Julia, MTC REVIEW 4 June 2024 ***1/2

 

THEATRE

Written by Joanna Murray-Smith, presented by Melbourne Theatre Company, production by Sydney Theatre Company & Canberra Theatre Centre co-production

At MTC, Sumner, Southbank Theatre until 13 July 2024

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Stars: ***1/2 (3.5)

This review is published only on this blog. I’ll present a radio review on Arts Weekly on 3MBS on Sat 15 June 2024. KH

Justine Clarke in Julia- image by Prue Upton

 

Julia Gillard’s misogyny speech on 9 October 2012 was an unforgettable piece of extemporised political debate is incisive, informed, accurate and a laudable dissection of the leader of the opposition, Tony Abbott’s frequent sexist and misogynistic comments over the previous years.

 

This speech is delivered in full by Justine Clarke at the end of Joanna Murray Smith’s play, Julia. Its impassioned and precise content, and Clarke‘s thrilling and audacious delivery of it, brought the opening night crowd spontaneously to its feet in an ovation for Gillard, her speech and Clarke.

 

This was not an ovation for the production itself – although the show is strong enough – but for the speech, Clarke’s  performance of it, and its placement as a momentous ending. During the play, we spend a great deal of time waiting for these most dramatic moments.

 

Murray Smith’s Julia is a smart, witty, one-person play with a non-linear narrative comprising episodes, characters and interactions from Gillard’s life woven into a coherent whole.

 

The fictionalisation of Gillard’s life is an extrapolation on stories, biographies, articles and her own comments. Essentially, it follows Gillard’s unexceptional persona and professional life until she became Prime Minister. After that elevation, she became a controversial figure and, finally, an iconic, powerful woman and a torchbearer for feminism when she delivered that exceptional misogyny speech.

 

Sarah Goodes’ direction is swift and deft, focussing on the character of Gillard, Murray Smith’s brisk humour and political commentary.

 

Clarke’s performance is compelling and masterly, as she shifts from Julia as an ambitious and intelligent teenager with a talent for debating, to a successful lawyer, a powerful member of the Labor Party and Member of Parliament and, finally, Prime Minister after she topples Kevin Rudd.

 

Clarke shifts in and out of direct address to audience in what is not an impersonation of Gillard but a representation of her behaviour, and her career highlights.

 

Intermittently, Clarke’s voice shifts to a direct imitation of Gillard’s recognisable broad Aussie vowels and twang but these moments are peppered throughout. This avoids any impersonation which was a feature of Heather Mitchell’s performance in RBG.

 

One weak element is the tokenistic presence of a second, younger woman (Jessica Bentley) whose role is extraneous and distracting as she trails around the stage in Clarke’s wake, perhaps representing young women in politics and society. The rear projection of video of young  people was also a distraction.

 

Despite these awkward and unnecessary elements, Julia is an engaging production with a fine performance by Clarke and the final misogyny speech is worth the ticket.

 

by Kate Herbert

 

 

Sunset Boulevard REVIEW 29 May 2024 ***

MUSICAL THEATRE

Sunset Boulevard, Music by Andrew Lloyd Webber; Book & Lyrics by Christopher Hampton and Don Black.

At Princess Theatre  Final date announced.

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Stars: *** (3)

This review is published only on this blog. I’ll present a radio review on Arts Weekly on 3MBS on Sat 1 June 2024. KH

Sarah Brightman - PIC CREDIT DANIEL BOUD

Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical, Sunset Boulevard, is a saccharine, sentimental version of William Wilder’s 1950 movie which is a biting indictment of the Hollywood movie machine and its star system that chews up and spits out its artists.

The narrative is peculiarly reminiscent of The Phantom of the Opera in which a reclusive, older man (the Phantom) is obsessed with a young woman. In Sunset the older, reclusive movie star, Norma Desmond, becomes obsessed with, and virtually imprisons the young,  impoverished Hollywood screen writer, Joe Gillis (Tim Draxl).

Even the music and songs, particularly those sung by Norma, echo musical motifs and melodies in Phantom to an unnerving degree. In fact, on the way home I was singing a song from Phantom rather than one from the Sunset!

