

REVIEW: Top Girls (Silo)

February 27, 2012

You Can Be a Successful Woman, Too! (Terms and Conditions Apply) [by Rosabel Tan] When people talk about women having careers, there’s a trade-off implied: You can’t have a career and a family – one will suffer if you try, and if you pursue the former, you’re defeminised: there’s something wrong with you or, at the very least, your womb. […]

New Performance Wrap-up: Show Pony, Providence and Wake Less

February 26, 2012

You want us to do what? [by James Wenley] Show Pony asks you to get naked. Providence asks for a pash. And Wake Less asks you to dinner… among other things.   Three shows where the normal ‘rules’ don’t apply. Three shows where the audience is an important part of the performance. Three shows that made up for one intense, […]

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