What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 3

December 4, 2016, 3:04 pm

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Today we hear from playwrights Fleur Kilpatrick and Keith Gow, and Circus Oz's Rob Tannion.

Fleur Kilpatrick

playwright, director, beagle lover

Fleur Kilpatrick by Jack G Kennedy

FK's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: My highlight for the year was Trilogy by Nic Green at Arts House. It managed to be the single most joyful thing I'd seen on stage in a long time, whilst talking about extremely damaging discrimination faced by women for over a century. As a female artist, it posed a wonderful question: how do we talk about the victimisation of our gender without talking about ourselves as victims?

Trilogywas a celebration of the strength, humour and power of women as both individuals and as a community. I left feeling stronger – feeling my cup replenished – and feeling immensely grateful for the women who came before me and changed what it means to be a woman today. Plus, dozens of amazing naked ladies dancing like mad on stage. It was impossible not to beam like an idiot.

My favourite mainstage work was Picnic at Hanging Rock, an outstanding new adaption of an Australian novel. A particular highlight for me was sitting in an audience full of school students during Picnic. Before the show, a girl next to me said to the boy she was with, "I would rather watch eight hours of footage of a public toilet". They then proceeded to scream, gasp and be completely engaged by the work for the entire 85 minutes. At the end, the boy turned to the girl and said, "Oh my heart", as I quietly punched the air next to them and celebrated the transformative powers of live theatre.

My favourite moment of new writing was Kill Climate Deniersby David Finnigin. David stood on stage in a bar and read his entire, ridiculous script, performing every character (all female) and describing terrorists abseiling down from the roof of Parliament House. The audience sat cross-legged on the floor of the bar, laughed and cheered on the story of a federal environment minister with nothing to lose and a killer playlist of house music from 1988 to 1993.

In the midst of the laugher, there was also the totally fascinating story of David's father, a climate scientist, trying to learn how to talk to the media back in the 1980s, when climate scientists suddenly became people the media wanted to talk to and undermine. This was the perfect version of this work. I'm so glad that David went in this beautiful, anarchic direction with the show, rather than placing it on a more conventional theatre stage with a cast and design elements. Plus, the night ended with the dance party I didn't know I needed.

What FK is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: I have the privilege of seeing a lot of readings of new work so, rather than talk about things that are programmed for 2017, I want to make mention of a kick-arse script that I really want to see programmed soon! Jessica Bellamy’s The One About the Two Rabbis, which we read in her living room over cheese and dip. Including the playwright, only four people were present and we loved every second of it. Religion meets time travel as Jess explores the religious stories and traditions that still have an impact on the lives of young Jewish women today. I want to see this staged! Someone please make this happen for me!

SM: Fleur adapted and directed Kurt Vonnegut Jnr's Slaughterhouse Five for MUST (Monash University Student Theatre). It's another great show that didn't get a review and wasn't seen by nearly enough people (although it filled the MUST space). What I loved the most about it was how much the student performers and creators took ownership of the content and its story. I remember rolling my eyes when I saw that it was over two hours long, but by interval I was so involved that I would happily have stayed for another couple of hours. 

If you haven't seen a MUST production, please make it a goal for next year.

Keith Gow
playwright, reviewer

Keith Gow. Photo by Keith Gow

KG's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I am not a performer and I don’t harbour that desire at all, but I’ve spent a lot of time on stage this year and a lot of time immersed in shows where I’ve ostensibly been part of the action. Immersive theatre and audience participation can be a tricky business; pick the wrong audience member and you can sink the good will your show has built up to that point.

I spent time on stage with Meow Meow and Chris Ryan in The Little Mermaid at the Malthouse. I wrestled with Adrienne Truscott as she wrestled with her critics in One Trick Pony!

As for immersive theatre, I was quite taken by the one-person-audience experience of The Maze during Melbourne Fringe; following a woman around the dark streets of North Melbourne was troubling in the way theatre should strive to be. I was also part of a two-person audience for Menage and a three-person audience for Dion.

I think theatre should embrace things only theatre can do. Yes, we can sit in the dark and watch figures under a proscenium, but sometimes that feels no different to watching a film. Some of the audience interaction I experienced was uncomfortable, in a bad way. But some of it was thrilling and, by extension, unforgettable.

What KG is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: The Malthouse Theatre. I’m always keen to check out the mainstage company’s news seasons from across Australia, once they start revealing them in August. I’m often envious of Sydneysiders and their Belvoir seasons. And their Griffin seasons. I didn’t make it to Sydney once this year, but I will next year.

That said, I’m mostly excited for the Malthouse. I’m excited by everything they have on offer, even though I’m sure there will be some shows that I won’t get along with.

How can I choose between new work from Declan Greene or Nicola Gunn or Tom Wright and Matthew Lutton’s Elephant Man? I can’t and you can’t make me. I’m looking forward to spending a lot of time at the Malthouse and in the Malthouse foyer after.

SM: One night during Melbourne Fringe, I waved and called out to Keith from my car as he was at the tram stop and he didn't react. I watched him walk down the street and not react to anything: he was seeing/experiencing The Maze and was so involved that he couldn't be distracted. It was also pretty damn cool to see his first tv script on live to air TV (Sonnisburg on Ch 31).

Rob Tannion 
Circus Oz Artistic Director

Rob Tannion. Photo by Tania Jovanovic

RT's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I have two very clear moments which defined Melbourne theatre in 2016. The first was seeing Patricia Cornelius’s Shit, at fortyfivedownstairs, directed by the amazing Susie Dee. An outstanding, raw and potent Australian production with an outstanding cast of Nicci Wilks, Sarah Ward and Peta Brady. It blew me out of the water, and still haunts me.

The second moment was during the Circus Oz Big Top season in July at Birrarung Marr. We were contacted via Facebook by a good samaritan to see if we could offer tickets up to a seriously ill 4 year old Indy, and her family. It was Indy’s dream to come to the circus, and being able to make that a reality for her was priceless. Her visit and reaction underlined why we are in the arts and the power it has to positively touch lives.

What RT is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: I am really looking forward to the smorgasborg of festivals that Melbourne has on offer: Midsumma, Asia TOPA, Melbourne International Comedy Festival, Yirramboi, Melbourne Fringe and Melbourne Festival… They are like cultural stepping stones crossing my year… I just wish I had the time and money to see everything. Definitely will not miss The Encounter by Complicite in early February at the Malthouse. They are a UK physical theatre company very close to my heart who always pushes boundaries.

SM: I don't know Rob (yet) but every Circus Oz opening night in Birrurung Marr is one of my favourite nights. I love this company; their politics, passion and heart are the voice of Australian theatre that I want to see, in a big top or on the poshest of stages. Circus Oz question the status quo and show what stages, workshops and admin offices can be like when barriers are kicked out of the way and boring choices are rejected.

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What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 4

December 5, 2016, 4:15 pm

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Today's moments are from three men whose theatre voices are bold, challenging and totally their own: Daniel Lammin, Stephen Nicolazzo and David Finnigan. We're going to see a lot more of their work of in the years to come

Daniel Lammin
director, writer, obsessive collector

Daniel Lammin's 30th birthday present-to-self selfie

DL's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: No piece of theatre this year hit me with as much force as Picnic at Hanging Rock. The book is my favourite Australian book and the film is my favourite Australian film, both having had an enormous impact on me growing up. I also love the work that Matt Lutton, Tom Wright, Zoë Atkinson and Paul Jackson have done together in the past, so consequently my expectations were enormous. The result though exceeded my expectations beyond my wildest dreams. The production captured the concerns of Lindsay’s story, the sexual repression of young women and the Australian landscape’s rejection of us as an invading force, and crafted it into an impressive work of art in its own right, pulsing from Matt’s rigorous direction, Zoë and Paul’s remarkable design, the cast’s tremendous performances and Tom’s diabolical, awe-inspiring text.

It also understood the most misunderstood aspect of the story, that at its heart it is a work of horror, one that crawls under your skin and festers there for the rest of your life.

Watching Picnic was one of the most exhilarating experiences I've ever had in the theatre, both because of what was happening on the stage and what was happening in the audience, a mass of people battered and thrown by the uncompromising force of what they were seeing, jumping and screaming and gasping in unison. The teenager sitting next to me literally jumped out of his chair at a moment of sublime theatrical horror, and sat on the edge of his seat for the rest of the night. It was a perfectly executed theatrical event, one that shows tremendous respect for its source material but with the imagination and rigour to be a great work of art on its own. It left me breathless, exhilarated, disturbed, in awe and in tears, and like the book and film before it, left an enormous and life-changing impact on me and my work as a theatre maker. I confidently rank it as one of the best pieces of theatre I’ve ever seen.

What DL is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: Unsurprisingly, I’m incredibly excited to see how the same team approach The Elephant Man. It’s a beautiful story but a theatrically complicated one, and if they apply the same rigour to this one that they applied to Picnic, it could be something really special. I also can’t wait to catch CULL during the Comedy Festival (I missed it during the Fringe and regretted it enormously), and to see what She Said Theatre does next – their work is just getting better and better, and continues to be some of the most important being made.

SM: Daniel wrote and directed Awakening for MUST (performed at Trades Hall). It was an adaption of Spring Awakening by Frank Wedekind (not the musical also based on it) and was one of the most moving and gut-punching pieces of theatre I saw this year. Another MUST show that nowhere near enough people saw. I really hope that someone gives this show another season because it's heartbreaking to think that it won't be seen again – with the same cast please.

Brilliant update: Awakenings has been picked up by the super-wonderful fortyfivedownstairs, so put 10–21 May in your diary now. Book here.

And while you're there, look at the at what else is coming there next year. What a season!

Stephen Nicolazzo
director,  Little Ones Theatre; likes Madonna 

Stephen Nicolazzo

SN's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Hands down, my favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016 were: Cain and Abel (The Rabble ), Gonzo (St Martin’s/Malthouse) and Terror Australis (Leah Shelton at Melbourne Fringe). These works were brave, beautiful, and furious. They were focussed on the craft of visual story telling and the presentation of complex political perspectives in cheeky, adventurous and moving ways.

All were born from Australia’s most courageous female artists: Emma Valente, Kate Davis, Clare Watson and the divine Leah Shelton, and all were a formally adventurous master class in contemporary theatre practice. Finally, each of these works had exquisite craft on display, which to me is an integral part of theatre making. They didn’t bend the rules simply to provoke. They bent them to explore craft and courage.

This is what I want in my theatre. My personal moment of 2016 was getting to tour Dangerous Liaisons for the last time. It has been two years since Dangerous opened at MTC Neon, and it has grown substantially since then, blossomed into a work that I am extremely proud of. It is so rare to develop a work after its initial presentation and in the case of this one, it has been such a unique gift to refine, reassess, and nuance. So very grateful to all of the festivals and presenters who took a risk on our huge mother fucker of a show and to the audiences across the country who have fallen in love with it.

What SN is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: The Theatre Works 2017 season. CAN.NOT.WAIT.

SM: I'll see any theatre Stephen makes, but I missed the return of Dangerous Ls and I missed the Madonna night that he programmed for Melbourne Fringe – but I loved lying in bed and watching the pics and videos of it on Twitter.

If you want to support Little Ones Theatre's Midsumma show, donate here.

David Finnigan
playwright

Georgie McAusley and David Finnigan. Photo by Sarah Walker

DF's favourite moment in Melbourne theatre in 2016: This might not be the moment, but I found myself really, really sinking into Nat Randall's The Second Woman performance at Next Wave. I went along intending to stay for a few minutes, found myself there for an hour or two at least. It was weirdly satisfying, so many dimensions to it, but it was sitting afterwards with Jane Howard while she unpacked it for me, that was the real lightbulb moment. I dug that. Maybe that's the combination: good artwork, good analysis, good chats with good humans. That's all you need.