Sarah Brightman has come to Australia to play Norma, this faded, former star of the silver screen, in a production directed by Paul Warwick Griffin.

Strangely, Brightman’s career is almost a mirror of Norma’s once lauded movie career: the glittering star that Brightman was in Phantom when she initiated the role of Christine Daee all those years ago, is a stark contrast to her stage career decades later.
 
Brightman has not performed a theatrical role on stage for almost three decades – and it shows. Evidently, she does occasional concerts and has had enormous success with recordings and concerts and is still held in high regard.

She focuses her performance on the other worldliness of Norma, her obsessiveness, delusions, self-absorption and complete alienation from the real world: the real world for Norma being Hollywood movie set which, in fact, is nothing like the real world.

The role requires power, charisma and a commanding stage presence but, unfortunately, Brightman does not have it here. Her voice has not survived all those decades. It has rather too much vibrato and lacks control, although the voice was stronger in the second half and her songs were certainly more affecting.

Her acting is disappointingly wooden, perhaps because she is trying to capture the posturing of a silent movie star. She seems trapped in her body and her range is limited to posing and floating and she lacks the ghoulishness of the magnetic Gloria Swanson.

In the final scene, when Norma trails eerily across her balcony after having killed Joe Gillis, she is surrounded by a swarm of police, cameras and lights. Her total mental breakdown should be moving as we anticipate her famous final line: “Mr. De Mille. I’m ready for my close-up now.” It is not!

 Ashleigh Rubenach, Tim Draxl - PIC CREDIT DANIEL BOUD

The supporting actors, in contrast, are compelling. Draxl is full-voiced, charming, vigorous, smart and provocative. We want Joe Gillis to succeed and we want him to get the hell out of that ghastly mansion.

As  Betty Schaeffer, Ashleigh Rubenach is delightfully exuberant with a fine musical theatre voice. We want Betty’s life to be wonderful because she is the only positive thing I’m this bleak story.

Playing Norma's valet and protector, Max Von Mayerling, Robert Grubb slips into the shadows and then surges out to rescue Norma. His song, The Greatest Star of All, is touching.

The ensemble is versatile and talented, singing some jazzy, upbeat numbers such as Let’s Do Lunch and Ashley Wallen's choreography is snappy rhythmic, pulsating and unusual.

The design (Morgan Large) is glorious, with a sweeping staircase and Art Nouveau iron work. Sheer scrims edged with lacework drop front of stage, reminding us that Norma lives behind a metaphorical veil which hides her ageing, loss of spirit and mental condition.
 

Projections (George Reeve) in black-and-white that echo the movie’s film noir style feature the Hollywood sign, Joe’s  body floating in a pool and 1950s cars driving towards us.

This production of Sunset Boulevard is a patchy production that is, unfortunately, let down by Brightman as the lead.

by Kate Herbert

KATE HERBERT Arts Weekly 3MBS Sat1Jun2024

 

In this radio review spot, I talk about The Odd Couple with Todd McKenney and Shane Jacobsen and Sunset Boulevard with Sarah Brightman and Norma Desmond. Nick Tolhurst joins me to chat. k

The Odd Couple REVIEW 23 May 2024 ****

THEATRE 

Written by Neil Simon

At  Comedy Theatre, Melbourne until 23 June 2024

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Stars: **** (4)

This review is published only on this blog. I’ll present a radio review on Arts Weekly on 3MBS on Sat 1 JUNE 2024. KH

Todd McKenney and Shane Jacobson (c) Pia Johnson

Neil Simon’s play, The Odd Couple, is witty, often laugh out loud observational humour about two quirky characters and their even quirkier relationship. The man was a comic genius!

 

Although Simon’s characters became household names because of the television series starring Tony Randall and Jack Klugman, and the movie with Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau as the eponymous odd couple, this 1965 stage version preceded both.

 

The focus of the narrative and most of the comedy is the relationship between Oscar (Shane Jacobsen) and Felix (Todd McKenney), friends who are polar opposites: Oscar is a scruffy, grubby, divorced and grumbling sportswriter who lives in relative squalor in an eight-room house; Felix is a straightlaced, hypochondriacal, socially dysfunctional misfit, whose wife recently booted him out because she couldn’t stand him anymore.

