William 37 by Adam J A Cass, Nov 23, 2001

by Adam J A Cass at La Mama, Nov 23 until December 2, 2001

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

It is puzzling why playwright/director, Adam Cass, chose to write this play based on Shakespeare's thirty-seven plays - puzzling mainly because it struggles to work as a piece of theatre.

Seven actors appear in Cass's ninety-minute narrative that involves numerous pseudo-Shakespearean themes including family, lovers, betrayal, patricide and some unseen terrorists.

The problem is that the narrative is incoherent and the form awkward.  The style keeps changing and the titles of scenes interrupt the flow of story.

The performers and director confuse shouting with passion. The actors do not lack commitment. All seven give the play their best shot.

However, characters are two-dimensional and display no genuine emotion. The actors are not connected to the text so they look uncomfortable and tense most of the time.

The story goes like this. Henry, a father and King (Ian DeLacy) is wounded but was evidently saved by Julia (Hayley Butcher) whose sister, Rebecca, (Vicky Fifis), is a prophetess of sorts.

William, Henry's son, (Lucas Wilson) craves the crown, marries Elizabeth (Justine Beltrame) and suffers the indignity of his father seducing her.

Confused yet? I still am. This is a valiant effort to create a new work that incorporates ideas and incidents from all the plays in chronological order. Each play warranted a two or three minute scene and was announced by the Prologue (Noni Bousfield) and Epilogue (Chris Molyneux).

It is a tall order to attempt to write a script that meets the level of its subject, the greatest English language playwright. Snippets of Shakespeare's own dialogue and poetry peep out of the play and shine. The audience clearly enjoys these references and quotations.

The design, by Paula Levis, is a clever and effective wallpapering of La Mama with enormous black and white printed text from Shakespeare's plays.

The soundscape, (Jeremy Collings) Anthony Pateras) it has some appropriate and interesting moments but is often too loud, intrusive and poorly placed.

More concentration on the central plot line before trying to feed the Shakespearean references into it might have helped the narrative but, as it stands, William 37 is convoluted and confusing.

By Kate Herbert

Inside Out, Brunswick Women's Theatre, Nov 14, 2001

Inside Out Brunswick Women's Theatre Brunswick Mechanics' Institute

Nov 14 until December 1 , 2001

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

The development of new theatrical work with inexperienced actors can be magical. Inside Out, Brunswick Women's Theatre, is a work that resonates with personal stories of the eighteen performers. 

 Director, Nadja Kostich, makes a moving and provocative work with this group of local women, most of whom have never been on stage before.

This is not a narrative based play. It does not have a linear story. There are threads of the lives of Australian women from all parts of the globe: South America, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Asia and Australia.

The thematic link is the home. The evocative design by Nina Sanadze incorporates countless window frames and a tiny doll's house floating downstage.

We hear snatches about family, childhood, love and child bearing. Some stories are melancholy, even tragic. Others are bright and hopeful. A Muslim woman, who appears only on video, proclaims in her broken but poetic English, " I can't believe I am freedom."

Kostich is masterly in her direction and nurturing of these women's input. She takes raw material and weaves a spell with it. The women trusted her with sensitive moments and personal revelations.

The form is abstract. The language is at times literal, at others lyrical.

Kostich employs a gestural language that takes advantage of repetition and symbolism to highlight moments in each woman's life. By creating a universal language and stylised representations of stories, we are able to see the threads that bind us rather than those that separate.

A moving monologue is from Maria Cabello talks about her epileptic, disabled son who only speaks to her through a hand puppet. A young woman talks about depression and suicide, a third (Lina Hassan) about escape from a violent regime. There is an eccentric and colourful scene by Julia Jeong who sings and gyrates as if in an Asian brothel.

The scene depicting a cluster of refugees knocking at our continental door is chastening given our recent experiences with boat arrivals.

Music is an intrinsic component of this production. Irene Vela, performs on guitar with the golden-voiced Linda Laasi and cellist Amanda Rowarth. The entire company of women sings but Sarah Clemens is one sweet voice amongst them.

The show has perhaps too many stories to tell and runs a little long. However, Inside Out is a fine example of community, devised theatre. Nadja Kostich must be commended for this sensitive and delightful work.

By Kate Herbert

Stones in his Pockets , Nov 13, 2001

By  Marie Jones

 Melbourne Theatre Company & Sydney Theatre Company 

at Fairfax Studio,  Arts Centre,  until 15 December, 2001

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

So often, the Irish are represented on screen as eccentric, cute and quirky. They must be bored to tears with it.

The desire to challenge these stereotypes may have been the motivation for Belfast playwright, Marie Jones, to write Stones in his Pockets.

Strangely, her characters are almost as stereotypical as those in the American 'fillums' that she parodies. It looks as if she wrote it to cater to the US thirst for Irish theatre, not to challenge it. This does not make it any less entertaining.

The residents of a village in County Kerry on the Atlantic coast of Ireland are paid forty quid as extras to add local colour to a movie. The Americans are vain, superficial and self-interested and the film seems comically reminiscent of the awful  Ryan's Daughter.

In this co-production with Sydney Theatre Company, actor, Garry McDonald makes his directorial debut. He keeps the pace swift, the laughs frequent and the stage almost empty.

Richard Roberts spare design hints at location with a slide of the Irish coastline and several film camera cases.

Actors, Greg Stone and Philip Dodd, play multiple characters and are successful in the greater part.