What DF is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: I'm looking forward to the major companies retreating further out of touch, the existing funding structures coming apart at the seams and the whole system continuing its histrionic slow-motion collapse, so we can hurry up and see what weird alternatives emerge out of the edges.

SM: I loved seeing Kill Climate Deniersat the Melbourne Fringe, but my moment was reading the play. I was sitting in a cafe in Avalon on Sydney's north coast (which is exactly like the awesome web series Avalon Now, made by real estate site) eating a huge salad with purple cabbage, kale and every super food – while listening to a woman ask why they didn't have a quinoa salad (nuts weren't good enough protein for her) – then being recommended a chocolate cake that was pretty much melted dark chocolate and dates. It was like I was living in the world of Kill Climate Deniers; I WAS in the world of Kill Climate Deniers – and willingly being part of it.

(PS: I love being sent new scripts to read.)

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What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 5

December 6, 2016, 5:36 pm

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While too much of the commercial theatre in Melbourne is regressive, boring and blah, there are amazing Melbourne companies and venues that make progressive, inclusive, challenging and mind-blowing theatre. Today we here from Scott Price from Back to Back theatre, Angharad Wynne-Jones from Arts House and Cameron Lukey from fortyfivedownstairs.

(Opps. In part 4  What Daniel Lammin is looking forward to didn't make it up yesterday, but it's there now.)

Scott Price
Member of the Back to Back Theatre ensemble since 2007, #autismpride

Scott Price. Photo by Jeff Busby

SP's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Sarah Mainwaring's show Duality Ok at La Mama has actually been my favourite piece in 2016. It was just a great piece of theatre and I just enjoyed it immensely. It was great to see Sarah perform outside Back to Back. I didn’t give a standing ovation, but it was a pretty good piece of theatre. If the others did it, I would have too. Sarah was just in casual clothes, and it was just the way that she spoke about her life, I don’t know how to describe it. We went with Simon Laherty, Alice Nash and Nikki Watson and we all thought it was good.

The Rabble’s Cain and Abel was good too, pretty full on and in your face and MTC’s Straight White Men with Luke Ryan I liked too.

What SP is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: Nothing basically comes to mind just at the moment, but I haven’t quite looked into it yet, haven’t had the chance. But I really enjoy comedy shows and the Melbourne Fringe and look forward to seeing more of that stuff next year.

SM: Scott's performance of God/god in the remarkable Lady Eats Apple is one that will stay with me for a long time. As communities and societies, we make assumptions about our gods and Scott challenged every one of those assumptions.

Angharad Wynne-Jones
Artistic Director, Arts House

Angharad Wynne-Jones. Photo by Pier Carthew

AWJ's favourite moment in Melbourne theatre in 2016: While I love the energy and risk in the experience of a work that has come to realisation in performance, I also really enjoy seeing works in development; work in development allows you to see the issues the artist is resolving, the pathways they might go down, the edits they might make.

This year I've had the opportunity to see Lz Dunn's work Aeon (premiering in March 2017 in Dance Massive) in a number of different places as she's developed it through the support of the Mobile States consortia. As a process of collaboration and co-commissioning with colleagues across the country, facilitated by Performing Lines, this has been an incredibly rewarding and enlivening experience. Running  and walking across the meadow in Royal Park (one of the traditional meeting places of the Kulin Nations and one of my most favourite places in Melbourne) with other test audience members was one of those times (of which there are so many working with the phenomenal artists that we do) that I felt so happy and honoured to be working at Arts House, with artists who are fiercely committed, deeply talented and determinedly experimental.

What AWJ is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: Oh so much! It's liking asking a parent to pick a favourite child … impossible. So, a couple at least are two new festivals: the gargantuan Asia TOPA that will change forever how Australia’s sees itself as part of Asia and gives us at Arts House the opportunity to  present two works from Japan. We are presenting the incredible chelfitsch with a beautiful, haunting contemplation on love and loss with Time's Journey Through a Room. We also welcome Hamanaka Company with Kagerou – Study of Translating Performance, a lyrical investigation into what it is to document disaster. Both works filled with the reverberations of life in Japan of post Fukishima, which resonate deeply with our Antipodean experience of the climate change emergency. And then Yirramboi, Melbourne’s First Nations festival creatively directed by Jacob Boheme, is a chance for us to work with First Nations artist  Emily Johnson who with Shore,  a quartet of community visioning, volunteering, storytelling and performance works  models  new ways and forms of collective imaging. A necessity now more than ever.

SM: 2017 is the year I will try even harder to see everything at Arts House. Sometimes we get so caught up with complaining about the boring regressive commercial theatre in Melbourne that we forget that Arts House is doing everything wonderful with progressive, exciting, inclusive, challenging, personal theatre. My favourites this year were a night at FOLA and Nic Green's Trilogy – another bloody amazing show that didn't get a review. Here was so much work that challenged the ridiculous perfection that is expected of women's bodies; so much work that let people leave and walk around in the world feeling good about the bodies that they have – and stop those conscious and unconscious judgments we make based on appearance.

But my favourite moment was seeing the photo Angharad chose. A photo that looks like the person and lets her true amazingness be seen without makeup and the insane need to Photoshop out every "imperfection". Thank you Pier Carthew for taking photos like this. Every time I open a program and see headshots of smooth faces that make them look computer-generated and barely resemble themselves, I wonder who took the photo, who chose the photo and why the person designing the program didn't question it. There's nothing wrong with looking like yourself.

Cameron Lukey
Development Manager and Executive Producer, fortyfivedownstairs

Cameron Lukey. Photo by Sarah Walker

CL's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I went to the closing night of Daniel Lammin's show Awakening at Trades Hall. I knew it had been a labour of love, and having worked with Daniel on Master Class,  knew how much time and effort he pours into every show he works on. It was funny, charming, insightful, and ultimately, very moving. I left feeling I'd seen someone really leave a piece of themselves on the stage. We're bringing it to fortyfivedownstairs next May for a return season, which is very exciting. I think it will have a great life in our space.

From a personal perspective (and I'm completely biased) it was also a thrill to watch Paul Capsis transform himself into Quentin Crisp in Resident Alien. I had been witness to his process, but watching him in front of an audience for the first time was pretty special. I forgot I had seen it dozens of times in rehearsal because his relationship with his audience is so unique.

What CL is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: I think it would be a bit Sophie's Choice to have to choose a show at fortyfivedownstairs, so outside of fortyfive, I'm looking forward to The Testament of Mary with Pamela Rabe at the Malthouse and Cabaret, which opens at the Athenaeum in April, with Capsis as the Emcee. That just seems like dream casting for both shows.

SM: My favourite is easily reading the email Cameron sent me yesterday after I'd said in part 4 how much I wanted to see a return season of Daniel Lammin's Awakening. He told me how fortyfivedownstairs are doing that season and gently hinted that he'd sent me an email* with that very info over a week ago. And fortyfivedownstairs giving Shit another season.

The first half of next year's fortyfivedownstairs season is unmissable. Not only for Awakening (I'm so happy to see this devastatingly wonderful work get another season), but there's another season of L’amante anglaise and I'm putting I am My Own Wife and Trainspotting in my diary now.

*As I say a lot: if I don't respond, it's likely that I haven't read it because it's lost in the deluge, flagged to read later or I just didn't see it.

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What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 6ters

December 7, 2016, 4:55 pm

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Part sixters is all Sixters Grimm. Where would we be without them?

Declan Greene
Resident Artist, Malthouse Theatre; and lots of other things

Declan Greene in rehearsal for Lilith. Photo by Deryk McAlpin

DG's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I spent a lot of this year very anxious about the dwindling support for independent artists. In particular those early career artists who missed out on the brief flourish of Heliums and NEONs and Downstairs Belvoirs and Wharf 2s that kick-started the careers of a lot of my friends. (And that was before the additional two-handed-fistfuck of NPEA/Catalyst and everything it ripped away from the small-to-medium sector).

So my favourite moments happened every time I saw early-career artists making incredible work in total defiance of the mess they've been plonked in.

Of these moments, my favourite-est was probably Embittered Swish's Our Lady Of The Flowers, an excavation of Jean Genet's novel, created by a phenomenal team of trans and non-binary artists led by Mick Klepner Roe (this was Mick's graduating piece from the VCA directing course). It seemed to exist in a state of constant slippage. A dream-like space where where gender, performer/character identity and temporality were in constant flux, and a thread of dark eroticism and violence pulsed beneath every fluctuation. The cast were uniformly exceptional, and there were moments that took my breath away: a horror-tinged monologue by Cinnamon Templeton about hormone therapy plus a sweating, pig-like doctor;  the visceral, driving sound design by Romy Seven. It wasn't a perfect work, but it felt daring, thrilling, and genuinely original in a way few art does.

AInaddition to this, I completely heart-and-soul loved Ian Michael and She Said Theatre's HART, Katy Warner's A Prudent Man, Mama Alto's Extravaganza, The Very Good Looking Initiative's CULL and there are probably a million others I'm forgetting, but those were some of 'em.

What DG is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: Finally seeing Ash Flanders's Playing To Win. Cuz he's a genius, duh.

And I'm super-biased, but pretty much the entire Malthouse 2017 season has me imploding with excitement: The Encounter,The Black Rider, Wild Bore, and Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again and more and more and more. Seriously, its all so good.

SM: Lilith, the Jungle Girl was something else (co-written and directed by Declan) and there was The Listies in Hamlet:Prince of Skidmark (written by Declan), which I went to Sydney to see. This gave me a brilliant afternoon with my niece and nephew (this was their first theatre show!) and, side-splitting Listies performances aside, was easily the most astute adaption of Hamlet I've seen. I was thrilled that the first Ophelia my niece saw was a super hero who took charge of her life instead of giving all of her emotion to a boy who wasn't worth her time.

But favourite moment was Declan talking about how mid-career artists should choose an emerging artist and mentor them because a lot of the opportunities that these mid-career artists had no longer exist.

Ash Flanders
home owner, still skinny, power bottom

Ash Flanders. Photo by Sarah Walker. Slight improvements by Jeff Miller, Photoshop and the Jim Henson archive

AF's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Without a doubt my favourite theatrical moment in 2016 was anything Dave said or did – or mimed – in Trigger Warning. Zoe Coombs Marr has created a metatextual behemoth that captivates and terrifies audiences in the most brilliant way possible. I have never laughed as hard as I did the night I saw that show. It's too bad she's already married to Rhys Nicholson, because I'd love to be her husband/wife/significant otter ...  and then steal all her ideas.

I know it's only meant to be one thing but I can't miss a chance to talk about Anti-Hamlet. This was my first time seeing Mark Wilson's work and I was utterly blown away by the singularity of his voice. This freudian fantasia – mixed with Australian politics, queer theory and Shakespeare – was chock-full of dense, meaty ideas and concepts; I don't remember any other show in 2016 making me think quite as much as that show did.

And OMG this just reminded me that this was the year I saw The Listies in Hamlet: Prince of Skidmark! I'll be quick about this but it was certainly worth the day-trip to Sydney and back. These guys made even the most cynical, jaded, bitter power-bottom remember why he ever fell in love with theatre in the first place. I can't wait to catch The Listies Ruin Xmas this month!

(I'd also like to mention my favourite onstage moment: looking out at my father as I penetrated myself with the leg of a stool while naked, covered in pink mud and chained to the MTC floor.)

What AF is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: Oh god, I know it's beyond shameless to pick Declan because he's clearly going to pick me, but in all honesty The Homosexuals, or Faggotsis what I'm most looking forward to. Because, duh, I like his writing a lot! I've heard bits of it and am already considering what outfit to wear when I picket the theatre with my other outraged, middle-class gay brethren. Personally I'm also looking forward to working with a band for the first time in Playing to Win and hopefully making more of my webseries Friendly with Peter Paltos (www.facebook.com/friendlywebseries).