 

The peculiar friendship between Oscar and Felix was based on a weekly poker game with their four pals. When Oscar invites Felix to move into his big empty house, it becomes more than sharing space. They are like a squabbling, old married couple who have completely different modes of living: Felix is obsessively tidy, loves to cook and clean, doesn’t like to socialise, cries a lot and complains about his health; Oscar loves to drink, gamble, cavort, mess up the house and clean nothing. They are genuinely the odd couple.

 

These glaring differences, of course, are the basis of Simon’s comedy. The clash of personalities and lifestyles becomes ridiculous and more exaggerated as the story progresses, until finally Oscar cannot bear Felix anymore.

 

Mark Kilmurry’s direction of this production is deft and playful. Jacobsen is suitably rambunctious and bulldog-ish as the increasingly intolerant Oscar, while McKenney is appropriately nervy and annoying –  or rather, maddening – as Felix.

 

The entire supporting cast is versatile and hilarious: Lucy Durack and Penny McNamee are very funny as the twittering, girlish and totally in-sync British sisters, Cecily and Gwendolyn (Yes, their names are drawn holus bolus from Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest).

 

Oscar and Felix’s poker playing buddies – Laurence Coy as Speed, Anthony Taufa as Murray, John Batchelor as Roy and Jamie Oxenbould as Vinnie – are as eccentric as their hosts and provide plenty of laughs, particularly in the opening scene before Oscar and Felix arrive. This is a versatile and vibrant cast.

 

The Odd Couple is almost a can’t-fail show and Kilmurry’s production is clearly a hit with audiences.

 

by Kate Herbert

 

Cast

Shane Jacobsen – Oscar

Todd McKenney – Felix

Lucy Durack – Cecily Pigeon

Penny McNamee – Gwendolyn Pigeon

Laurence Coy – Speed

Anthony Taufa – Murray

John Batchelor – Roy

Jamie Oxenbould – Vinnie.

 

Creative Team

Directed by  Mark Kilmurry

Designer - Justin Nardella

Lighting Designer - Trudy Dalgliesh

Sound Designer - Michael Waters.

Shane Jacobson with poker players (c) Pia Johnson

Shane Jacobson, Todd McKenney, Lucy Durack and Penny McNamee (c) Pia Johnson

KATE HERBERT Arts Weekly 3MBS SAT18MAY2024

Today I talk briefly with Nick Tolhurst about Norm & Ahmed at La Mama, focussing on the issue of the final line which has an expletive and a racial slur.

 In `968 the show was raided at La Mama for obscenity. Now it would be the racial slur. Then we talk about issues that are controversial in theatre these days.

KATE HERBERT LUNG Arts Weekly 3MBS Sat4May2024

In this week's radio spot, I review:

 Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream by Bell Shakespeare

and

RBG: Of Many, One, by Suzie Miller with Heather Mitchell who gives an exceptional, solo performance.

 

Interview- LUNG-David Astle-Evenings ABC 774 THURS 02 MAY 2024

This is the interview about LUNG a radio play performed on the stage at La Mama. David Astle talks to Kate Herbert, writer of LUNG, and Nancy Black, director. It runs 7-19 May 2024.

 

RBG: Of Many, One REVIEW 26 April 2024 ****1/2

THEATRE

Written by Suzie Miller, by Sydney Theatre Company

At Playhouse, Arts Centre Melbourne until 20 May 2024

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Stars: ****1/2

This review is published only on this blog. I’ll present a radio review on Arts Weekly on 3MBS on Sat 4 May 2024. KH

Heather Mitchell  STC RBG_ Of Many, One_Image by Prudence Upton

 

Let me start by saying that Heather Mitchell gives a five-star performance as Ruth Bader Ginsburg in Suzie Miller’s play RBG: Of Many, One.

 

Mitchell totally transforms both physically and vocally to inhabit the diminutive US Supreme Court judge who became a surprise icon, a meme, and much quoted hero of gender politics. Ginsburg was a judicial advocate of women’s rights who pursued specific cases in her early career as a lawyer to institute change for women. This is an exceptional, versatile and masterly solo performance from a stalwart of Australian theatre.