Their central characters, Jake ( Stone) and Charlie ( Dodd) are new to film. Both are losers who fantasise about making it in the movies and with the leading lady.

The movie system conspires to keep them in their places - at the bottom of the food chain and the food queue.

Stone and Dodd make a good comic duo, being physical opposites.  They people the stage with quaint characters, shifting gears in a beat, to change characters.

McDonald directs them as if in a dance as they weave a path from one personality to another.

Stone is delightful as the drunken old villager, Mickey, " 'last remaining extra from 'The Quiet Man.' " As Jake, he is the voice of the disenfranchised Irish. His spritely playing of Sean Harkin offsets the boy's tragedy.

Dodd, as Charlie, elicits our sympathy when he reveals his past and his dreams and his security guard, Jack, is a hoot.

There is some lack of definition in characterisation. Transitions between characters are sometimes blurry. Characters are generally  two-dimensional which is ironic given Jones' apparent intention to break the pattern of Irish representation.

Stones is a warm, amusing and charming play. However, its argument about the exploitation of the Irish is laboured by the end.

By Kate Herbert

Beyond the Gate of Heavenly Peace , NOV 7, 2001

by John Ashton and Jian Guo Wu

La Mama at Carlton Courthouse until November 24, 2001

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

The image of a Chinese student standing vulnerable and resolute in front of a tank in Tiananmen Square is indelibly printed on our common psyche. We are chillingly reminded of this event by video footage in this play.

The immigration to Australia of young people from Mainland China after the massacre is the theme of Beyond the Heavenly Gate, by John Ashton and Jian Guo Wu.

Four young Chinese arrive in Australia on student visas. Their fates and backgrounds comprise the spine of the narrative. 

In the capable hands of director, David Branson four actors, originally from China, Singapore and Indonesia, play the lives of immigrants in this timely story.

There are some problems to be ironed out in the form and structure of the play and in the performances, but its themes are compelling. When the emotional level of the acting deepens, the play is at its best. 

Zu Jihong's ( David Lih) rage at seeing his friend shot and Lu's (Fanny Hanusin) loathing of Australian hypocrisy are passionate moments.

Branson successfully edited the script from three hours to ninety minutes. The play is built on Wu's own experience as an immigrant and in the student uprising at Tiananmen where he was injured.

Ashton's performance poet background gives the script a lyrical and atmospheric language. This is enhanced by the traditional Chinese poems spoken by a Chinese 'coolie' from the 19th century goldfields. (Ron Morales)

The live, original music by Kelvin Tan, Nick Craft and Melissa Compagnoni  is evocative as is the video footage.

Wang Jun ( Warwick Yuen)plays a former soldier who shot  students at Tiananmen. His regret and shame bring him to Australia to find a new life. His friend, Zu Jihong, is an unrealistic, impractical  gambler. His sad fate is sealed. 

The frightening thread of the narrative involves Judy (Hanusin), the daughter of an influential Beijing family. She rips off new Chinese immigrants and uses her timid flatmate (Lorraine Lim) as her puppet. She despises Australians and capitalism. Ironically, she ends up a flourishing business manager. Her refugee application was a tissue of lies. 

The tragedy of the story is palpable. The struggle to survive and overcome adversity is strong. However, Wu does not stint on his criticism of those immigrants who manipulate and abuse their countrymen for their own gain.

By Kate Herbert

A Midsummer Night's Dream , VCA Drama, Nov 4, 2001

by William Shakespeare 

VCA Drama School, Studio 45, 45 Sturt St Southbank until November 18, 2001

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

The austere Victorian College of the Arts Drama School Studio 45, is transformed into a fairy forest at present.

The entry space, contrived as the Duke Theseus' palace, is rich, scarlet and gold. After the opening scene, the audience is moved to seats around the usually cavernous warehouse. The magic of theatrical illusion and design begins to weave its spell.

Set "realiser", Paula Levis, creates an ethereal wood with glittering, fairy-lit trees, falling leaves, rope swings and woody bowers. Sally Hitchcock's sheer cobweb fairy costumes are very sexy and apt. Sound designer (Lydia Teychenne) creates an evocative atmosphere and professional lighting designer, David Murray, lights the woods spectacularly.

Director of the show and Dean of the Drama School, Lindy Davies, secretes, under leaves, flimsily clad fairies brandishing torches in this magical space.

Davies keeps this romantic comedy moving at a swift pace. Each of twelve actors has a substantial role to showcase talents at this exit point from their three years of training.

As Fairy King, Oberon, Angus Grant is passionate and has a clear sense of Shakespeare's language. Alice McConnell plays a luscious Titania and is supported by a sexy, writhing band of fairies (Simon Aylott, Patrick Brammall, Jodie Harris, Rita Kalnejais, Catherine Moore, Peter Cook).

The much-loved wicked fairy, Puck, generally played by a male actor, is played by not one, but two women. (Kalnejais & Harris) They are both cheeky and impish in the role.

This doubling device is most successful in the scene where Puck must fool the two lovers, Lysander) (Aaron Halstead) and Demetrius. (Luke Mullins) who seek their lovers, Helena ( Luisa Hastings Edge) and Hermia. (Amanda Falson)

The production is charming and beautiful to watch. These students make Shakespeare accessible and comprehensible. Performances are particularly strong from Grant, Moore and Edge.

There are a few problems. Some characterisations bleed into others.