SM: It's a tough choice for Ash this year: kittie onsie or nude and covered in pink goo? Nup, can't decide which was better.

I'm going to watch Friendly asap (cos I adore Peter P).

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What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 7

December 8, 2016, 3:53 pm

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Today we here from Penny Harpham from She Said Theatre, Morgan Rose – whose show F.  runs until 11 December – and Kerith Manderson-Galvin – whose show 186,000 runs until 17 December.

Morgan Rose
playwright

Morgan Rose

MR's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: This is easy. Conviction (Zoey Dawson and Declan Greene and, holy shit, Ruby Hughes). All the way. Made me feel every feeling there is: fear, joy, disgust, anger, jealousy, confusion, awe ... and more. It made some people uncomfortable because she writes about herself (which we all do, but she doesn't try to keep it a secret); isn't that just a really hilarious thing for people to be upset about? I say keep doing it until their heads bust open.

Incomparably different, but equally as moving was Nic Green's Trilogy at Artshouse. I wept, and I'm not a weeper. I don't know what I was feeling, I'd never felt it before, it doesn't have a name, but it was uncontainable. Seeing a bunch of women, naked, beautiful, unphotoshopped, dancing, and proud in their skin was like seeing the truth for the first time ever. Hmmmm...maybe that new unnamable feeling was just the absence of shame.

Oh! I also say Mammalian Diving Reflex's All the Sex I Ever Had at the Sydney Festival last January; it was probably in my top-three shows ever. A group of seniors sat at a table on stage and told us their entire sex lives, year by year starting at birth. It made me want to never write a play again because people talking unscripted about real things is so much better than anything any playwright could dream up.

What MR is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again. at Malthouse. Stephen Nicolazzo's direction of The Moors at Red Stitch.  She Said's Fallen (although we will all have to travel to NSW see it).

SM: I saw F. on Wednesday night (the last show of the Poppyseed Festival). Morgan wrote it in conjunction with a cast of amazing young people. It's a chance to get into teenagers heads and see the world from their points of view. Some parts of being a young adult today still scare me, but overall this work made me remember that young adults are pretty good at navigating and negotiating the world they live in and it left me feeing positive about a future that's going to be shaped by these people. It finishes on December 11.

Kerith Mandseron-Galvin
playwright

Kerith Manderson-Glavin. Photo by Cam Matheson "who captures me in photos the way I see myself"

KMG's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Church at Melbourne Fringe. All of it, but, particularly, crying with absolute joy and for one small moment freedom while singing “Natural Woman” with the Divine Femme Choir. That night I felt community and hope.

Luke Devine’s Work Bitch at Hot Hot Hot. It should be put on again and everything Luke has written should be published and put in your letter boxes. It’s nice to get mail from time to time.

DJ Donna Quixote, aka me, djing at Blue Room’s Silent Disco at Perth Fringe. Watching everyone change their silent discos away from my channel and the few that remained dance in a frenzy.

James Chance, oh my goodness, James Chance. I mean he was really, very good. Feeling like I understood music or it understood me.

The time Loretta Miller of Jazz Party removed an item of clothing at a gig and it was pure theatre. Also her costume change at the Rock and Roll Graveyard single launch.

Casey Jenkin's Programmed to Reproduceat FOLA was hard and necessary and sad and so smart and meticulous and beautiful.

Titanic was a great movie when it came out and I saw it twice but Dopplegangster's Titanic was better. Wow. World class. First class. I hope so much it happens again and again.

Gob Squad’s War and Peace or being on stage in it and so supported in a position that would usually have me running off stage, or more likely sitting quietly and disappearing. I felt safe and happy.

And finally.

Your Ever Illusory Hosts *Jimay Falcon & Sh'Gazey A Game Show Extravaganza. I smiled all night long and the corners of my mouth are turning up again when I think about how much I loved that night.

What KMG is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: I actually haven’t thought about it one bit. So that’s something.

SM: I so wish I'd been at War and Peace the night Kerith was on stage (Chris was). She's just finished her Masters at VCA and her new show 186,000 opens this week and runs until 17 December. I haven't seen it yet and am trying to find a free night.

And another terrific photo that captures the person how she really looks; it's lovely to know that Kerith sees herself how the world sees her.

Penny Harpham
co-founder and co-Artistic Director, She Said Theatre

Penny Harpham. Photo by Lachlan Woods

PH's favourite moment in Melbourne theatre in 2016: For me it would be in Influx's new work, Animal, presented at Theatre Works, created and performed by Kate Sherman and Nicci Wilks and directed by Susie Dee. There is a moment towards the end of Animal where he two female performers climb and crawl all over the set, which is made entirely of stacks and stacks of solid industrial containers, and it seems to transform in front of you as the containers at the very back of the stage reveal themselves to be not solid, but full of water. One of the performers drags the other into the container and violently drowns her. The lights shift so that as her body goes limp the lights blur and darken and though we know we are watching a performance, the performer is now floating lifelessly in anonymity at the back of the stage.

It is both a masterstroke of stage craft, but also a visceral attack on the senses. It made me think of all the women who had been killed by their partners this year. It made me think of Eddie Maguire saying on national radio that AFL journalist Caroline Wilson should "drown herself".  It made me realise how powerful and strong and vulnerable and brave women are and how we are forced to shrink in this world in order to survive under this suffocating, relentless, Trump-filled patriarchy. It made me realise how a moment of live performance can leave me reeling and angry and charged and aware of the macro and micro and it made me want to make work that did for other people.

What PH is looking forward to in Melbourne theatre in 2017: 
I'm very excited about the Yirramboi First Nations Arts Festival, 5-14 May. Jacob Boehme is one of the country's most exciting and versatile performance makers and I'm so excited to see the program he has curated take over the city in May. Also, Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again at Malthouse sees an almost all female team explore (or perhaps attack?) language and violence against women with a cultural diverse cast and some of my favourite creatives including Emma Valente and Marg Horwell.

SM: I love that She Said Theatre is getting lots of mentions this year. My favourite moment was seeing how HART had developed and changed since its first season. What a show!

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What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 8

December 11, 2016, 4:47 pm

≫ Next: What Melbourne Loved in 2016, part 9

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Everyone today loved Maltilda. Welcome Richard Watts, Sara Collins and Jason Whittaker.

But before you read. If you want to be part of this series (and your friends and fans want to read what you think), you have to send your answers to me.


Richard Watts
Performing Arts Editor, Arts Hub; Smarts Arts presenter; legend

Richard Watts. Photo by Nicola Peniguel

RW's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I’ve seen some brilliant, beautiful, challenging and moving life performances this year, in Sydney, Perth, Adelaide and the Northern Rivers region of NSW, as well as in a diversity of Melbourne venues.

Works such as Zoe Coombs Marr’s Trigger Warning and Sammy J’s Hero Complex made me roar with laughter even I as marvelled at the skilled writing on display. The Artisan Collective’s Wit at fortyfivedownstairs and MUST’s Awakening at Trades Hall made me sob. Backstage in Biscuit Land and Matilda the musical made me cheer. Dancenorth’s IF _ WAS _ and Le Patin Libre’s Vertical Influences allowed me revel in the splendour and the beauty of the human body moving through space.

But if there’s one moment that typified everything I love about the performing arts, it was the Lotus play readings at the National Play Festival back in July. Extracts from four new plays by Asian Australian playwrights; four fresh new perspectives; four very different takes on storytelling that didn’t rely on the familiar tropes and clichés of Australian mainstage drama.

Siti Rubiyah by Katrina Irawati Graham, Squint Witch by Shari Indriani, My Father Who Slept in A Zoo by Ngoc Phan and Entomology by Natesha Somasundaram – each reading made me hopeful for the future and hungry for more.

What RW is looking forward to in 2017: The further decolonisation of our theatres and performances spaces, more plays and stories by First Nations and culturally diverse artists, more amazing work by female-identifying playwrights and directors, and more stimulating conversations with friends, peers and colleagues in the foyers of Melbourne’s theatres.

SM: Every moment with Richard is pretty damn good. One of my favourites was seeing Sammy J's Hero Complex with him. We braved front row centre because we knew we were in safe hands, but had no idea just how great this show was going to be. Being able to share the love you have for a show with someone is what live theatre is all about. Laughing by yourself on the couch is never as good.

Richard is a tireless advocate for independent art and artists in Melbourne, he sees more theatre than most of us, and he listens to music, reads books, and goes to films and art exhibitions. He loves theatre and art with the kind of unconditional passion that we wish from our lovers. Every time I see Richard chair a discussion or I listen to a radio interview, I learn more about how to be a journalist. He researches, he asks excellent questions and knows when to change tack during an interview.

I'm sure that indie artists in Melbourne know how lucky they are to have Richard (I hear some very lovely things being said), so let's all make sure we make sure he knows how respected, appreciated and loved he is.

Sarah Collins

playwright, photographer

Sarah Collins

SC's favourite moment in Melbourne theatre in 2016: It's been a hard old year. Where previously I felt "the less money and resources we have the more punk we will be!",  I'm really struggling to get past the cuts, the closures and the lack of opportunity in theatre in 2016. (I'm writing a comedy about it so please get in touch with me if you want to laugh your way through this too. I'm sick of feeling despondent). 

The best performance I saw this year was Lyall Brooks in A Prudent Man. He. Did. Not. Skip. A. Beat. It was a huge treat to see such a polished performance at the wonderful Melbourne Fringe and he made the script sing and every word count. Matilda was fantastic. Tim Minchin (that writing!) and James Millar were the highlights for me. James Millar could honestly play that role on Broadway; he was born for it. Unfortunately due to my niece just missing out on that role I was a bit pissed with our Matilda. I'm sure under any other circumstances I would have found her a true delight. 

Finally my favourite moment that happened IN a theatre in 2016 was a moment told by a friend who has been teaching drama at an all boys private school in Brisbane for ten years. Irrespective of the fact that support for the arts is being ripped from here there and everywhere, theatrical expression can never be killed. In the context of an all boys school this was breathtaking. In the context of why we all gravitated to theatre in the first place it's a great reminder.

SM: It's been a year without a new show from Sarah – toddler wrangling is more time consuming than making art –, so I've had to be happy with Facebooks posts that make me know why social media was invented. I think my favourite was vomiting on the way to Ikea and the Christmas photo.

Jason Whittaker
journalist, critic

JW's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: What made me feel the most? The cry-o-metre registered one Melbourne show in 2016: The Events, the singular and devastating Edinburgh Festival choir-backed play brought to Malthouse Theatre via Belvoir Street in Sydney. Catherine McClements broke me; it must be a career-best performance and she’s given plenty of them.

Malthouse had a strong year under an artistic director growing in confidence. Matthew Lutton’s Edward II and, particularly, Picnic At Hanging Rock were urgent pieces of auteur theatre. And I have enormous affection for The Glass Menagerie production bought in from Belvoir, even though the Malthouse space sucked out intimacy. Melbourne Theatre Company’s best was probably Disgraced, though Jasper Jones was a terrific adaptation and I liked Kip Williams’s Miss Julie more than most. And don’t forget The Secret River, STC’s simply yet stunningly staged adaptation that got to us in March. It wasn’t new in 2016, but it’s probably the best Australian work we saw this year.

What made me happiest in the theatre in 2016? Matilda  is the best commercial musical to come to Australia in decades. Little Shop of Horrors via the Hayes Theatre in Sydney was so smart and so much fun. The foul-mouthed, sweet-singing Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour were a Melbourne Festival highlight.

But the absolute best piece of theatre in this city in 2016? I’d give it to Robert Lepage’s masterful, magical bio-monologue 887. A spell of wide-eyed loveliness, as I gushed on Twitter afterwards. A genius theatremaker wringing everything out of himself and the form.