 

Not only does Mitchell play the pocket rocket, Ginsburg, but she also gleefully embodies every other character, populating the stage with a parade of recognisable or eccentric characters. Her performance is a joy to behold and reminds us what acting can be.

 

Miller‘s play shifts back and forward in time over decades, creating a tapestry of Ginsburg‘s life and work. We witness her anxiously awaiting President Clinton’s phone call confirming her appointment to the Supreme Court; it returns to Ginsburg’s childhood and her unstinting admiration of her mother; we see her college years, meeting and marrying her husband, having children, her early work, her arduous years working on watershed cases, and the many famous people, including the US presidents who she encountered on her journey.

 

Mitchell captures RBG’s world and personality as she shifts from Ginsburg as a child, to her old-age, then back to middle-age or her teenage years. She transforms in an instant, into impeccable impersonations of Clinton, Obama and even Trump who was the target of Ginsburg’s venom and her only unwise public comment that breached the boundary between the judiciary and the executive. For this she was much vilified and, personally, mortified.

Heather Mitchell  STC RBG_ Of Many, One_Image by Prudence Upton

 

Miller’s script is clever and clearly thoroughly researched, incorporating fact, observations and opinions into an episodic, dramatic structure that uses short vignettes, times shifts, and a multitude of characters for Mitchell to play.

 

It is, however, often more informational than it need be. The  play eulogises Ginsburg, presenting her with a virtually uncritical view, despite the myriad people – mainly on the right wing of US politics – who expressed significant criticism of her work, character and public profile. In Miller’s play, Ginsburg is lionised and presented as a gender politics icon, which she was. However, surely there was more to the woman and the public and private view of her.

 

Another minor issue is that a biography has no natural dramatic structure, so Ginsburg’s life evolves in a wave motion, with some higher points such as her appointment to the bench, but no clear climax, turning point, dramatic arc or satisfying ending, apart from her death.

 

These are all quibbles, because Mitchell makes this a compelling and uplifting performance.

 

by Kate Herbert

 

Director Priscilla Jackman
Designer David Fleischer
Lighting Designer Alexander Berlage
Composer & Sound Designer Paul Charlier
Assistant Director Sharon Millerchip
Voice & Accent Coach Jennifer White
Associate Designer (Tour) Emma White
Associate Sound Designer (Tour) Zac Saric

With
Heather Mitchell

Understudy
Lucy Bell

 

A Midsummer Night's Dream REVIEW 25 April 2024 **1/2

THEATRE

Written by William Shakespeare, Bell Shakespeare

At Fairfax Studio, Arts Centre Melbourne until 11 May 2024

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Stars: **1/2

This review is published only on this blog. I’ll present a radio review on Arts Weekly on 3MBS on Sat 4 May 2024. KH

Imogen Sage, Richard Pyros, Matu Ngaropo (front. Photo by Brett Boardman

 

 

 Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a playful romantic and comical romp that is littered with magic, fairies, laughs, unrequited love and eloping lovers.

Usually, the most entertaining and hilarious scenes are those featuring the group of tradesmen known as The Mechanicals, a band of amateur actors who are rehearsing a riotously appalling performance for the Duke. Actors playing this group need to be exceptional clowns working as a cohesive ensemble to pull off these characters and their comic business.

 

Unfortunately, the comedy in this production, directed by Peter Evans, is overwrought and unsuccessful for the most part. The opening physical comedy is laboured and delays the actual start of The Mechanicals’ usually very funny rehearsal far too long.

 

There are some successful performances, particularly Matu Ngaropo as the vain, overconfident and absurd Bottom, and Richard Pyros playing Oberon, the Fairy King, as well as delightfully clownish Flute, while Imogen Sage is stately as Titania.

 

But there are problems: Shakespeare’s text, narrative and characters are not penetrated or given full range, the lyrical dialogue is laboured, there are some harsh vocal tones, and the joy and delight of this play is often lost. The female characters are played as modern women with rather more aggression than positive assertiveness.