And the tradesmen, rehearsing their play for the Duke and his bride, are disappointing clowns. Much of the laughing arose from two actors (Aylott & Moore) simultaneously playing royals and clowns.

This VCA graduation production has one of the great assets of an acting school show: a large available cast, plenty of designers, production crew and fine staff to direct.

Company 2001 comprises twelve acting graduates: six men and six women. All display the burgeoning qualities of the well-trained pre-professional actor. Some are more compelling than others.

By Kate Herbert

Lucky Stiff , Oct 31, 2001

Book & Lyrics by Lynn Ahrens Music by Stephen Flaherty

At Chapel off Chapel until  November 4, 2001

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

There is a corpse on stage throughout Lucky Stiff. Yes, a corpse. A live actor spends two hours playing dead in this US musical written in 1988 by Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty.

Let me explain. In order to inherit six million dollars from his unknown American uncle's will, young Englishman, Harry Witherspoon, (Mark Doggett) must take Uncle Anthony's stuffed, dead body (Larry Hunter-Stewart) on a jaunt to Monte Carlo.

He is pursued by a peculiar collection of persons all after the money: Rita, the rapacious ex-girlfriend and accidental murderer of Uncle, (Pamela Shaw) Vinnie, her optometrist brother (Randall Berger) and a dogged young woman, Annabel, (Elizabeth O'Hanlon) supporter of a Dogs' Home.

This bizarre premise makes for really good comic business. Ahrens' lyrics and dialogue are witty and swift. Music by Flaherty derives from the US school of musicals. It is peppy and filled with singable tunes.

Rita's Confession song is a gem. The lyrics dip and dive through her complex and hilarious confession of theft, murder and blame. Shaw, a skilful and funny musical theatre performer, is delightful in the role of Rita, the over-dressed tart.

Doggett has a certain charm as the shy young shoe salesman and his light tenor voice is a treat.

As his love interest, Annabel, O'Hanlon gets all the best songs. Her Times Like This (...A Girl Could use a Dog) allows the relentless pace of this production to slow momentarily and her love duet with Doggett, Nice, is a sweet, romantic moment.

There are some cheering cameos from the chorus members, particularly Iain Murton and Greg Ross.

However, there is a tendency to over-acting and pushing the comic characters so that there is no room to breathe for an audience. But director, Luke Gallagher, keeps the pace swift. Scene changes are snappy, choruses are jolly and the choreography (Tamara Finch) is simple and effective.

The feature of this show is the musical director and sole musician, Nigel Ubrihien, He alone, on a grand piano at the side of stage, maintains the musical background and foreground of the show. He works like a Trojan and it pays off.

The show just needs to take a breath here and there.  

By Kate Herbert

Thank God for the Idiot Box, Oct 24, 2001

Cool Cat Cabaret

 La Mama at The Carlton Courthouse until October 27, 2001

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

There is so much sophisticated, hyped up performance on during the Melbourne Festival, it is refreshing to see a bunch of teenagers doing a show they created themselves.

Director, Ella Filar devised Thank God for the Idiot Box with ten teens called Cool Cat Cabaret from Princes’ Hill Community Centre drama program. It is a cabaret and sketch comedy show that is genuinely funny.

It has some laugh-out-loud scenes, polished musical numbers, slick scene segues and a couple of poignant moments. Filar keeps the pace quick and the scenes short and funny.

These kids have keen powers of observation. Their absorption of popular culture is total. They have captured the essence of television shows including the syrupy pseudo intellectual teen soapy, Dawson’s Creek and the unquestionably silly Scream Test and Popstars.

The lead male from Dawson’s Creek makes us squirm with his politically correct statement, “I don’t believe the child within is gender specific.” Another keeps leaping on stage and announcing gleefully, “I’m gay!”

The outrageously deep and husky Scream Test host (Dylan Evans) takes us on scary trips inside an abandoned orphanage and a home for old Elvis impersonators.

The weather guy on the news cheers us with news that “the clouds have happy faces tomorrow”.

The actor-writers keep the parodies coming thick and fast. In one witty moment, a grandpa listens to a child cry and says, “ I wish I was teething.”

There is some very listenable live music played by Filar between scenes and as background to sketches. The opening song, written and performed by Luke Troyner,  is a very fine number with bass, violin and guitar in a Paul Kelly style. Troyner, is a classy presence on stage playing the “I’m gay! “ guy as well as a rap artist performing a song called “Bitch!”

There are  scenes about kids left at home alone, kids with drunken parents, loser mothers, no dinner and split families. So much for the happy family.

There is a peculiar convention in the latter half. A boy watching television alone, channel surfs with his remote control until finally he disappears into the screen. This is not resolved properly but could make a clever ending.

The closing musical number is a cheerful finale to a charming and cute show with some real teenage talent on stage.

Kate Herbert

Singing in the Rain, Oct 6, 2001

 by Betty Comden and Stanley Donen music by Nacio Herb Brown and Arthur Freed

Venue: Regent Theatre Collins Street, Oct 6, 2001 until....?

Producer: RSL Com

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

The opening night crowd at the Regent Theatre burst into spontaneous applause as the onstage rain fell from the theatrical sky. My witty guest quipped, “That’s the first time I’ve ever seen an audience applaud plumbing.”

It is spectacular plumbing and what fun to see water soaking Todd McKenney’s perfectly gelled hair as he kicks water at the front row. The miniature brollies prvided were no protection.The finale has the entire cast in Paddington Bear yellow macs under big yellow umbrellas.