What JW is looking forward to in 2017: Red Stitch has secured some super-hyped US and UK plays next year: Rules For Living, The Realistic Joneses, Incognito and The Moors. I’m excited by all of them. I think the Malthouse program looks as strong as this year’s. I’ll be interested to see what MTC does with Annie Baker’s John, which I had mixed feelings about in New York and will really test subscribers, and of course what Simon Phillips does with Macbeth. And trust me: The Book Of Mormon is as good as everyone says it is.

SM: Jason and I know each other and read each other, but I don't think we've met. I'll fix that in 2017. What I love about his reviews is that he shares his gut feelings towards a show and I'm either "What he said!" or "Did he see a different show?"– no in between. And that's what I love about reading other criticism: I want an extreme reaction; reading something meh is as meh as doing something meh.

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What Melbourne Loved in 2016, part 9

December 12, 2016, 3:51 pm

≫ Next: What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 10

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Today we here from three amazing kick-arse women and actors: Andi Snelling, Mary Helen Sassman and Genevieve Giuffre.

And we're reminded that La Mama turns 50 next year. Here's to spending a lot of time in Carlton next year.

Andi Snelling
actor

Andi Snelling. Photo by Sarah Walker

AS's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I'm the sort of person who uses the word "love" a lot. And I do mean it when I say it. I love colour co-ordination. I love satire. I love cry-laughing. And I really, really, really super love theatre. This year, I recall saying the word "love: in relation to something I’d seen on a stage in these ways:

Am I Right Ladies? (Luisa Omielan, MICF): I loved the dance party atmosphere Luisa created as you entered and exited her show. It made me feel like everyone in the audience had suddenly come together to be in the same feminist, fist-pumping gang. Like we instantly got every other stranger in the room. It was that simple and powerful.

Nelken (Tanztheater Wuppertal, Adelaide Festival*): I loved this show and the way I ended up there. Sometimes with theatre, you don’t go to it, it comes to you. I randomly wound up with a ticket to this show via a fortuitous conversation with someone I bumped into at the Adelaide Fringe Artists Bar. You know, one of those a-performer-I-met-once-at-a workshop type connections? He had accidentally gone on the wrong night to the show, but the ushers, for whatever reason**, hadn’t noticed his tickets were for the following night and they let him in and he somehow got seats. So on the real night that the tickets were valid for, I ended up going! I had second row seats so could literally smell the Nelken (carnations) – actually, they were fake, but I could definitely smell them, that’s how excited I was to be there. Apart from the show's historical significance, I feel like this was the first time I saw Tanztheater done the way it's meant to be done. I've always felt actors lack physical expertise and dancers lack acting expertise, so seeing these two elements beautifully melded together hit my heart hard. This experience was one that goes well beyond the minutes and seconds of the show itself.

* I know it’s not a Melbourne theatre moment, but I’m a sometimes rule-breaker and this was my favourite show of the year. (SM: Breaking rules is a rule here.)

** I like to think they subliminally knew that Andi Snelling chick just has to see this.

Purge (Brian Lobel, MICF): I loved the way something of significance in my life changed because of this show. Purge was totally out-of-the-box: part–game show, part–love story and part-lecture, which got my cry-laughing juices going (which you already know is a thing I love). It was a highly interactive theatrical experience in which Brian shared his story about how he had kept or deleted 1300 of his Facebook friends, based on strangers' decisions. During the show itself, I ended up on stage re-friend requesting an old friend who I had unfriended the year before after a bitter falling out. This personal moment for me became a personal moment for everyone in the audience that day. And I wasn't the only one who got up. I realised how extraordinary it was that a kooky comedy show had got me reflecting so soberly on my connection to the humans in my world.

What AS is looking forward to in 2017: Somehow managing to score a free ticket to The Book of Mormon!

SM: I love anyone who uses the word love even more than I do. Andi's Deja Vu at Melbourne Fringe was dance theatre at its best. It was emotionally dark and at times very weird; for most of it, I had no idea what it was about or what was going on – and that was the point. I loved being able to sit and watch a performer without having to assign any meaning that wasn't my own. It was like crawling around emotion and not being able to tell which were hers and which were mine.

andisnelling.com

Mary Helen Sassman
actor

Mary Helen Sassman. Photo by Brett Boardman

MHS's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I guess I can't name watching my four-year-old make his ballet debut in an excerpt from The Nutcracker as my faourite moment in a theatre in 2016?  It's not what you think, it's just that I got to watch his face in the theatre after his item had ended as he fell deeply in love for the very first time. Awwwwww.

I have two legitimate favourite moments to share:  One was to witness the harrowing transformation of Jane Montgomery Griffiths as a woman dying in Wit. She killed it. She crushed me. She is remarkable.

The other was Jess Thoms in Backstage in Biscuitland. I howled with laughter and crumbled with shame while she performed with vulnerability, with sheer resilience and at every step with consumate story telling skill.  This was the piece I raved about in the school yard.

What MHS is looking forward to in 2017: La Mama turns 50!!! What does this mean? Well, a party of course. But also a book on the history of my favourite theatre (oh the stories, oh the pics!) And then a season curated by Liz Jones where she has invited loads of excellent people who have worked here to present a work for a few nights.  The rest of this town might as well shut down for a time – it's going to be jam packed and so much fun!

Oh, Joan (The Rabble) at Theatre Works will surely be AMAZING (I'm not in it so I'm allowed to say that). In fact, I'd take out a subscription to the entire 2017 Theatreworks program if I could.

And my now five-year-old wants to sign up for jazz and acro next year and that might just trump 'em all.

SM: Mary Helen acts from a place so deep inside her that it feels like we're watching something secret. As for a moment: steak and glitter in Cain and Abel.

Genevieve Giuffre
actor

Genevieve Giuffre

GG's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I loved Hissy fits menacing work I might blow up someday for FOLA. After a long winter of some pretty boring theatre in London, it was so nice to be beaten and tackled to the ground by a giant head banging Bratz doll (main man Nat Randall).

I can still see Mark Wilson's body contorting in front of a black curtain in Anti-Hamlet (what a great show!) The "SORRY" on fire in Blaque Showgirls after the sorry not sorry dance. Ben Grant's yogo and wigs nightmare in The Rug, and how Zoe Coombs Marr's Trigger Warningemerged  like a phoenix out of a desolate tip of a year for independent funding and support.

What GG is looking forward to in 2017:  The next generation taking over... but in the meantime, The Homosexuals or Faggots, Joan, Merciless Gods, The Book of Exodus 1 & 11 and of course the return season of Playing to Win.

SM: This is easy: every moment Genevieve was on stage in Lilith, the Jungle Girl. She captures the soul of broken people and makes their pain so hilarious that it hurts to keep watching because you're trying to laugh and cry at the same time.

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What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 10

December 13, 2016, 4:11 pm

≫ Next: What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 11

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Today we here from two independent reviewers: Maxim Boon and Simon Parris.

Remember that you don't have to write a lot – a sentence can say as much as an essay – and that your reflections, memories and wishes don't have to be about a specific show or performance. It could be an overheard comment in an interval, a thought the next day or anything that gave you that jolt that says "this is why we do this".

Simon Parris
reviewer

Simon Parris

SP's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I’m going to mention something from each of the performance styles that I review.

A handful of musicals with my all time favourite scores were produced by independent companies this year. StageArt presented a scaled down version of Tony-winner Titanic, which I reviewed then paid to see again twice; Tyran Parke’s direction for Storeyboard Entertainment’s Follies was so incisive that I paid to return the day the after opening; Life Like Company finally gave Melbourne a chance to see divine 2005 Broadway musical The Light in the Piazza(another return visit); and Manilla Street Productions assembled a wonderful cast with a 30-piece orchestra for a one-night concert of Nine.

While there were many excellent independent opera productions in 2017, the quality of The Ring Cycle cannot be surpassed. It may seem a cliché to pick something as eternally popular as this, but Neil Armfield’s concept and direction is brilliant in its simplicity, the Australian singers were wonderful, and the handful of international singers were extraordinary. The camaraderie amongst audience members was really special.

The local ballet audience was electrified when The Australian Ballet went against the grain with Nijinsky, a thrilling abstract work in which Vaslav Nijinsky’s contribution to ballet was explored through the lens of his decaying metal health.

What SP is looking forward to in 2017: StageArt’s Australian premiere of Tony-winner Memphis will be a welcome addition to the sea of safe musical revivals and family fare. And I am pleased to see that the new Australian musical Ladies in Black is having a commercial tour. Melbourne Opera will compete their excellent Tudor Queens trilogy with Roberto Devereux. The Australian Ballet’s local premiere of Christopher Wheeldon’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is sure to be a blockbuster.

simonparrismaninchair.com

SM: I think I see a lot of music theatre, but Simon sees everything. (I didn't see any musicals on his best list and I regret it.) He loves music theatre, opera and ballet and his passion comes through in his positive, honest and detailed reviews. He's also always excited to be at a show and he reads other reviewers. I really appreciate his comments (often compliments) on Twitter and in person. (Writer secret: it's nice to know that we are read.)

Maxim Boon
arts writer, reviewer

Maxim Boon

MB's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Doing a (not so) little audit of all the bloody wonderful things I've had the good fortune to see this year has been a real tonic. 2016 is a year many people will be happy to see the back of, myself included, but this exercise has definitely added a silver lining to the big, black, intolerant, fact-free clouds that the past 12 months have stirred up.

Witling down a list of favourites has been hard, so forgive the indulgence of citing so many top moments.

As I’ve scanned my memory for the shows that touched me the most this year, one stands head and shoulders above the rest: Wit at fortyfivedownstairs. Margaret Edson's Pulitzer-worthy text about an academic dying of cancer is, of course, an excellent springboard, but the triumph of the Artisan Collective’s production is predominantly thanks to the utterly transcendent performance of Jane Montgomery Griffiths. Words feel inadequate to properly summarise the power of that extraordinary night of theatre, but suffice to say, I have rarely felt as profoundly altered as I did walking out after this show. I was with my husband Toby and as we stepped out onto Flinders Street, neither one of us could talk,because we knew if either of us uttered a single syllable we would both have broken and unravelled. We hugged for a minute or two and summoned an Uber. Even thinking about it now is pushing me dangerously close to sobbing onto my keyboard. Jane, if you ever happen to read this, I cannot thank you enough.

I’m a passionate believer that Indigenous narratives must be a vital presence in our theatres, as it brings First Nation stories into an environment that is largely skewed white and socioeconomically privileged. Three shows this year were particularly striking for the way in which they galvanised the duality of the contemporary Indigenous experience, which simultaneously reacts to the zeitgeist while anchored to historical injustice. Ilbijerri Theatre's presentation of Jacob Boehme’s frank yet affirming exploration of being black, gay and HIV-positive in Australia, Blood On The Dance Floor, offered a view of Aboriginal life that is rarely seen, articulated in a way that was powerfully and beautifully realised. Nakkiah Lui’s Blaque Showgirls and hip-hop cabaret Hot Brown Honey both told defiant and gloriously shameless stories of what it means to be a woman of colour in a society that still clings to colonial ideals.

On the smallest scale, some great solo shows graced Melbourne's stages this year. Lab Kelpie's production of Douglas Rintoul's Elegy, based on interviews of gay men living in insurgency held Iraq, was not only a slick and resourceful staging (especially the excellent sound design by Russell Goldsmith), but also a potently affecting performance by Nick Simpson-Deeks; I left feeling shaken and ashamed and enlightened. The always masterful Susie Dee’s production of Harry Melling's Peddling, featuring an astonishingly committed performance by Darcy Brown, was a gut-punch of a show; superb storytelling executed fearlessly. Brilliant Brit playwright Duncan Macmillan’s Every Brilliant Thing, co-written and performed by Jonny Donahoe, made me laugh all the way through and sob all the way home, the kind of production that busts you open with that bittersweet joyful sorrow that only theatre can tap.