 

The character of Puck (Ella Prince) is commonly played as mischievous, playful, enchanting, enchanted and somewhat ethereal. However, Puck in this production is weird, almost alien and uncomprehending of humans, which could be viable. But the character here is humourless, cruel, and most of all, without charm or playfulness. We need to love and enjoy Puck. We don’t!

Meanwhile, in line with this darker, more ominous tone of the production, the black-clad actors playing Titania’s fairy servants look more like looming demons than charming fairies as they mill about their mistress.

 

Actors playing multiple roles is common and often effective in productions of the Dream, but it seems a drawback in this instance, because some of the cast lack the versatility to carry off the multiple character transformations.

 

The effective design is a simple, large, tumbledown wooden frame resembling a dilapidated barn wall that provides a vehicle for entrances, exits and hidden observers including Titania, Oberon and his servant, Puck, who all perch on, and peer from the upper levels.

 

This is a valiant attempt at a new interpretation of Shakespeare’s Dream but, ultimately, it fails to deliver the captivating, magical quality of this romantic comedy.

 

by Kate Herbert

Isabel Burton, Richard Pyros, Matu Ngaropo, Imogen Sage, Ella Prince, Ahunim Abebe and Laurence Young–.Photo- Brett Boardman

 

CAST:

Ella Prince as Puck
Ahunim Abebe as Hermia / Snug
Isabel Burton as Helena/ Starveling
Mike Howlett as Demetrius / Snout
Matu Ngaropo as Bottom / Egeus
Richard Pyros as Theseus / Oberon / Flute

Imogen Sage as Titania / Hippolyta / Quince

Laurence Young as Lysander / Mechanical

CREATIVE TEAM:

Director Peter Evans
Associate Director Julia Billington
Assistant Director Dan Graham
Set and Costume Designer Teresa Negroponte

Lighting Designer Benjamin Cisterne

Composer and Sound Designer Max Lyandvert

Fight and Intimacy Director Nigel Poulton

Voice Coach Jack Starkey-Gill
Dramaturg James Evans

 

 

 

,,,,

KATE HERBERT Arts Weekly 3MBS Sat20April2024

In this radio spot, I talk about the writing and rehearsal of my new play, LUNG, a radio play performed live on stage at La Mama from 7 to 19 May 2024. 

 

Directed by Nancy Black, performed by Nikki Coghill, Geoff Wallis, Tony Rive, Carmelina Di Guglielmo and Alison Richards, with sound design by Elissa Goodrich.

 

The Almighty Sometimes REVIEW MTC 19 April 2024 ****

 THEATRE

Written by Kendall Feavers, Melbourne Theatre Company

At Southbank Theatre, The Sumner, until 18 May 2024

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Stars: 4

This review is published only on this blog. I’ll present a radio review on Arts Weekly on 3MBS on Sat 20 April 2024. KH

 

Max Mckenna, Nadine Garner and Karl Richmond - image Pia Johnson

 

For some people, the warts-and-all exposure of mental illness in The Almighty Sometimes by Kendall Feaver, may hit too close to the bone.

 

The play, directly deftly by Hannah Goodwin, explores the struggle between a mother, Renee (Nadine Garner), and her 18-year-old daughter, Anna (Max McKenna) as Anna wrestles with her mental condition that swings between mania and depression. (It appears to be B polar Disorder.)

 

 Anna has been on powerful anti-psychotics and other mediation since she was 11 years when Renee took her to a child psychiatrist (Louisa Mignone) because of her increasingly disturbed, albeit creative and advanced writing, her erratic behaviour and apparent suicidal thoughts. 18-year-old Anna finds her 8-eyear-old self’s unsettling stories and decides to rediscover her searing creativity.

 

The stage become dangerous for Anna and Renee, as well as Anna’s mild-mannered, unwitting boyfriend, Oliver (Karl Richmond), when Anna decides to assert her newly acquired adulthood and independence by secretly and unsupervised, stopping her medication cold turkey. The result is a catastrophic deterioration in her mental condition.

 

McKenna is compelling as the volatile and mercurial Anna, as she trawls the depths of this character’s disturbing actions and her disturbed mind, finding her strength, imagination and vulnerability. Garner is sympathetic and fragile as the beleaguered, desperate Renee who fiercely protects her daughter while feeling guilty for subjecting her to such potent drugs and therapy at such as early age.