 “Gotta dance” is exactly how that toe-tappin’ number, Singing in the Rain, makes one feel. David Atkins with stars McKenney, Rachel Beck, Wayne Scott Kermond and Jackie Love provide us with a welcome relief from the trials of the ravaged real world.

It is a boy meets girl tale. Vaudevillian makes good in silent movies.When the first talkie changes the face of movie making forever, his career is in jeopardy.

McKenny is charming in the lead as Don Lockwood, the role made famous in the film by Gene Kelly. McKenney is all delightful teeth and smiles, dancing like a 40s hoofer.

There are moments when his singing is not note-perfect,  but Gene Kelly was no Pavarotti. McKenney is a musical theatre star since his success in Boy from Oz.

As his onstage love interest,  Rachael Beck has plenty of voice and talent to burn in the role of the pert wannabe actress, Kathy Seldon. Her solo, You Are My Lucky Star, was superb.

A major drawcard is the recognition factor. We recognise Kelly’s exceptional choreography and many songs and scenes from the movie.

Wayne Scott Kermond’s  plays Don’s vaudeville partner, Cosmo Brown, Donald O’Connor’s role.   Kermond is a skilful, seasoned and lively music theatre performer. With Atkins,he recreates the  ‘climb the wall’ dance sequence, sending the audience into paroxysms.

The “Good Morning” routine  is another recognised number in which the trio dance over the back of a couch. We sing along with Make ‘Em Laugh, Beautiful Girls, Broadway Melody and the classic word play song, Moses Supposes.

What is less successful is the slapstick and clowning. None of the three leads is a natural clown so the comedy often feels manufactured.

Which brings us to the crunch. This production feels tired. It is flat and at times lacks the intense energy required to make this kind of huge, light entertainment work at optimum level. Perhaps six months running in Sydney, getting soaked every night, has worn the cast out sooner than expected. It needs an injection of high octane pep juice.

Jackie Love’s bimbo, Lina Lamont, is a highlight. She squeaks as the vengeful, stupid silent movie actress whose shrill voice is unsuited to talkies. Her solo, What’s Wrong With Me, is sparkling, vivacious and hilarious.

Another high point was Sheree da Costa’s fantasy scene. Her dance is is sexy, lyrical and provocative.

The designers and technicians are also stars. Michael Anania’ s  set creates miniature versions of New York cityscapes and Trudy Dalgliesh’s  lighting is evocative and is echoed by whimsical fairy lights on headdresses in Paula Ryan’s wild 20s costumes.

Conrad Helfrich’s musical direction is well-supported by the band of seventeen.

This show is all bells and whistles. Take a break from your real life.

By Kate Herbert

Aussie plays in USA, Sept 29, 2001

Article: Aussie plays in USA, Sept 29, 2001

Writer: Kate Herbert

Australian artists are still gasping to have their work recognised abroad. in the theatre world, it was impossible to be taken seriously as an actor during much of the  last century unless you travelled, studied and were employed in London or New York.

Although we have overcome the worst of the ‘cultural cringe’, Australians still think that an actor or a playwright is not a success until they make a name in the US or UK.

We have movie actors succeeding in Hollywood but it still a struggle for our playwrights to get a gig overseas.

In San Francisco recently, I discovered that not even people in the theatre know a single Australian play. Ask yourself how many Aussie playwrights’ you know.

The Australian National Playwrights’ Centre, (ANPC) is trying to redress this. This week, the Artistic Director, May-Brit Ackerholt, Sydney, announced six play scripts to be sent to New York.

The plays are: Nick Enright’s A Man with Five Children, Stephen Sewell’s The secret Life of Salvador Dali, Duong Le Quy’s Meat Party which was seen at Playbox in 2000, Catherine Ryan’s Gravity and John Upton’s Men of Honour.

One will be selected as winner of The New Dramatists Exchange award.

Sadly for this black duck, my own play, Hit and Run, was in the long-short list of ten and was knocked off the short-short list. Ho hum.

Each year, a lucky Australian playwright spends three glorious theatre-drenched  weeks with New Dramatists on 44th Street near Time Square. As part of the Exchange program,  a New Dramatists US playwright participates in the workshop program at the Australian National Playwrights’ Conference in Canberra.

 I think we get the better deal - Canberra or the Big Apple? No comparison.

The prize includes an airfare, accommodation and the playwright is treated to nights at the theatre on Broadway. Some shows may have closed due to the recent events, but New York is still a smorgasbord of live theatre.

 Says Ms Ackerholt, “The winning play gets presented in a rehearsed reading to an audience of theatre people, and a play in development ( by the same playwright)  is extensively workshopped with American directors and actors before it, too, is presented to an audience.“

Playwrights submit their best play. It must be no more than 8 years old and can be previously published or produced.

 Playwrights  must have had at least one play produced and have a thorough  knowledge of Australian theatre. The winner's body of work and ability to represent the theatre industry play a significant part in the judging process.

It may seem odd to some that established playwrights such as Enright and Sewell are in a New Dramatists category, but the criteria focus on new plays rather than emerging writers.

Very few of our plays have made it over the Pacific. In January 2002, Hannie Rayson’s award-winning play, Life After George, will open on the West End in London and may travel to Broadway.

HIlary Bell’s play, Wolf Lullaby,  and Timothy Daly’s play, Kafka Dances, were produced in the USA.