Feminist theatre, another area of the art form I feel passionately protective of, also enjoyed some excellent turns this year. Nic Green and Laura Bradshaw's Trilogy, offered probing, eccentric, gloriously irascible and occasionally naked perspectives on feminist philosophies in a show that is as potent and relevant today as it was when the pair first staged it ten years ago. Patricia Cornelius’s Shit, revived at fortyfivedownstairs following its sold-out debut season, was a brutal, bold, touching, confronting and thought provoking instigation. That Cornelius's work is so rarely recognised by Australia's major state theatre companies is, for lack of better words, fucking maddening.

Finally, this year’s Poppy Seed Theatre Festival showed why emerging theatre-makers must be championed in a space where they can flex their creative muscles, make mistakes, try things out and hone their craft. From this year’s excellent quartet of works, Three Birds Theatre's LadyCake and Riot Stage's F. were impressively accomplished in their thinking and execution, despite being fledgling works made on shoestring budgets.

Honourable Mentions

Paul Capsis in Resident Alien: a superbly observed study of Quentin while retaining the ineffable fabulousness of Capsis.
Belarus Free Theatre, Burning Doors: a model for any and all political theatre-makers.
Dance North, If____Was____ :  a nifty concept with genuinely breathtaking results.
Malthouse Theatre, Picnic At Hanging Rock: Matt Lutton may not always be the theatre-maker we want, but he is definitely the theatre-maker we need.
Vic Theatre Company, 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee: face-aching grins guaranteed.
NTS/Melbourne Festival, Our Ladies Of Perpetual Succour: Cum-filled submarine; need I say more?

What MB is looking forward to in 2017: Malthouse Theatre's 2017 season makes me feel physically giddy. It's innovative, it's unapologetic in its motives, it's bolshy and it's proudly nonconformist. While MTC cements its reputation as the most cynically pandering presenter in Victoria, Malthouse continues to ensure Melbourne's more discerning theatre lovers are sated. I am especially excited about Lutton's new adaptation of The Elephant Man, as I am, to be blunt, a big ol' Matt Lutton fan boy and have adored both adaptations from this year’' season.

Fortyfivedownstairs will also present plenty to get excited about next season, especially Trainspotting Live and Ben Gerrard in I Am My Own Wife, both early on in the year.

SM: Reviewers often deal with restricted word counts, so it's nice to write as much has you want. And Maxim generally writes longer reviewers that are detailed discussion rather than a pull quote and star rating. This great discussion reminded me of a few brilliant shows that I saw but didn't review and made me regret missing a couple more.

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What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 11

December 14, 2016, 4:41 pm

≫ Next: What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 12

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Today's group of wonderful people are reviewer Tim Byrne, playwright Katy Warner and Neddwellyn Jones from La Mama.

And another day in which I regret missing Animal (to be fair, I wasn't in the country). This show has to have another season.

Tim Byrne
arts writer, reviewer

Tim Byrne. Photo by Chris Boyd

TB's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: The best assumptions to burst are the ones you hold about yourself. This year I burst an assumption I’ve held all my life: that I’m not really into traditional ballet. Australian Ballet’s first ever production of Nijinsky was undoubtedly superb, an intense and sustained masterpiece, but my most treasured moment in a theatre this year was under the spell of the Houston Ballet as they performed an impeccably danced, utterly rousing, muscular and deeply moving Romeo and Juliet. It was thrilling, and opened me to a form I’d dismissed as fusty and moribund.

What TB is looking forward to in 2017: I’ve been hopelessly slack with tracking upcoming programs, but I am off to Adelaide to see Thomas Ostermeier’s Richard III, which should prove interesting, given his electric Hedda Gabler here a couple of years ago for Melbourne Festival. But mostly I’m hoping to discover a new and unexpected love, something that opens me to forms I’ve never considered. Because that’s really the point of art, isn’t it?

SM: Tim's another reviewer who sees so much more than he's able to write about. I read his reviews even when I haven't seen the show.because they are a great read and they always show me something about the show or artist that I hadn't seen before. But my favourite moment with Tim this year was his talk with Stan Grant (about his book Talking to my Country) on a stupidly hot and still February night in a church hall in Albert Park. The room was fringed with boxes of second-hand stuff for a fete and Tim asked the perfect questions to let Stan tell his story.

Katy Warner
playwright

Katy Warner

KW's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: I think I was hidden in a bubble of first drafts and deadlines this year and did not get to see as much as I wanted. I could name a couple of favourite missed moments. Like Animal. I am kicking myself for missing Animal.

This year I was fortunate enough to catch Jack Charles vs. The Crown after missing it the first time around. Uncle Jack makes it all look so effortless. What an incredible human. This was poignant, vital storytelling.

Loved Gonzo for its form, risk and performances. Plus, the discussions it generated in the foyer, and at work the next day.

OUR land people stories from Bangarra Dance Theatre. Jasmin Sheppard's choreography and David Page's music for MACQ was incredibly powerful.

Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour (Melbourne Festival) made me laugh and cry and sing and I just adored it.

Blaque Showgirls created some unforgettable moments, costumes, performances – satire at its best.

What KW is looking forward to in 2017: An Austrian-esque swing to the left across the world.

And pretty much everything in the Malthouse and Theatre Works seasons, the Yirramboi First Nations Arts Festival, the new Australian writing on show at Red Stitch Theatre and, for families at Arts Centre Melbourne, Luke Kerridge's Bambert's Book of Lost Stories (just the trailer makes me teary).

katywarner.com

SM: Katy wrote and directed A Prudent Man at Melbourne Fringe. There's plenty of easy and average satire about elected right-wing politicians around; what made this stand out was how it made the audience begin to not like but listen to, and even care, about a selfish conservative middle-aged straight white man in a suit. This is another show that I really hope gets a return season.

PS: Maxim Boon sent me a message yesterday because he couldn't believe he'd not mentioned A Prudent Man in part 10; it's been added.

Neddwellyn Jones 
La Mama Theatre

Neddwellyn Jones

NJ's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: The moment that stayed with me the most in 2016, was in the minutes following the opening of Animal (influx) at Theatre Works in November.

Following one of the most powerful and affecting productions of the year, we all joined in for three heavy rounds of applause. None of us in the audience, all fairly seasoned theatregoers, seemed to want to stop clapping. When we finally did, we sat there, as a group, united in silence and awe at what had just unfolded. No one dared to speak for at least a minute, and it felt like an eternity before anyone left their seat... and it felt like a reaction that came as close as it could to doing the work justice.

What NJ is looking forward to in 2017: In 2017, I cannot wait to check out the inaugural Asia TOPA Festival in February and March, which will provide an unprecedented opportunity for Melbourne audiences to celebrate the rich and wonderful contemporary arts and culture on offer from our close neighbours in Asia.

La Mama’s 50th Anniversary will also provide undeniable highlights, the stand-out being a month long festival in July with some of Australia’s most talented and celebrated writers, directors, designers and performers returning "home".

And lastly - if someone out there is listening to the word on the street  and were to program Angus Cerini’s The Bleeding Tree for a Melbourne season, I dare say the chances of it being included in this same column in 12 months time would be extremely high!

SM: Another easy one: Every time Nedd changes ticket dates for me or squeezes me into a show on very short notice.

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What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 12

December 15, 2016, 5:08 pm

≫ Next: What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 13

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Today's wonderful people – Bron Batten, John Kachoyan and Myf Clark – are published a bit late today because of many amazing moments at Finucane and Smith's cocktail fundraiser last night. One being, Moira reminding a room full of very generous people that "Art does change culture and it does change lives". Let's remember that.

Bron Batten
theatre-maker, performer, producer, Grand Designs enthusiast

Bron Batten. Photo by Theresa Harrison

BB's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Can I say something I was involved in? Oh well, I'm going to anyway! Working with 90-plus women of all sizes and ages on Nic Green and Laura Bradshaw's production of Trilogy at Arts House was a wonderful honour. Experiencing the openness, trust, tears and humour we shared whilst exposing ourselves (literally and metaphorically) was breathtaking and a total privilege, as was working with Nic and Laura. Plus I'm pretty sure that everyone I've ever known or worked with in Melbourne has now seen me naked so that dream where you go to work in the nude now holds no terror.

Backstage in Biscuit Land generated some really difficult discussions about inclusion and cultural access that I thought were really important and made me question my own attitudes towards who and what dictates those terms. Jess's spontaneous tics were the kind of brilliant, inherent improvisational element that is the reason why I go to live performance.

Of course Zoe Coombs Marr's brilliant and disgusting creation Dave should get a mention and I know it was in Sydney but The Listies Hamlet: Prince of Skidmark was loaded with ridiculous jokes and completely amazing in its ability to get tiny children screaming with excitement about Shakespeare.

What BB is looking forward to in 2017: I think The Malthouse has some really interesting programming and I'm sure the whole Dance Massive program will have me inspired whilst at the same time moaning about my complete loss of flexibility.

SM: I knew that Bron's work in Trilogy was my favourite moment* of hers before I read this. It's a show that changes lives by making the bit of our brain that-believes-all-the-controlling-bullshit-about-how-women-should-look realise that it's bullshit. (I still sing Jerusalem when I'm naked.)

* Even though her Onstage Dating may well be one of my favourite shows of all time. I saw it twice and would happily have seen it every time.

John Kachoyan

director,  dad

John Kachoyan

JK's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016:  Duncan Macmillan’s Every Brilliant Thing; a piece I’ve seen grow from a little showing in London. I really loved Edward II at Malthouse, Jane Montgomery Griffiths heartbreaking, towering and utterly brilliant performance in Wit, and Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour was my Melbourne Festival highlight.

Outside of shows,  some of the small moments of community have been amazing for me. Chats in foyers, excitement over works to come and celebrating success in others – a maturity and calm in the face of such crisis. And it's more a movement than a moment, but the rise and rise of amazing creative women into positions of influence, care and creativity in all aspects of our theatre landscape; long may it continue.

And the birth of my son August, who's made me ask more than ever "Who do I make work for?".

Things I wish I saw and hope to see again; Mark Wilson rounding out his Shakespearean trilogy with Anti-Hamlet, Picnic At Hanging Rock and LabKelpie's A Prudent Man by Katy Warner with the gorgeous Lyall Brooks.

What JK is looking forward to in 2017: So many shows! Desert by Morgan Rose at Red Stitch - Morgan is a brilliant writer and I cant wait to see her next play, Daniel Lammin’s Awakening remount at fortyfivedownstairs, Fraught Outfit’s The Book of Exodus - Part I and Part II (a double treat after the mesmeric, challenging Bacchae), Christopher Hampton’s version of Florian Zeller’s The Father at MTC and Kate Mulvany’s Richard III for Bell Shakespeare is sure to be stunning.

Also! Go and see The Listies Ruin Xmas. (SM: At Malthouse: finishes this weekend. I'm going tomorrow.)

SM: On Facebook, one of John's friends quoted him talking about his awe and love for his partner after she gave birth. That was cool. And his direction of Elegy: he let the audience feel safe until they realised they were so involved with the story that it was almost personal.

Myf Clark
reviewer, arts worker, co-director of Girls on Film festival

Myf Clarke

MC's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016:  Highlights for me were either supremely intimate and/or made me cry.

On the intimate side, I was completely taken by Dion and Menage (both in Melbourne Fringe). I ended up being the only audience member for Dion the night I went, as the other two didn't show up, and it was a truly breathtaking and eerie experience. While Menage (performed in a cafe and bedroom for an audience of two) was one of the most thought-provoking shows I saw this year.

Meanwhile, I ended up in tears watching Blaaq Catt by Maurial Spearim and 186,000 by Kerith Manderson-Galvin within 10 minutes of each show starting. (SM:186,000 finishes tomorrow, 17 December.) Both shows broke my heart and made me think in different ways and I am so glad that I can now carry these shows in my heart.

