Written and performed by Damien Warren-Smith, and directed and cowritten by Cal McCrystal, Garry Starr Performs Everything is riot of a show that will delight theatre-makers and casual audience members alike. Having won awards in the Adelaide, Brighton, and Manchester 2018 Fringe Festivals, and having been nominated for both Best Newcomer and the Golden Gibbo Award in the Melbourne International Comedy Festival 2018, I was intrigued to say the least. Let me break down this must-see of Wellington Fringe Festival 2019.
Harry GibbonsThe promotion for Imposter Child describes it as contemporary (which it certainly is) fresh (which again it very much is) and hilarious. Well it was certainly genuinely funny and there were a number of very funny moments in what proved to be yet another great Fringe Festival contribution.
Jenny NimonAs someone who has never had a bent for movement, it always astounds me to see the way that dancers can tell a story with their bodies alone. Flying Down Sand Dunes is the first full-length work by Well Fare State—recent graduates of contemporary dance at the New Zealand School of Dance. Created as part of the Toi Pōneke Choreographic Residency, it explores the human condition, addressing themes of love, fragility, strength, and loss.
Jenny NimonBlonde Mountain Wolf Man, a piece of solo physical theatre by Craig Geenty, is an exploration of family history with strong emphasis on name, place, and identity. In an hour, the audience is taken on a journey that is both lighthearted and oddly intimate.
Kate NorquayHarleQueen is a one-woman comedy show written and performed by Abby Howells, and directed by Anya Tate-Manning. HarleQueen is a celebration of female fools, taking us on a journey through the history of female comedy. Abby intermingles the stories of famous female comedians like Joan Rivers and Mabel Normand with her own discovery of her love for comedy.
Kate NorquayOrder Up is a devised cabaret show inspired by the stories of hospitality workers in Wellington.It is also performed by a cast of mostly past or current hospitality workers. Order Up is a fun late night show which will make you laugh and cringe. But more than that, Order Up is both a critique and celebration of the hospitality industry that will make you think twice before you complain about shoddy service.
by Laura Ferguson Fun Fact: the cinematic masterpiece that is She’s the Man starring Amanda Bynes and Channing Tatum is a modernised version of Twelfth Night. Did I watch She’s the Man eleventy more time as “research” for this play? Yes, I did. Did I like this play better? My gawd, yes henny! Why? Because Anastasia Matteini-Roberts’ version has EVEN MORE DRAG! My personal opinion is that everything in life would be better with a little more drag tucked into it, so I was gagged to find out that one of the plays in Victoria University’s Six Degrees Festival had made my queer little dream come true.
Emilie HopeDolphins are fun, friendly, and full of energy, and Thinking Dolphins at BATS was also all of these things. As I walk up to the Heyday Dome, the doors are closed and I panic that the show has already begun! Thankfully, this was only to keep the mysterious stage smoke within the theatre. As soon as I stepped into the space, the actors greeted me and spoke enthusiastically to the audience. Their energy juxtaposed the ominous smoke and the moody blue and green lighting palette.
Emilie HopeCyndi Lauper’s Time after Time, quickly followed by Madonna’s Material Girl, welcomes me into BATS Random Stage to see a show about women, sex, and beauty standards. Low Level Panic by Claire McIntyre, directed by Six Degrees Festival’s Harriette Barker, ticks those three boxes, as we watch flatmates Mary (Charlotte Glucina), Jo (Amy Dean), and Celia (Zoë Christall) as their bathroom turns into a place to confide in each other and to the audience. Lizzie MurrayRetold dreams are typically incoherent rambles only interesting for the teller. I usually don’t want to hear about your dream unless I was in it. Director and writer Shona Jaunas, however, delivers a lucid odyssey into the subconscious of her protagonist in The Dream. The experimental theatre piece layers film, psychedelic soundscapes and dramatic lights to illustrate just how our dreams can be more than the sum of its random images.
Kate NorquayWhy Are We Still Here? follows four young women dealing with grief. During a storm they break into an abandoned theatre for shelter. They are visited by two ghosts overnight, who help them explore their pain, while working through their own. A solid debut from Tempest theatre, Why Are We Still Here? is a successful exploration into the ways we grieve.
Emilie HopeThe Attitudes: Refusing Performance at BATS Theatre is an examination of whiteness, an art piece that opens a long overdue conversation and asks for pākehā to look within and start the change we want to see in the world.
Lizzie MurrayFeminist fruit comedy punk band The Rotten Cores are back from their award winning Fringe season. In Discharge is Rotten to the Core, directed by Christine Brooks, friendships, old and new, are put the test during an intense band practice. The show is a fresh, vibrant, laugh out loud musical with lots of artificial colours and naturally funny flavours.
Lizzie MurrayLana, 20-something, Rotorua. A Sagittarius-cat owner-stand up comic with a “it was mutual” breakup haircut seeks romance, midnight snacks and ex boyfriends’ weddings. In her first solo NZ Comedy Festival entry, Lana dishes on her disastrous attempts at dating and faking having everything together.
by Laura Ferguson“Sit down, be humble,” blasts Kendrick Lamar in BATS’ Propeller Stage. Well, I am sitting down, beer in hand, and indeed humbled. Not by Mr. Lamar, but by those who wield his work. Frickin’ Dangerous Bro’s Humble starring Pax Assadi, James Roque and Jamaine Ross, has left the stage slick with talent as the trio receive our deserved whoops, hollers and applause.
I admit, I went to this show tonight on the recommendation of someone else as I was not familiar with Frickin’ Dangerous Bro, being the network TV Grinch that I am. I had no idea that it was a comedy sketch show! (I know, I know, I could have at least read the show blurb, but that would have ruined my surprise.) I am quite partial to comedy sketch shows and this one mixed my love of social commentary with continuous, raucous laughter. |
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