Of the  eight winners since 1993, four were Melbourne writers: Sam Sejavka’sAll Flesh Is Glass (‘93), Matt Cameron’s Mr. Melancholy (‘95),  Daniel Keene’s Because You’re Mine (‘96) and Peta Murray’s Salt which was seen this year at Playbox.

The New York readings are not fully-fledged productions but, at the very least, our new Australian works are being seen in the theatre capital of the USA and our two countries are exchanging cultural capital.

By Kate Herbert

Improvisation Across the Pacific, Sept 9, 2001

Article

Improvisation Across the Pacific, San Francisco, Sept 9, 2001

Writer: Kate Herbert

Improvisation is an elaborate form of lying. I have been lying elaborately in Australia, USA, Canada and New Zealand since 1985.

Most recently, I visited San Francisco for the  BATS ( Bay Area Theatresports) Improvisation Festival. it ran throughout August with classes and shows day and night.

 BATS has its own theatre overlooking Golden Gate Bridge. It's improvisers' heaven.

The good news is that plans are afoot for the Melbourne Theatresports Inc. to host its own improvisation Festival in April 2002 to rival  BATS bacchanalia.

 The plan is to bring impro guru, Keith Johnstone,  to Melbourne during the Comedy Festival in April 2002 to teach workshops with both beginners and advanced improvisers.

Johnstone, an expatriate Englishman, is Emeritus Professor of Theatre at Calgary University, Canada.

In addition to Johnstone's visit, the San Francisco companies, BATS, True Fiction Magazine and LATS from Los Angeles as well as other companies, are planning to bring their long form improvised plays to the Comedy Festival.  Members of the companies are invited to teach on the course with Johnstone.

Classes in Melbourne may reflect the range of those offered at the BATS Festival: Narrative, Improvised Song, Shakespeare Improvised, Masked Improvisation and full-length improvised plays .

We may import a class from BATS which is known by its inventor, Diane Rachel, as ‘Sex and Violence’. It was originally called  "finding emotional intensity on the improvised stage," but the students called it Sex and Violence.

 The focus is on stage intimacy, stage combat and improvising in movie genres such as Film Noir,  Romance and Horror.

 Discussions are proceeding with The Victorian College of the Arts and The Melbourne International Comedy Festival to bring the Improvisation Festival plans to fruition.

Johnstone, who is an international improvisation leader, would be the greatest draw card for the festival. He wrote world-wide best-sellers, Impro and Impro for Story Tellers.

 He established Theatre Machine, an English improvisation company that travelled Europe. He settled in Calgary where he set up Loose Moose Theatre Company.

 Johnstone teaches all over Europe and North America, Asia. 2002 will be his first visit to Melbourne although we have been performing his formats since 1985.

Johnstone's is a genuinely eccentric character. He  combines the wisdom and presence of Peter Ustinov with the wackiness of Morecambe and Wise.  His classes are a labyrinth of weird information, anecdotes and his catch cry, "be average guys."

He rails about the damage schools did. We are expected to get things right and these demands ruin our ability to be spontaneous and to make mistakes.

Johnstone asks, " Have you done this before? No. Should you be good at it then? No. So get it wrong,.” Students’ eyes light up, their faces relax and they create astounding stories.

Johnstone is the inventor of the trademarked Theatresports,  which is enormously popular with audiences in Australia since 1985 and even had a TV series in 1987. He also created and trademarked Gorilla Theatre, Micetro and the Life Game (now a US TV show) which may be seen performing in Melbourne through Melbourne Theatresports Inc.

Melbourne is a hotbed of improvised theatre. All over you'll find improvisers telling stories, playing games and pretending to be other people. Sounds like psychosis but it's heaps more fun!  Improv rules!

Theatresports Grand Final is on Saturday September 22 at the National Theatre

By Kate Herbert

Aus Stage: website for Australian Performing Arts, July 25, 2001

Aus Stage - a website for Australian Performing Arts

July 25, 2001

Article by  Kate Herbert

Ever needed to settle a pub bet about Mel Gibson’s early Shakespeare work or Geoffrey Rush’s life before Shine?  Now you can check old reviews and prove to your mates that Nicole Kidman could never act.

Aus Stage is a website in development to be launched publicly early 2002. It does what no-one has done before - records all events on the Australian stage. This  includes professional and some amateur theatre, musicals, opera, hybrid arts, new circus, dance - everything but pure music which is huge, requiring its own specialised project

 “The seed for Aus Stage was sown after the Australian and New Zealand Theatre Record ceased publication in 1986,” says  Geoffrey Milne, Chair of Drama and Theatre at Latrobe University .

Milne’s personal archive is the main source of current and recent Victorian data for the website.  His office is littered with piles of material. Programmes, reviews and press releases, collected by Milne since the ANZTR ceased, are collated into monthly groups. It is like a huge sandpit for theatre obsessives like me to frolic in.

Joh Hartog  was the primary initiator of the project. He is Head of the Drama Department at Flinders University which, with our Latrobe Uni, is one of eight universities in a national Aus Stage consortium.

“Aus Stage came from my post-grad work on the Performing Arts Collection of SA. The actual idea to take it further came from the ADSA (Australian Drama Studies Association) executive.”

It will be “a pathway from event, to potential sources of further information, to the actual source material.,’ says Hartog. It will also link to other performing arts sites. On it, you will find performers, directors, designers, producers, venues, lists of reviews and articles.