On a lighter note, I discovered the joy that is artists like Maeve Marsden and Tom Dickens. Between Jagged Little Singalong and Romeo and Juliet, I relived two of my all-time favourite albums and left with the biggest grin on my face and the sorest of throats from singing along to every single song (I really am a 90's child!).

I also discovered this year that I actually quite like stand-up comedy (as long as it's not performed by a famous male comedian). Lauren Bok, Grant Buse and Tegan Higginbotham were my first shows of MICF this year and all three left me on an absolute high!

What MC is looking forward to in 2017: The funding cuts of this past year were incredibly devastating, notably for me in regards to Platform Youth Theatre (which I joined at the tender age of 17 as a performer and then worked for years later) shutting down. I'm hoping that 2017 sees new and emerging talent step up and make their art known by all, no matter what our funding bodies put us and them through.

I'm also incredibly excited to see what La Mama Theatre puts on (as I am every year), while the Theatre Works program for next year has really caught my attention. I also honestly believe that Patricia Cornelius should have a show in every season of every theatre company all of the time.

SM: I've loved reading Myf's reviews this year, especially when I read one and instantly wanted to see the show.

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What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 13

December 18, 2016, 4:19 pm

≫ Next: What Melbourne Loved in 2016, part 14

≪ Previous: What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 12

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The "Lovies" will be ending this week, but if you send me some today, I'll make sure they get in.

Today we hear from Mama Alto and the Opera Chaser, Paul Selar.

Mama Alto
diva (in the most magnificent sense of the word)

Mama Alto. Photo by Alexis Desaulniers-Lea

MA's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Hot Brown Honey, at Arts Centre Melbourne, was affirming, daring, excoriating, exciting, irreverent, holy and empowering. It was joyous and emotional for me to see – for a change – so many people of colour, not just on stage but in the audience, too. This show, and the direct expressions of these artists, is a complete revelation. And it provided words to live by: "Moisturise, decolonise… stand up, speak up, rise up, make noise!".

Between Two Lines (Anna Nalpantidis with Elizabeth Brennan), at Embiggen Books,was my absolute pick of the Melbourne Fringe. Intimacy, stillness, presence, tenderness and the astoundingly profound depth of a one-on-one live art experience: the esoteric and curious ritual of bibliotherapy in a bath tub, and the feeling of balancing in an enormous snow globe, floating like a bubble in a precarious world.

Retrofuturismus (Maude Davies, Anni Davies and ensemble) at fortyfivedownstairs, which was equal parts shocking, tender, insightful, powerful and interrogative. A collision of the then, the now, and the yet to come, posing questions and explorations of environmental catastrophe, history repeating, queer possibilities, feminist futures and human nature.

Lisa Fischer at the Melbourne Recital Centre gave us the magic of unadulterated storytelling, with utter focus, dedication, talent, skill and sheer musical honesty. Lisa Fischer pours forth a fluid, breathtaking, all-encompassing and limitless voice with a warmth and generosity of storytelling, empathy and healing that is crystalline and rare.

Honourable mentions:
Blaque Showgirls (Nakkiah Lui and company) at Malthouse: a damning, hilarious, uncomfortable, layered spectacle of the state of this nation.

Lilith, the Jungle Girl (Sisters Grimm) at MTC Neon: a nuanced, raucous and provocative exploration of colonisation, culture, gender and the body.

Meow Meow's The Little Mermaid at The Malthouse: there are no words for the scintillating, glimmering madness of this diva’s unleashed psyche.

Frock Hudson FURRlesque at the Melba Spiegeltent: in the midst of a queer circus of silliness, humour, glamour and camp, Dean Arcuri in a glorious state of disarray delivered a poignant, raw, honest, tragically beautiful, emotional and heartbreaking sung rendition of "Will You Still Love Me When I’m No Longer Young And Beautiful" that spoke volumes about what it means to be queer and in love today.

The Color Purple (StageArt) at Chapel off Chapel: a stunning and passionate rendition of this Broadway icon-in-the-making, with a star turn by Thando Sikwila as Shug Avery. "It takes a grain of love to build a mighty tree – even the smallest voice can make a harmony."

Vanishing Act (Candace Miles and Rosie Clynes) at The Butterfly Club for Melbourne Fringe: a fabulous and unique cabaret journey through life with influences as diverse as Weimar, Grace Jones, Klaus Nomi, Kander and Ebb, and more, but syncretically combined to create a postmodern mishmash spectacle.

Lastly, powerful, eccentric, (rightfully) unashamed, (rightfully) unapologetic,authentic voices from women in cabaret comedy, two highlights of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival: the irrepressible local legend Geraldine Quinn in a brilliant retrospective revue Could You Repeat That at Malthouse, and emerging feminist rabble rousers Pink Flappy Bits in their eponymous shows.

What MA is looking forward to in 2017: Particularly, Pamela Rabe in The Testament of Mary, DisColourNation’s second iteration of The Unbearable Whiteness of Being, and the new Jackie Smith play directed by Moira Finucane, The Exotic Lives of Lola Montez.

And more generally, anything involving the extraordinary talents and stories of people of colour, people experiencing disability, queer people, trans and gender diverse people, non-binary people and women.

mamaalto.com

SM: The Adulteress (Melbourne Fringe) was cool and delightfully camp, but my Mama highlight was last week at Finucane and Smith's Christmas Cocktail party. There were many magnificent performances that captivated the sold-out, overflowing room, but one left the room silent: Mama Alto. One captivating song and the room exploded with pure love.

Paul Selar
Opera Chaser

Paul Selar selfie

OC's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: In my three decades of opera-going that I'm now calling OperaChasing and the piles of opera programs I'm not sure what to do with, 2016 will remain special: 95 opera productions in 21 cities. The memories of many may wilt as they hopefully nourish the heart and soul but others presumably will have everlasting immediacy.

In Melbourne, I love seeing how the operatic pulse beats and I'm always wishing more people would taste what's on offer, from the smell-of-an-oily-rag budget productions to the polished bells and whistles of the hugely funded national opera company. One thing for certain is that the smell of an oily rag is often at least as overwhelmingly affecting and rewarding as any high-end work performed to the more toffee-nosed culture that sticks to opera's heals.

Melbourne staged no less than 24 opera productions in 2016. Adding Gertrude Opera's Nagambie Lakes Opera Festival, a little weekend outing for city dwellers to combine wine and opera, the number swells to 32. Ok, part of that diverse program included three "nano" operas around 15 minutes in length each, but how their succinct attack still penetrates. Apart from the bacchanalian-steered opening night dinner and gorgeously sung operatic arias, Bernstein's Trouble in Tahiti directed by Greg Eldridge and The Scottish Opera, a new gripping, shortened and stylised meshing of Verdi's Macbeth in an 80-minute work directed and designed by Luke Leonard still resonate.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, the return of Opera Australia's Ring Cycle directed by Neil Armfield surprised me how much more arresting it was than its 2013 premiere (possibly due to that wilted memory). Elements of the everyday, mixed with the symbolic and surreal accompanying detailed characterisation and the year's most extraordinary singing and music-making, came together in a work of astounding beauty. Thank the gods it wasn't staged earlier in the year. I was so emotionally pummelled that immersing in anything outside The Ring seemed completely mundane.

Of the four, I had to see Die Walküre and Götterdämmerung again, and not just because of the allure of the double-dotted diacritics. Let's hope the cycle returns to Melbourne in 2019 so that it can be ticked off many more bucket lists.

But take note Opera Australia. More double-dotted Wagnerian repertoire got a magnificent outing by independently funded Melbourne Opera with Tannhäuser. This was a huge achievement that saw the company take a bold risk while making opera look right at home in the iconic Regent Theatre. Wagner's recurring theme of redemption resonated with glorious singing, expert orchestral support and director Suzanne Chaundy and her creative team's compelling staging portraying the contrast between one world of societal strictures and another of sexual pleasures. Perhaps Melbourne does have the initiative and resources to call itself a Wagnerian city after all. Is there any dream this city can't dream without making it a reality?

Victorian Opera's innovative arm muscled up once again under Artistic Director Richard Mills's tireless efforts in giving a fresh approach to the art. Directed by Emil Wolk, Laugher and Tears saw Mills's powerful reimagining of Leoncavallo's great tragic one-act opera, Pagliacci– the tears – came with a prologue made up of a pastiche of Baroque and Renaissance music imbued with comic abandon and contextual contrast – the laughter. Integrated circus arts handsomely illuminated the stage for one of the company's most compelling recent works that saw opera return to another splendid venue, the Palais Theatre. Certainly a work worthy of revival.

Finally, little Lyric Opera of Melbourne delivered an exquisite three-season adventure headed by the succulently staged, mojito-driven and rarely seen operatic version of Graham Greene's Our Man in Havana by Aussie composer Malcolm Williamson. The musical richness of the score – brilliantly sung by many of Melbourne's young artists – the witty libretto and the directorial flesh Suzanne Chaundy gave to this festering black comedy (performed to an audience not much larger than 150), reflects the knack Artistic Director Pat Miller has in unearthing varied and exciting works.

Much further afield, controversial Catalan director Calixto Bieito's dark, thought-provoking interpretation of Fromental Halévy's rarely seen 1835 La Juive (The Jewess) at the Bavarian State Opera stood out for its subtlety and strength. Musically and vocally outstanding, it remains for me the year's most powerfully relevant work highlighting the oneness and differences in humanity, the instilled fear of the other as a threat, and of intolerances we harbour but can't see. Much food for modern thought.


Finally, for those interested in the many great contributions made to the art of opera in 2016, I'm running a one-hour Twitter night for The 2nd Annual OperaChaser Awards and Commendations via @OperaChaser between Christmas and New Year. I've given only a little away so come join in and have a drink to find out more to celebrate our artists with me.

What OC is looking forward to in 2017: If you think opera isn't your thing, maybe 2017 might change that. Bizet's ever-popular Carmen comes to town in a new production from Opera Australia so that could do the trick but I saw it in Sydney earlier this year and it's Cuban-set concoction needed a deal of attention I hope it gets by May. Two works at the top of my list are Opera Australia's King Roger– a 1924 work by Polish composer Karol Szymanowski and a co-production with London's Royal Opera House – and Melbourne Opera's second outing at the Regent Theatre for hours and hours of more Wagner with Lohengrin.

Rarely do we see Czech composer Leoš Janácek’s powerful works so Victorian Opera's Cunning Little Vixen, his poignant reflection on the cycle of life, shouldn't be missed either. Make sure you add Tom Waits and William S Burroughs's allegory of addiction, The Black Rider, to the list as well. It's a co-production with Malthouse Theatre starring Paul Capsis with Meow Meow and Kanen Breen.

Lyric Opera of Melbourne will no doubt enchant with a contemporary work by female composer Rachel Portman, The Little Prince. Based on Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's delightful 1943 book, it premiered at Houston Grand Opera in 2003 with Teddy Tabu Rhodes in the role of the Pilot.

Finally, on the international front, for something quirky amongst so much impressive work that'll be impossible to see, there's a new comic opera based on that botched restoration of a fresco of Jesus likened to a hedgehog. Written by two Americans, librettist Andrew Flack and composer Paul Fowler, Behold the Man will premiere in a fully staged production in the town of Borja where everyone's laughing at how a town's misfortune turned with just a few well-intended brushstrokes. That I'd love to see.

operachaser.blogspot.com.au

SM: I didn't see as much opera as I wanted to this year, but Paul makes sure that I see some. His blog is great; no one else writes about just opera – let alone about opera all over the world. I learn so much about opera by reading his reviews and tweets.

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What Melbourne Loved in 2016, part 14

December 19, 2016, 3:41 pm

≫ Next: What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 15

≪ Previous: What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 13

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Today we hear from actor and singer Petra Elliot and two of the biggest supporters advocates for the arts in Melbourne: arts writers Myron My and Rohan Shearn.

