REVIEW: Skin Hunger (Q Theatre)

November 8, 2023

[Like a Prayer] Grief, masturbation, and the catholic church – the holy trinity of Tatiana Hotere’s Skin Hunger, a one woman show that explores life after the death of a spouse and how grief can make you unexpectedly horny. Returning to Q theatre after a sell-out season earlier this year, the show has been reimagined — transformed from a three […]

REVIEW: How to Throw a Chinese Funeral

October 12, 2023

Kenangan Wangi (Sweet Reminiscence) Alamak!  It’s such a treat to hear authentic Manglish at The Basement Theatre. For the uninitiated, Manglish is the ‘rojak’ (fruit salad) combination of English-Malay-Cantonese-Hokkien-Hindi-Tamil words that typically pepper everyday Malaysian conversations.  And How to Throw a Chinese Funeral’s dialogue epitomises this Malaysian vernacular down to its core.  The play captures a familiar slice of Malaysian […]

REVIEW: Boom Shankar (Matchbox 2023)

September 14, 2023

Boom Shankar is a delightfully silly and immensely creative piece, which explores and subverts ideas around love and death. The play follows Shankar Shinde, an overconfident and arrogant bomb defusal expert, and Murray Murray, an overworked but conscientious bureaucrat in heaven. Writers and performers, Bala Murali Shingade and Aman Bajaj, must be commended for creating and embodying such complex and […]

REVIEW: Prima Facie (Herald Theatre)

June 23, 2023

[The Injustice of It All ] Holding court for 100-minutes is a feat in itself for a full cast. However doing so as a solo performer is downright laudable and absolutely deserving of the standing ovation that Acushla-Tara Kupe received on opening night. Writer Suzie Miller is a former lawyer, and it’s heartening to read that despite Prima Facie being initially […]

SCENE BY JAMES: When will Arts in Aotearoa get the Green Light?

November 20, 2021

In the same week Auckland Theatre Company and Basement Theatre confirmed they were closing for the rest of the year, I attended a one night-only performance of Back to Square One? at the Tahi Festival of Solo Performance at Wellington’s BATS Theatre. Back to Square One? is a Covid show, inspired by writer/performer Anders Falstie-Jensen’s conversations with his 95-year-old grandmother […]