"The site can be used as a pub bet settler,” quips Milne. Visitors to the site, according to Hartog will be, “ Researchers, reviewers, students and staff from educational institutions, the General Public.”  Milne suggests it has already saved one of his PhD students six months of research.

A partial grant was received in 1999 from DEETYA (Department of Education and Training). “With contributions from individual universities, the total exceeded a quarter of a million dollars over two years, “ says Milne with a gleam in his eye.

,Hartog anticipates the number of individual entries to be “ 5000 from 1/1/01 and a further 20,000 from before 1/1/01, but it is a bit of a guess.”

 ‘We are in the process of extending the coverage of events into the past ,”  he says.

Private collections are gold mines for this project and a recently discovered JC Williamson archive will provide material for decades of shows in Melbourne.

Company archives including those at La Mama, MTC, Playbox, Opera Australia,  Australian Ballet will be invaluable. The Wolanski collection in Sydney is enormous. “It fills a room, “ says Milne.

“The website is not merely a duplicate of the ANZTR, says Milne. The record was a monthly publication compiling reviews from 1987 to 1996. From 1988, it included New Zealand.

Noni Bousfield, graduate of Latrobe Drama, is a researcher for Aus Stage. Her task is to log Australian shows reviewed in ANZTR.

“In ‘87,’ she observes, “it had about 50 shows per month. By 1996 it held from 100 to 150.”

According to Milne, “The crucial decision was to aim for comprehensivity - a little information about a lot of events.”

 But the plan is to add  detail.  "We can append sound and video clips,,"Hartog says, "still photographs, reviews, articles, etc. to provide much more comprehensive information on some events.” He describes this as adding “vertical information” to existing “horizontal information.”

 According to Bousfield, “ It is fascinating charting the journey across Australia of a play such as Strictly Ballroom which began on stage at NIDA then became a major film.”

So get those trivia quizzes ready and lay down some bets on what Kate Blanchett was doing in April 1980. High School probably.

by Kate Herbert

Theatre Safety in Australia, July 11, 2001

Theatre Safety in Australia

By Kate Herbert

July 11, 2001

Accidents will happen anywhere, any time. Theatre may be all artifice but the accidents that happen on and off-stage are all too real. Julie Nihill cut her hand on broken crockery n a  Playbox show. Dan Spielman cut his had on a broken beer bottle just last week in KTTP 's The Share. Anni Davey fell from circus rigging during a Circus Oz show in Perth ten years ago and Heather Tetu circus performer broke both ankles at Jupiter casino some years ago.

there are candles cigarettes, electrical cables and lamps, pyrotechnics, guns, knives, high stages, scaffolding,  ladders, ropes, stage fights, choreography, acrobatics, concrete floors , unconventional venues, movable seating, stairs to climb, dark backstage space, furniture to negotiate, tricky props to manipulate, flammable costumes, and the list goes on and on and on...

Actors are dropped down trap doors (Ross Williams in Man the Balloon), work with knives (Julia Blake and Victoria Eagger in Salt Playbox) they climb up stacks of chairs (Julie Forsyth and Paul Blackman in the chairs MTC) or perform on very steeply raked stages wearing corsets and high heels (Trelawney of the wells MTC) or hang from harnesses above the stage (Margaret Mills in Angels in America)

No wonder the MTC has a consultant physiotherapist on call to advise on health and safety issues for actors.

If the actors do not do the warm up advised for them when working on a raked stage, then the production manager cannot control the damage to their backs, says Louise McRoberts.

The Melbourne Theatre Company has a rigorous safety procedures which were developed over the last few years by Ian Cooksley with Mc Roberts. it is clear that much of this material is now part of the new Safety Guidelines for the Entertainment Industry produced in draft plan by the MEAA (Media and Entertainment Arts Alliance).

Risk assessment, says McRoberts, is the first step in protecting actors against injury. When working in the Arts centre, when any hazardous activity is proposed the VCA requires a risk assessment.

When NYID performed in a city car park this year, an occupancy permit was requited. Jackson says that the City of Melbourne is particularly rigorous about safety unlike some other councils. "They require a detailed evacuation plan. They give a provisional permit until they check whether the plan complies with their regulations.

"We traded off on safety lights by providing five trained fire wardens for each show"

In theatre, there is says Production Manager of NYID, Paul Jackson, there can often be a split between the production workers and the creative team in relation to safety procedures. The creative workers may think the production people obstructionist when they raise safety issues. The production team may think the creative personnel don't know how to realise their vision.

Louise McRoberts, lecturer in production and stage management at VCA and former Stage Manager at Melbourne Theatre Company, says that the practical solutions need to be provided by the production manager in order to meet the needs of the director or other creative personnel.

In the draft plan, almost every contingency is covered although I could not find anything specifically related to use of glass on stage. McRoberts says that sugar glass can be obtained in Melbourne bout hat it is very expensive. Small companies on smaller budgets cannot afford to sue it. In A Little Night Music a sugar glass champagne glass was smashed every night.

Jackson says that budget is often the constraint for small companies. It compromises safety al the time.

Venues such as La Mama and the Carlton Courthouse are death traps, says Jackson. He believes that profit margins compromise safety.

"In the end the concern about safety has to be balanced by the fact hat very little does go wrong." " You cannot legislate on every possibility in the theatre because theatre is about pushing the boundaries. "  "We all have horror stories in the theatre but more accidents happen on building sites and that is the most heavily regulated industry."

