Author: Sita Borhani

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Review: The Empty City – The Human Company at Powerkids Festival @ Brisbane Powerhouse

The Empty City, directed by David Fenton, is based on the picture book of the same name by David Megarrity and Jonathon Oxlade. It explores an idea that has undoubtedly crossed the mind of every child: What if, for one day only, everyone disappeared and the city belonged to you? What would you do? Go on, you’ve already started picturing yourself eating and playing your way through a large department store, haven’t you? Jumping on all the beds, stuffing yourselves with gumballs, pouring your own McDonald’s thick-shake? Thought so.

Tom, our young protagonist, explores his options in the empty city between two projection screens that give the animated metropolis a 3D effect, allowing plenty of room for snazzy tricks and magical sleight of hand. Designer Jonathon Oxlade, lighting designer Freddy Komp, animator Luke Monsour and graphic designer Ray Pittman have done a fabulous job creating a city that is familiar yet mysteriously different; it could exist anywhere. The actors, Tom Oliver and Bridget Boyle collaborate inventively with their surroundings to tell Tom’s tale. Continue reading “Review: The Empty City – The Human Company at Powerkids Festival @ Brisbane Powerhouse”

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Review: Argus – Dead Puppet Society at Powerkids Festival @ Brisbane Powerhouse

Puppets – they’ve come a long way since Punch and Judy. In fact, I would go so far as to say the ‘puppet renaissance’ has been busily playing itself out for a few years now, with local Brisbane theatre company the Dead Puppet Society at its helm.

Always hard at work creating new and wonderful ways for humans to help their puppets tell a story, the latest offering from the Dead Puppets is the delightfully magical Argus, a 45 minute children’s piece, playing as part of the Powerkids festival at the Brisbane Powerhouse this June. Continue reading “Review: Argus – Dead Puppet Society at Powerkids Festival @ Brisbane Powerhouse”

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Review: Mother Courage – Queensland Theatre Company and QPAC at The Playhouse, QPAC

Images: Rob Maccoll

The last time Herr Brecht and I crossed paths was in a high school drama room, some 16 years ago and, to be perfectly honest, I wasn’t taken with his work. Come opening night of QTC’s indigenous production of his most famous play, and all I could remember about Brecht was that I was supposed to remember something about Brecht. Nonetheless, as the corrugated iron curtain flew up on Mother Courage, I was put at ease. These people I knew.

Probably his best known play, Brecht’s epic Mother Courage (1939) is set on the battlegrounds of the European thirty years’ war, 1618-1648. This production, adapted in a new translation by Wesley Enoch and Paula Nazarski, is set in a post-apocalyptic Australia, a world where ‘government is lost and human greed takes the form of mining armies.’ The indigenous population is clearly divided and, like the original, this Mother Courage is making her living – surviving the impossible odds – by profiteering from war. Continue reading “Review: Mother Courage – Queensland Theatre Company and QPAC at The Playhouse, QPAC”

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Review: Escape from the Breakup Forest – Mixtape Theatre Collective at Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts

Main Image: Simon Hall

I first saw this show in its infancy, at the USQ Arts Theatre in Toowoomba. It was a one-man job (well, one man and one puppet) created by Steven Pirie who was a first year theatre student at the time. It was raw, fun and silly, but most importantly, it was the seed that grew into the marvellous Escape from the Breakup Forest that made its Brisbane debut in the Shopfront of the Judith Wright Centre on Saturday night.

The show is now a three-hander and comes to us from the Mixtape Theatre Collective. Hailing from Toowoomba, Mixtape is proudly regional and relatively new. Read more about them here.

Directed by Claire Christian and Ari Palani, Steven Pirie is joined onstage by Dan Stewart and Ell Sachs, who play a host of minor characters and manipulate Curly the puppet with obvious joy and skill.  The plot is thus: Geeky teenage boy, Josh (Steven Pirie) meets quirky teenage girl, Emma (Ell Sachs). They fall in love and embark on a five-year relationship. Girl dumps boy for reasons unknown, boy collapses into an abyss of self-loathing and all-encompassing hatred for three years. One morning at the end of the third year he wakes up in a fantasy forest, ‘the breakup forest,’ and must embark on a quest to escape (whilst also overcoming his loss), with the assistance of a puppet spirit guide, Curly (Dan Stewart). Continue reading “Review: Escape from the Breakup Forest – Mixtape Theatre Collective at Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts”

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Review: cloudCUCKOOland – heartbeast Vicious Theatre at Trinity Hall

A karaoke musical based on Aristophanes’ The Birds entitled cloudCUCKOOland? I don’t really know what I expected.

Stepping out of a rainy night into the beautiful Trinity Hall in The Valley, packed for opening night of this original work, I was excited – as we know, I love a musical. Unlike any of the dodgy joints where my girlfriends have deigned to grab the mic and give Madonna’s Borderline a good flogging, this glittering karaoke bar was shiny and new, complete with slick barman and posh drinks. cloudCUCKOOland was written by Michael Beh (the company’s artistic directed) and co-directed with Michelle Carey who also plays Stevie in the show. It is heartBeast’s eighth show. Continue reading “Review: cloudCUCKOOland – heartbeast Vicious Theatre at Trinity Hall”