Tag: reviews

Greenroom’s reviews of Queensland theatre

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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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On putting the community into theatre

Image: That Production Company (RUINED)

It’s so easy to get caught up in attempting to define and partition off the kinds of theatre we produce. We tend to box, define, create matrices of the way stuff works, test things against check lists of expectations: professional, amateur, pro-am, community, independent …

Western theatre is no stranger to evolutionary processes; it’s one of its great strengths. Right here, right now, it’s clear that, as part of the wider arts-industrial landscape and the generational change in arts leadership, theatre makers are experimenting with the how and where of creating theatre. New alliances that enable greater participation are being thought about and enabled – look at the way the main-house companies like QTC and La Boite are opening the portals – something which, even a few years ago, was unthinkable. Many of the boundaries that used to exist are porous if they haven’t already been dismantled.

The notion of a ‘full ecology’ of theatre existing out there was put by Wesley Enoch (AD of Queensland Theatre Company) recently in a Facebook discussion. But it’s not so much out there as in the things we talk about in foyers, in the rehearsal rooms we occupy, the chat about shows we see. Wesley goes on to compare this ecology with the kind of easy acceptance of the range of activities in sport in this country and wonders why art-making hasn’t been as accommodating. It’s a good question and one that’s part of the thinking I refer to above.

Why no easy access as Wesley asks? It has, I think, as much to do with the ongoing struggle that art and artists in this country have had to ‘prove’ their worth. But it’s a big question that goes to the heart of Australian culture and will continue serving as food for ongoing discussion, but not here right now. I’m interested in the ways and means and the impact this movement is having in and on the wider theatre community here in southern Queensland. Continue reading “On putting the community into theatre”

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Review: A Tender Thing – Full Circle Theatre at Visy Theatre, Brisbane Powerhouse

Images: Full Circle Theatre (supplied)

Of course I loved it. There’s very little not to love about an intelligent, heart-felt play, fine performances, and sensitive direction in a space that seems so absolutely tailor-made for this show. Brisbane Powerhouse’s Visy Theatre is an intimate, welcoming space where the audience is never far from the on-stage action and A Tender Thing, Ben Power‘s play (originally commissioned by the Royal Shakespeare Company) fits it like a glove.

Linda Davey directs Flloyd Kennedy and Michael Croome as the contemporary, 60-something, star-crossed lovers Romeo and Juliet who are living in blissful, loving retirement on a coast somewhere. Their love is, indeed, tender. The tides lap and wash the days as they pass – Scott Norris provides the soundscape design and Daniel Anderson lights the bedroom and surrounds of Romeo and Juliet’s beachside house – a beautiful design by Freddy Komp augmented by AV from mk2.

As Time – that old enemy – passes, their love, deeper than ever, is challenged by changing circumstances. I don’t wish to spoil the key event for audiences; it came as a shock to me and I think the play is more powerful when it works on audiences who are unsuspecting. I love plays that wrong-foot you so ingeniously … Continue reading “Review: A Tender Thing – Full Circle Theatre at Visy Theatre, Brisbane Powerhouse”

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Brad Jennings and Steven Maxwell: Markwell Presents (Interview 37)

Image: Brad Jennings & Steven Maxwell – (c) Greenroom

One December day, about 5 years ago I interviewed Brad Jennings and Steven Maxwell as part of Apple’s Create World Conference. That year I was part of the Create World team using podcasts and blog posts to capture the points of view from creative people working in (mostly) higher education. I remember at the time thinking how interesting was the aesthetic concept of what they were calling ‘cinematic theatre.’ I managed to see a snippet of the way Brad and Steven integrated it into performance via a short performance they presented at that conference.

In the past 5 years I’ve seen their work in production (The White Earth for La Boite Theatre and August Moon for QTC among others). Markwell Presents is a name that’s been appearing more and more, and especially in education circles. It turns out that, among other things, they do about 12 artistic residencies in schools each year, an amazing number, I think. You can check the scope of their work on their website, but I wanted to talk again with Brad and Steven and find out how cinematic theatre and their work has progressed in that time and what lies ahead for them. Continue reading “Brad Jennings and Steven Maxwell: Markwell Presents (Interview 37)”