"The most I can do is bring in a specialist," which is what he did with Front (Melbourne Workers Theatre) The scaffolding was signed off by a certified rigger. However, Jackson says, he checked every bolt himself every night of the season just to be sure.

Says Jackson, "The reality in the theater is time line versus budget versus creative drive."

Jackson believes that the major impact of the safety guidelines will be on the major organisations and venues. What we need is qualified production managers working in each company.

MEAA's representation of production workers in theater is appalling he says.

In Canada all production crew wear hard hats. The rules are different not only in different councils but in each state. Hopefully this plan will regulate to some degree the variables between companies, states and ...

By Kate Herbert

Theatre Safety - Article, July 11, 2001

Writer:  Kate Herbert

July 11, 2011

Accidents will happen anywhere, any time. Theatre may be all artifice but the accidents that happen on and off-stage are all too real. Julie Nihill cut her hand on broken crockery n a  Playbox show. Dan Spielman cut his had on a broken beer bottle just last week in KTTP 's The Share. Anni Davey fell from circus rigging during a Circus Oz show in Perth ten years ago and Heather Tetu circus performer broke both ankles at Jupiter casino some years ago.

there are candles cigarettes, electrical cables and lamps, pyrotechnics, guns, knives, high stages, scaffolding,  ladders, ropes, stage fights, choreography, acrobatics, concrete floors , unconventional venues, movable seating, stairs to climb, dark backstage space, furniture to negotiate, tricky props to manipulate, flammable costumes, and the list goes on and on and on...

Actors are dropped down trap doors (Ross Williams in Man the Balloon), work with knives (Julia Blake and Victoria Eagger in Salt Playbox) they climb up stacks of chairs (Julie Forsyth and Paul Blackman in the chairs MTC) or perform on very steeply raked stages wearing corsets and high heels (Trelawney of the wells MTC) or hang from harnesses above the stage (Margaret Mills in Angels in America)

No wonder the MTC has a consultant physiotherapist on call to advise on health and safety issues for actors.

If the actors do not do the warm up advised for them when working on a raked stage, then the production manager cannot control the damage to their backs, says Louise McRoberts.

The Melbourne Theatre Company has a rigorous safety procedures which were developed over the last few years by Ian Cooksley with Mc Roberts. it is clear that much of this material is now part of the new Safety Guidelines for the Entertainment Industry produced in draft plan by the MEAA (Media and Entertainment Arts Alliance).

Risk assessment, says McRoberts, is the first step in protecting actors against injury. When working in the Arts centre, when any hazardous activity is proposed the VCA requires a risk assessment.

When NYID performed in a city car park this year, an occupancy permit was requited. Jackson says that the City of Melbourne is particularly rigorous about safety unlike some other councils. "They require a detailed evacuation plan. They give a provisional permit until they check whether the plan complies with their regulations.

"We traded off on safety lights by providing five trained fire wardens for each show"

In theatre, there is says Production Manager of NYID, Paul Jackson, there can often be a split between the production workers and the creative team in relation to safety procedures. The creative workers may think the production people obstructionist when they raise safety issues. The production team may think the creative personnel don't know how to realise their vision.

Louise McRoberts, lecturer in production and stage management at VCA and former Stage Manager at Melbourne Theatre Company, says that the practical solutions need to be provided by the production manager in order to meet the needs of the director or other creative personnel.

In the draft plan, almost every contingency is covered although I could not find anything specifically related to use of glass on stage. McRoberts says that sugar glass can be obtained in Melbourne bout hat it is very expensive. Small companies on smaller budgets cannot afford to sue it. In A Little Night Music a sugar glass champagne glass was smashed every night.

Jackson says that budget is often the constraint for small companies. It compromises safety al the time.

Venues such as La Mama and the Carlton Courthouse are death traps, says Jackson. He believes that profit margins compromise safety.

"In the end the concern about safety has to be balanced by the fact hat very little does go wrong." " You cannot legislate on every possibility in the theatre because theatre is about pushing the boundaries. "  "We all have horror stories in the theatre but more accidents happen on building sites and that is the most heavily regulated industry."

"The most I can do is bring in a specialist," which is what he did with Front (Melbourne Workers Theatre) The scaffolding was signed off by a certified rigger. However, Jackson says, he checked every bolt himself every night of the season just to be sure.

Says Jackson, "The reality in the theater is time line versus budget versus creative drive."

Jackson believes that the major impact of the safety guidelines will be on the major organisations and venues. What we need is qualified production managers working in each company.

MEAA's representation of production workers in theater is appalling he says.

In Canada all production crew wear hard hats. The rules are different not only in different councils but in each state. Hopefully this plan will regulate to some degree the variables between companies, states and ...

By Kate Herbert

Salt, March 23, 2001

Salt by Peta Murray

Playbox Theatre at Beckett Theatre March 23, 2001

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Mothers and daughters. Food and kitchens. They seem part of the same picture. Mothers teach daughters to cook. They fight and make up over the kitchen table and pots of tea.

In Peta Murray's new play, Salt, it is, ironically, the daughter, Meg, (Victoria Eagger) who is the devoted, pernickety, innovative cook and her mum, Laurel (Julia Blake) who cooks meals from Heinz cans. It is a pity we in the back rows miss the aromas of the on-stage cooking.

The play is directed effortlessly and seamlessly by Aubrey Mellor a on a sleek design by Trina Parker.