 

Jacob Battista’s set design is a constantly moving jigsaw of panels and cupboards that swivel and swing around the characters when Anna’s psyche is most unhinged.

 

The Almighty Sometimes is a challenging but dramatically satisfying production that deliver a complex mother-daughter relationship as well as a voyeuristic look into the tragic life of a young woman with a serious mental illness.

 

 

by Kate Herbert

 

CAST & CREATIVES

The Almighty Sometimes
By Kendall Feaver
Cast Nadine Garner, Max McKenna, Louisa Mignone, Karl Richmond Director Hannah Goodwin
Set & Costume Designer Jacob Battista
Lighting Designer Amelia Lever-Davidson
Composer & Sound Designer Kelly Ryall
Voice & Text Coach Matt Furlani
Fight Choreographer & Movement Consultant Lyndall Grant Intimacy Coordinator Bayley Turner
Assistant Director Jennifer Sarah Dean

TICKETING INFORMATION

 

KATE HERBERT RADIO REVIEWS Arts Weekly 3MBS Sat6APRIL 2024

In this radio spot, I review Chicago, Her Majesty’s Theatre Melbourne and the truly hilarious London Assurance adapted by Richard Bean(2010) by National Theatre at Home. 

I then mention some shows in the Melbourne Comedy Festival 2024.

Chicago REVIEW 26 March 2024 ****

MUSICAL THEATRE

Music by John Kander, Lyrics by Fred Ebb, Book by Fred Ebb & Bob Fossey

At Her Majesty’s Theatre, Melbourne until Sun 2 June 2024

Reviewer: Kate Herbert

Stars:**** (4)

This review is published only on this blog. I’ll present a radio review on Arts Weekly on 3MBS on Sat 6 April 2024. KH

CHICAGO-Antony Warlow & cast -2023-photo-Jeff-Busby

Chicago is one of the great, exhilarating musicals, and the more recent production featuring Anne Reinking’s choreography, based on Bob Fossey’s original dance, still catches that energised, sassy and saucy physicality that accompanies the audacious narrative about female murderers.

 

Of course, it does glamorise murder, making it funny, entertaining and strangely understandable when couched in the manipulated narrative spun by characters such as Roxy Hart and Velma Kelly.

 

These bold leading characters are played here by Zoe Ventoura as Velma and Lucy Maunder as Roxy, who are both capable singer/dancer /actors and vamp it up as these two ambitious killers seeking to be catapulted into show biz careers based on their infamy.

This may not be the best Chicago that I’ve seen. It’s a tall order to compete with Carolyn O’Connor, Chelsea Gibb and Sharon Millerchip, all of whom did Chicago over the past 20 + years.

 

However, the choreography, the music and the sassy songs carry this show, making it almost bullet-proof.

Cell Block Tango is a highlight with its sexy, captivating representation of six female prisoners singing their justifications for murdering partners.

 

The opening chorus of All That Jazz is thrilling and intensely physical. The choreography throughout the show is replete with Fossey’s bump-and-grind, hip swivelling and sexualised movement that captures the 30s cabaret and jazzy era. This musical is less about narrative and more about its dance, songs and characters.

 

The vocal highlight is Anthony Warlow as Billy Flynn the expert showman, defence lawyer who Warlow plays as sleek, dignified and cunning, rather than slick, showy and overly conniving. Warlow has a composure and dignity as Billy that is unlike other  actors’ more brash, brassy versions of the role. Billy manipulates facts and the jury to elevate his profile and his profit. He has no interest in the women; he is purely interested in his own success and reputation.

 

Peter Rowsthorn wins the hearts of the audience with his quirky, clown-like Amos Hart and Asabi Goodman as Matron ‘Mama’ Moreton, belts out the song, When You’re Good to Mama.

 

If you’ve not seen Chicago, get out and have a look at it because it’s effervescent and diverting and one of the great 20^th century musicals.

 

by Kate Herbert

CHICAGO-Zoe Ventoura, Lucy Maunder 2023-photo-Jeff-Busby

 

CHICAGO-Cell Block Tango 2023-photo-Jeff-Busby