Myron My
reviewer, best dressed of all the reviewers

Myron My

MM's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Rather than talk about shows I loved, I really want to talk about shows that made me feel things that I don't normally feel or thoughts I had not considered before. To begin with, Backstage in Biscuitland really made me think about how we all need to work towards inclusivity in the arts, and not just performers or theatre makers, but as audience members as well. Similarly, Jodee Mundy and Deafblind artists Heather Lawson and Michelle Stevens's Imagined Touch had a strong response from me in terms of how we view disability, both in society and within the arts and a great lesson in reminding us that going to a performance doesn’t necessarily mean watching it or hearing it. 

Also at Arts House was Melanie Jame Wolf's Mira Fuchs, a feminist work on how women's bodies are seen and used within the context of stripping, Wolf herself having been a stripper for eight years. It's the first piece of a trilogy so I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of this. During the Fringe festival, The Honeytrap's immersive show, The Maze put me in the mind of a woman walking home alone at night while simultaneously being in the shoes of a man following her. The performance made me acutely aware of the concerns and worries women face on a regular basis and left me feeling vulnerable and ashamed, but in a good way. 

I also have to give a special mention to Joshua Ladgrove and his brilliant creation of Neal Portenza. I've seen him perform three times this year and each time, no matter what was going on in my life, his antics on stage always made me forget about everything and gave me permission to laugh a hell of a lot and to allow myself to just enjoy the moment. 

What MM is looking forward to in 2017: I have already purchased my subscription to the Malthouse Theatre and will be purchasing one to Theatre Works shortly. Both their seasons look amazing and I can't wait to get to see them all. Also looking forward to Little Ones Theatre's Merciless Gods and Stephen Nicolazzo's direction of The Moors for Red Stitch. And pretty much everything that will be on at Arts House. Oh, and to try and break this year’s record of 172 shows!

Myron's top-10-plus of 2016: myronmy.me

SM: No one sees as many Fringe shows as Myron does. He might see more than Fringe staff. He's one of the biggest advocates and ongoing supporters of independent artists (and especially cabaret) in town. He's the reviewer I read to find out about artists I haven't heard of (and he was a great source of "do I need to see x" during Fringe). But my moments with Myron are not about theatre: He loves Survivor– the tribe has spoken – more than I do. He knows the contestants names, he streams it before free-to-air. He should be on the Australian version; he applied but the producers were stupid and didn't choose him. I can share my love for this show with him and he makes me feel like I'm just a fan rather than an obsessive Survivor nerd.

Petra Elliot
actor, singer

PE's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: My friend invited me to visit her one Wednesday evening, but as I was already slated to go to fortyfivedownstairs that evening to see The Artisan Collective's Wit, I arranged to have brunch with her on Saturday morning instead.

That night I sat in the audience of Wit, marvelling at Jane Montgomery Griffiths in the lead role. Her performance was incredible, and I sat there with the tears she had evoked streaming unashamedly down my cheeks – I made absolutely no attempt to conceal them. The set design, direction, and supporting cast were just as impressive, creating a space in which I felt safe to just feel. It was one of the most dynamic and unforgettable pieces of work I'd seen in a while.

Perhaps though, there is another reason this work has stayed with me. That Saturday brunch brought with it news that my friend had found out she herself had cancer (which she had wanted to tell me that Wednesday, the night I saw the show). Experiencing Wit became that much more powerful – I suddenly had an even stronger tie to the work – and I can only imagine how much of a mess I would have been in the audience if the order of events had been reversed.

For me this is often the best theatre. Work in which you are able to do more than just witness, but experience, and truly immerse yourself.

Don't get me wrong, I of course love feel-good theatre and, on a lighter note, I turn my mind to the incredible cabaret I've seen in 2016. Special mentions to Cabaret Festival highlights Alice Tovey  in Personal Messiah, and Karlis Zaid, Mark Jones and Aurora Kurth for Australian Horror Story (with direction by Stephen Gates). Incredible performances, stunning original songs and musical arrangements, shining a light on the darker side of our society while still being incredibly entertaining. Mother's Ruin: A Cabaret About Gin was another highlight and is everything I love about cabaret: dynamic voices singing in killer harmony, a fascinating narrative on a topic you'd never have expected, and stunning re-arrangements of well chosen songs that progress the story and evoke all of the feels.

Double Indemnity at MTC was also a particular favourite. The performances were delightful, and how good was that set!

What PE is looking forward to in 2017: Like most people, I'm excited by the seasons of Theatre Works and the Malthouse, and I love what the Butterfly Club are doing with their curated seasons. I'll also be spending a few weeks in Adelaide for Fringe with The Mighty Little Puppet Show and Petrasexual (2014 review), and I'm super excited to get immersed in Mad March and see as much as I can.

petraelliott.com

SM: I've seen Petra this year, but I haven't seen her perform this year – not by choice – but I have watched her in part the tv show Sonningsburg that I'm going to watch all of before the year is out (it's all on YouTube). Favourite moment though was her getting 3D printed clitorises for her season of Petrasexual.

Myron at the Butterfly Club with Petra's clitoris

Rohan Shearn
Managing Editor, Australian Arts Review

Rohan Shearn. Photo by Alexander Evans

RS's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016:We were spoilt for choice this year as the commercial and independent sector delivered a mixed bag of delights.

Capturing the Australian vernacular of the 50s, Ladies in Black was a divine Australian musical adaptation of Madeleine St John’s popular 1993 novel, The Women in Black.  Matilda, featuring Tim Minchin’s witty lyrics, was everything a musical should be – it made you laugh and cry, and brought out the inner-child in us all. Special mention goes to Jacqueline Dark, and her rousing rendition of "Climb Ev’ry Mountain" in The Sound of Music– simply stunning.

Not to be outdone, the independently produced Thrill Me: The Leopold & Loeb Story was hauntingly intelligent, while Blue Saint Productions presented a beautifully crafted production of Jason Robert Brown’s Songs for a New World. Both productions were presented at Chapel Off Chapel.

The Melbourne Festival also delivered two of the most heart-warming performances of the year: Jess Thom was unpredictable and enlightening in Backstage in Biscuitland  while the National Theatre of Scotland’s Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour was pitch perfect in its delivery.

Drama wise, Paul Capsis delivered an exquisite performance in Resident Alien at fortyfivedownstairs, Daniel Clarke delivered an in-your-face exploration of masculinity with Caleb Lewis’s  Rust and Bone at the La Mama Courthouse, and the Belarus Free Theatre presented the confrontingly brilliant Burning Doors at Arts Centre Melbourne.

What RS is looking forward to in 2017: Musicals will be well represented again in 2017. It may have taken awhile to get here, but The Book of Mormon make its Australian premiere in February. It may have missed out on some nomination gongs at the Sydney Theatre Awards, Aladdin will take us to a ‘whole new world’ in this spectacular rendition of a modern Disney classic at Her Majesty’s Theatre in April. The Ladies in Black take up residence at The Regent for a return season, and Watch This continue their Sondheim journey with Merrily We Roll Along at the Southbank Theatre. Also, expect announcements on Dream Lover – The Bobby Darin Musical, and a new Australian production of Evita.

SM: Rohan is another amazing advocate and arts writer who sees everything, especially music theatre and cabaret. If I want to know anything about a musical, he's my source. I can't pick a favourite moment because I'm happy to see him every time I see him in a foyer, which is at most opening nights.

artsreview.com.au

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What Melbourne loved in 2016, part 15

December 20, 2016, 8:04 pm

≫ Next: What I loved in 2016, The best of Melbourne theatre

≪ Previous: What Melbourne Loved in 2016, part 14

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All that's left is me. Tomorrow I'll publish my 2016 list of the shows I loved, but it's time for some moments.

This year marked 10 years of me reviewing. I had a month off to breathe.

I only saw 165 (or 20+ more if I count events with multiple performances) shows this year. There were also less reviews but a lot more tweets. And I was teaching arts journalism; meeting and reading young writers who want to write about the arts is as good as it gets. It's been a shitty year for arts writers, but there are plenty of voices who are going to be there and demand that they are heard. And I love teaching.

Selfie. Not giving a single fuck in Ubud in November.

Plus a special thanks to Faster Pussycat Productions for the new logo.

SM's favourite moments in Melbourne theatre in 2016: Having this series welcomed back after a year off was awesome. Getting the emails and messages and talking to people about it IRL reminded me that we are a strong and active community.

Like so many others, I was a bit over it this year: funding cuts, Fairfax cuts, creative and writing tertiary courses being branded "lifestyle choices", far too many people still excluded from having a voice on main stages, boring conservative mainstage programs, and criticism of that dullness being ignored. The arguments I began to have in the 1980s are still happening; it's fucking depressing.

Then in the last couple of weeks I saw:

• Blaque Showgirls at Malthouse. An Indigenous fuck you to every condescending, well-meaning and earnest statement about acceptance and respect. Laughed until I cried.
• Burning Doors by Belarus Free Theatre at Arts Centre Melbourne. Some people are using theatre to save lives and change their world. Some people risk so much more than a couple of dull hours to go to the theatre.
• Hot Brown Honey at Arts Centre Melbourne. Standing screaming ovation for rejecting everything that denies women and especially women of colour a voice. 
• Briefs at Arts Centre Melbourne. The other side of the Hot Brown Honey coin. What this show said about gender and masculinity needs to be bottled and drunk by everyone who tells someone to "man up".

Maybe there's a lot of hope for our main stages in 2017.

And throw in Moira Finucane telling a room of cheering people that "Art does change culture and it does change lives", at a fundraiser where Finucane and Smith raised enough money to create the kind of art that does change lives.

Going to Coranderrk to see Coranderrk and hearing the voices that spoke there 135 years ago.

Being totally relaxed lying in bath in the Embiggen Books window for Between Two Lines at Melbourne Fringe (Anna Nalpantidis with Elizabeth Brennan).

Coranderrk at Coranderrk

Between Two  Lines

iOTA singing "Life on Mars" at the Melbourne Festival Bowie concert.

Watching children cut Cameron Woodhead's hair at Haircuts by Children at Melbourne Festival.

Cameron Woodhead at Haircuts by Kids

Having no idea what was funny at Two Dogsat the Melbourne Festival.

The moment when Joshua Ladgrove decided that Neal Portenza couldn't do his scripted show when there were only nine people in the audience and The Age reviewer was in the front row. 

Watching a stage of naked women dancing in Nic Green's Trilogy at Arts House.

The Harry Potter and the Cursed Child reading that wasn't a reading because it was just a group of friends hanging out and reading out loud. (Thanks Ben McKenzie.)

Getting a bag of "FUCK YOU" candy hearts at Dion in the Melbourne Fringe.

Dion

The best way to read a play

The whole audience breathing in together when the black world became white, and again when the white world dropped to reveal Hamer Hall in Back to Back's Lady Eats Apple at Melbourne Festival.

Dancing in an industrial fridge in a hotel dressing gown as Otto and Astrid sang "Ich Bin Nicht Ein Roboter" at the Finucane and Smith Christmas Cocktail party.

Otto and Astrid

Robbing a bank with Richard Watts and Fleur Kilpatrick at Pop up Playground's Small Time Criminals.

Fleur Kilpatrick, me, Kevin Turner, Richard Watts at Small Time Criminals

Running late to see Pound It, walking down the stairs and wondering who that amazing voice could be coming out of – then seeing Bridget Everett and knowing that I was going to love every second of her show.

Every tweet from Candy Bowers.

Hanging out in Ai Weiwei's cat room for kids at the National Gallery of Victoria at 6.30 am during White Night.

Ai Weiwei's cats at NGV

What SM is looking forward to in 2017: Whatever it brings, everything else that everyone else has said, and The Book of Mormon.

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What I loved in 2016, The best of Melbourne theatre

December 21, 2016, 4:40 pm

≫ Next: Review: The Book of Mormon

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Tenth list and still no trophy, cheque or print-at-home certificate for the winners.