The history and relationship of these two women is played out in their kitchens. They cook, argue, reminisce. We very quickly realise that memory is unreliable, particularly for Laurel who is losing her grip on her past. She is fearful of the unspecified 'tests' that will name her dementia.

Julia Blake's Laurel is a complex characterisation of the unravelling of a woman who has always been narcissistic, flirtatious and abandoned. It is a movin portrayal of the fear and despair that accompanies Alzheimer's. Roles are swapped. The mother becomes the mothered, the baby bird feeds the mother bird.

Victoria Eagger plays Meg, the brisk, practical 'kitchen fascist' who has missed her final chance at relationship and children. She now devoted herself to her mother.

Vegetables and fruit feature throughout. Fresh specimums are displayed in spotlights in the set. Tomatoes, potatoes, mushrooms, eggplant, rhubarb are paraded like celebrities by Paul English who plays an anonymous Man/Narrator. He provides us with scientific details of their origins and poisonous properties. He is charming and witty as the representation of all men in their lives.

Murray splices warm, naturalistic scenes between the women with their internal monologues, memories, recipes and readings from famous foodies: "Fulton, Margaret."

It is a study of the mother-daughter relationship and the deterioration of a mind with age but it is also about lost dreams.

Mysteries are suggested early in the pasts of both women. The revelations of these in the final scene are disappointing in the script. They seems contrived and arch, lacking any genuine significance in the greater scheme of things, in the face of dementia.

It is an enjoyable meal of a play.

By Kate Herbert

Scenes of the Beginning from the End , NYID

Not Yet It's Difficultat Public Office Car Park

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

March 20, 2001

We are meaning makers. Our little synapses go mad hooking up seemingly disconnected images or sequences and making meaning of them.

Contemporary performance groups such as Not Yet It's Difficult, demand an audience some intellectual work to pull the threads of themes together.

In their latest work, performed in the still active car park of the Public Office in West Melbourne, audience participates in an event that combines video installation, performance art, contemporary dance and  a parody of Neighbours.

The themes forming the glue for all these forms revolve around notions of how and why we live where we do. We begin our video and movement journey in the desert then travel via images and dialogue to the suburbs. Then we take a video train to the city and end up right back in the Public Office building again.

The opening sequence is clearly the most successful component of the performance. It is the scene in which the various elements of performance are most cohesive and most creatively combined by director David Pledger, dramaturg, Peter Eckersall and the ensemble of seven actors.

We are guided upstairs, warned about safety issues and exits, ushered to surprisingly comfortable seating. Images of the outback are set behind a complex and fascinating movement sequence that conjures thoughts of desert creatures, lizards and birds. Evocative sound design (Roger Alsop) and stark lighting completes the picture.

The very end of the final sequence , after we return to the screen after out journey around the suburban stereotypes and soap opera, is also effective linkage of forms.

The performers (Paul Bongiovanni, Greg Ulfan, Tamara Saulwick, Louise Taube, Tony Briggs, Natalie Cursio, Cazarine Barry) appear on screen via live video cameras, mocking and mimicking the office workers who are trailing past us out of the car park in their cars.

There are some very entertaining moments in the suburbs with teenagers and adults arguing, families living out the Neighbours dream and even a Japanese and Vietnamese video version of Charlene and Scott in Ramsay Street.

However, the critique of lifestyle, city and suburbia lacks depth. Some of the acting is limited but the physical work and choreography are delightful.

By Kate Herbert

Design for Living, MTC, March 15, 2001

by Noel Coward

MTC at Playhouse, Mar 15 to  14 April, 2001

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Noel Coward was a prolific playwright and song-writer. His plays are stuffed with witty dialogue and smart, urbane, often glib characters. Design for Living written in 1932, is no exception.

It was controversial in its time. It is not, however, his best or funniest work. Nor does it have the poignant edge of his play, Private Lives, nor its level of incisive commentary on the immoral middle classes and their petty squabbles and concerns.

Design for Living is directed with style by Rodney Fisher at a swift pace appropriate for Coward.  It is a co-production for the State Theatre Company of South Australia and the MTC. Dale Ferguson's design is exceptionally rich. His New York apartment drew gasps of pleasure from the audience.

It focuses on three self-centred and privileged people who love each other but are careless with each other's affections and with their mutual friendships. It is social farce about love and lust in the 1930s. It may be out of date now to be horrfied at couples living together unmarried but it is still awful to watch such blatant selfishness in action.

In Act One, Gilda (Josephine Byrnes) lives in Paris with Otto (Rhys Muldoon), a young portrait painter. Their mutual friend Leo (Nathan Page) arrives and Gilda and he fly off together.

In Act Two, Otto interferes with their little love nest in London when he arrives as a successful painter. Leo meanwhile has another hit play. Gilda runs off with their older conservative friend , Ernest. (Dennis Olsen) Yes, Gilda marries him and escapes from her two lovers to live in benign boredom in New York .

Byrnes is a bright presence on stage and creates a nervy, deceitful and  immoral creature of the period. Her journey to conservatism and back again is credible.

As Ernest, Olsen creates a powerful and substantial character. Ernest is the only character who deserves our sympathy when he is dumped unceremoniously by his wife.

Muldoon gives an arch and witty portrayal of Otto . Page seems uncomfortable in the style but relaxes in the very funny drunk scene between the two men.

There is much unresolved sexual tension between all three characters. It is surprising that Fisher did not exploit the homo-erotic layers of Otto and Leo's relatiionship. It is palpable in Coward's script.

By Kate Herbert