I sit on judging panels that have very specific criteria, but the criteria for this list remains simple: What did I love the most? And I've now added: Would I (did I) see it again?

The most popular show on from the What Melbourne Loved series was Backstage in Biscuitland. Tourettes Hero, we'd love you to visit us again.

Outstanding Artists 2016

WRITING

The Listies: Prince of Skidmark. Photo by Prudence Upton

Declan Greene and The Listies for Hamlet: Prince of Skidmark, Sydney Theatre Company
(Melbourne season please.)

Special mentions

David Finnigan for Kill Climate Deniers at Melbourne Fringe and the script

Sammy J for Hero Complex at Melbourne International Comedy Festival

DESIGN

Blaque Showgirls. Photo by Pia Johnson

Andrew Bailey (set) for Lungsat MTC

Paul Jackson (lighting) for Picnic at Hanging Rock at Malthouse

Eugyeene Teh (set and costume) for Blaque Showgirls at Malthouse

Special mentions

The Making Space team (Bronwyn Pringle, Melanie Liertz, Pippa Bainbridge,
Jack Beeby, Chris Molyneux and Rachel Edward )(whole space) for Beneath and Beyond at La Mama

Kate Davis (design) and Emma Valente (lighting) for Cain and Abel by The Rabble at The Substation


PERFORMANCE

Wit. Photo by Pia Johnson

Jane Montomery Griffiths in Wit by The Artisan Collective in conjunction with fortyfivedownstairs

Special mentions

Awakening. Photo by Nura Sheidaee

The cast of Awakening by MUST: Nicola Dupree, Samantha Hafey-Bagg, Eamonn Johnson, James Malcher, Sam Porter and Imogen Walsh.

The cast of Lilith, the Jungle Girlby Sisters Grimm at MTC: Ash Flanders, Candy Bowers, Genevieve Giuffre.


DIRECTION

Straight White Men.  Photo by Jeff Busby

Sarah Giles for Straight White Men at MTC and Blaque Showgirls at Malthouse

Special mentions

Daniel Lammin for Awakening by MUST

Daniel Clarke for Rust and Bone at La Mama


BEST FESTIVAL

FOLA: the Festival of Live Art

including Arts House ticket, Hotel Obsucura, and Portraits in Motion at Theatre Works.


EVERYTHING THEY DO ROCKS

Jason Lehane and Yvonne Virsik

MUST: Monash University Student Theatre

Every time I see a MUST production, I'm thrilled that I went. Yvonne Virsik (Artistic Director) and Jason Lehane (Technical Manager) help students to create the kind of theatre that blows me away every time. It's work made with an intelligence and a freedom that doesn't restrict ideas and regularly creates work so original and unique that I wonder why it hasn't been done before.

I only saw three shows this year – Noises Off,Slaughterhouse Five and Awakening. Each explored form and told story in ways that made the exploration of form invisible.

If you're one of those people who I tell to see shows, you know that MUST comes up a lot. So, what about making 2017 the year that you get out to Clayton? (It's really not that far.)

And so many artists and creators who are making their mark on Melbourne (a few have contributed moments) are from Monash and got their start at MUST.  Fleur Kilpatrick, Sarah Walker, Daniel Lammin, Mark Wilson, Mama Alto, Jack Beeby, Sarah Collins, Danny Delahunty, James Jackson, Kevin Turner, Anna Nalpantidis, Elizabeth Brennan, Tom Halls, Trelawney Edgar, Jake Stewart, Mark Crees, Bek Berger, Piper Huynh, Hayley Toth, Andrew Westle, Tom Middleditch. (I'm going to add to this list as more names are given to me.)

Slaughterhouse Five

Outstanding Productions 2016

CABARET

Leah Shelton in Terror Australis

Terror Australis by Leah Shelton (Polytoxic) at Melbourne Fringe

Special mentions

Mother's Ruin. Maeve Marsden & Libby Wood

Mothers Ruin: A Cabaret about Gin by Maeve Marsden and Libby Wood at the Butterfly Club

Briefs by The Briefs Factory at Arts Centre Melbourne

Princesstuousby Isabella Valette at the Butterfly Club, Melbourne International Comedy Festival


COMMERCIAL SHOW

Matilda, Royal Shakespeare Company and all the producers listed here


MUSICAL

Matilda, Royal Shakespeare Company and all the producers listed here


COMEDY

Dave and Zoe Coombs Marr. Trigger Warning

Trigger Warning by Zoe Coombs Marr at Melbourne International Comedy Festival

Special mentions

Rama Nichols. Mary Weather's Monsters

Mary Weather's Monsters by Rama Nichols at Melbourne International Comedy Festival

Marco. Polo. by Laura Davis at Melbourne International Comedy Festival (and Melbourne Fringe)

CIRCUS

Notorious Strumpet and Dangerous Girl by Jess Love at Melbourne Fringe


OPERA

Il Signor Bruschino. Lyric Opera

Il Signor Bruschinoby Lyric Opera

LIVE ART

Small Time Criminals players

Small Time Criminals by Pop up Playground

There's still time to play this live action game that closes (after a year) in February. It was so much fun. But it's not easy.

Listen to my co-robbers Richard and Fleur on RRR discussing our perfectly brilliant night. It starts at 2.34. (Fleur, I was giggling cos I was having so much fun! And because I was really shit at turning off my torch and had to hide my light from the terrifying guard, who never found me hiding under the table.)

Between Two Lines by Anna Nalpantidis with Elizabeth Brennan at Melbourne Fringe 


BEST OF THE BEST

Awakening by MUST

Every Brilliant Thing

Every Brilliant Thing by Paines Plough and Pentabus at Malthouse

Matilda, Royal Shakespeare Company and all the producers listed here

Trigger Warning by Zoe Coombs Marr at MICF


MY FAVOURITE SHOW OF 2016

Backstage in Biscuit Land. Jess Mabel Jones and Jessica Thom. . Photo by Jonathan Birch

Backstage in Biscuitlandby Tourettes Hero at Melbourne Festival

hedgehog

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Review: The Book of Mormon

February 5, 2017, 4:29 pm

≫ Next: Review: 'Tis Pity

≪ Previous: What I loved in 2016, The best of Melbourne theatre

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The Book of Mormon
Producers listed here
4 February 2017
Princess Theatre
open run
bookofmormonmusical.com.au

The Book of Mormon. Ryan Bondy & Auguston Aziz Tchantcho. Photo by Jeff Busby

Oh, I believe!

The expectations of the Australian production of The Book of Mormon were higher than a stoner watching South Park– the Broadway run hasn’t had an empty seat since it opened, and won Tonys, in 2011. These expectations have been reached – and surpassed.

Seeing it once isn’t enough.
...

Review on AussieTheatre.com and will be published her soon

As it's also a very expensive ticket (musicals don't welcome everyone), it's worth trying for the nightly $40 ticket lottery. You have to be at the theatre when it's drawn, but it could save you around $400 for two tickets.

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Review: 'Tis Pity

February 8, 2017, 4:06 pm

≫ Next: Reflection: The Intimate 8

≪ Previous: Review: The Book of Mormon

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'Tis Pity: An Operatic Fantasia on Selling the Skin and the Teeth
Victorian Opera
6 February 2017
Elisabeth Murdoch Hall
to 8 February
victorianopera.com.au

'Tis Pity. Kanen Breen & Meow Meow. Photo by Pia Johnson

The 2015 Victorian Opera production of Die Sieben Todsunden with Meow Meow took me as close to seeing how Brecht and Weil must have imagined their work. It was a highlight of that year and the newly devised 'Tis Pity song cycle reunites Meow and director Cameron Menzies, adds the rather divine tenor Kanen Breen and Richard Mills composing for a full orchestra. And it's about exploring the history of prostitution. All the ingredients are brilliant, so what went wrong?

...

The full review is on AussieTheatre.com and will be published here soon.

Reflection: The Intimate 8

February 9, 2017, 5:46 pm

≫ Next: Review: The Way Things Work

≪ Previous: Review: 'Tis Pity

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The Intimate 8
Finucane & Smith, National Gallery Victoria
4 February 2017
NGV
to 11 February
ngv.vic.gov.au

Last year, Moira Finucane became the NGV's first Creative Fellow. It's an honorary role, but what an honour.

And what an absolute joy to be among the lucky few who have taken Moira's The Intimate 8 tour through the gallery. Over three Saturdays, groups of 20(ish) took a free whirlwind tour where hundreds of years of art saturated our souls and reminded us to look around, see what people make and live our life as a total work of art.

A gift. Porcelain Heart handcrafted by Catherine Lane and held by many hands. (I put it next to my cat's ashes.)

Guests wear headphones and follow Moira in her swishing long black gown with crystal straps. She tells us what she thinks about when she looks at the works, what she imagines the artists thought or what the characters in the paintings are thinking.

I saw pieces I've never looked at before, but some weren't new. Her imagined revenge on the ravens in Anguish – August Friedrich Albrecht's 1878 painting of the sheep with her dead lamb that always breaks me a little bit – was gory and glorious.

ngv.vic.gov.au/explore/collection/work/4344/

The headphones add a soundtrack (composed and collated by Darrin Verhagen and Ben Keene) to her commentary – like hearing "... then we take Berlin" (from Cohen's "First we take Manhattan") while looking at Great dancing pair by Erich Heckel, painted in Germany in 1923 at the height of the Weimar Republic, when the war to end all wars was over and no one believed that a greater hell was on its way.

It felt like being in a film; feeling distanced from everyone else in the gallery and being immersed in Moira's thoughts. Even though she's talking out loud, and others are listening, we only hear her through the headphones.

There's little time to contemplate, but it's easy it is to remember each work and its story – why don't I live in the Gallia apartment? –  and still have time to accidentally hold hands with a stranger while imagining afternoon tea served eighteenth century English silver. And watch gallery visitors watching us; we became as much a part of their gallery visit as the art.

ngv.vic.gov.au/explore/collection/work/15185/

ngv.vic.gov.au/explore/collection/work/116841/

What a way to introduce and share art. Imagine if there were tours like this through the gallery every day? Think of all the artists and performers that you'd love to take a tour with. Think of all the people – some who might have never been to the gallery – who would take the tours.

The six Intimate 8 sessions were booked out almost as soon as they were announced. There are two tomorrow afternoon, so if you're in the gallery after 2.30, you may want to follow a group of people in headphones following a magnificent woman in black.

Review: The Way Things Work

February 12, 2017, 10:59 pm

≫ Next: Review: Lifetime Guarantee

≪ Previous: Reflection: The Intimate 8

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The Way Things Work
Red Stitch Actors Theatre
8 February 2017
Red Stitch
to 5 March
redstitch.net/gallery

Joe Petruzzi & Peter Houghton. Photo by  Teresa Noble

My review in The Age/SMH.

Review: Lifetime Guarantee

February 12, 2017, 11:11 pm

≫ Next: Review: Little Emperors

≪ Previous: Review: The Way Things Work

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Lifetime Guarantee
Theatre Works
10 February 2017
Theatre Works
to 26 February
theatreworks.org.au

Izabella Zena & Julian Dibley-Hall. Photo by Pier Carthew

My review in The Age/SMH.

Review: Little Emperors

February 15, 2017, 9:29 pm

≫ Next: Review: John

≪ Previous: Review: Lifetime Guarantee

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Little Emperors
Malthouse Theatre for Asia TOPA
15 February 2017
Beckett Theatre
to 26 February

Little Emperors. Photo by Tim Grey

Little Emperors was commissioned and developed by Malthouse Theatre for the Asia TOPA festival. Australian writer Lachlan Philpott (The Trouble With Harry) was flown to Beijing to work with director Wang Chong (founder and director of the Beijing-based experimental company Théâtre du Rêve Expérimental) to create "a piece about the connection between China and Australia ... appealing to both English and Mandarin speaking audiences."

...

Full review on AussieTheatre.com and will be her soon.