Zoe Christall
I came for the name, I stayed for the quirky characters, artful depiction of a chaotic mind and emotional renderings of a brain hurt and overwhelmed.
Kate Norquay Shitspeare is a rapid-fire devised piece, cutting together words from various Shakespeare plays to reframe them from a feminist perspective. It examines gender power imbalances in modern day Aotearoa and calls for change.
Kate NorquayYears ago, Andi Snelling was bitten by a tick while on holiday in New Zealand. The resulting Lyme Disease left her unable to perform, unable to do much except fight to stay alive. Happy Go Wrong is the show she never thought she would be able to make. That description makes the show sound rather tragic, but Snelling presents us with a moving take on suffering - That it’s not until you are close to death that you truly know how much you want to live. The result is a celebration of life that is profoundly moving, joyful and life affirming.
Ellen Morgan Butler If I could describe What’s the Purpose of this Project? (created by Potentially Playing Productions’s Evangelina Telfar and Marcus Jackson) in one word, I would describe it as lovely. Or cerebral. Or dreamy. But this project requires much more than just one word.
Emilie Hope The 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.
 Hilary Penwarden With I, Will Jones, comedian Eamonn Marra steps beyond stand-up to create a piece of theatre that expertly explores the feeling of desperately wanting to be somebody else. When Eamonn Marra was 12 years old, Will Jones was the coolest kid in his school. Will was great at sports, he had a girlfriend and his name was unmockable - everything Marra wanted. I, Will Jones is Marra’s recount of stories from his adolescence that centre around his desire to be Will Jones instead.
The stories are at once autobiographical and magical and the production introduces us to Marra’s past youth with style and humour. Entering the theatre, we are treated to a messy tweenage bedroom with a clothes-strewn floor, skates and a child-sized desk. Eamonn enters with amusing spectacle on a bicycle, immediately capturing the audience’s allegiance. His over-the-top entrance as a fully grown man dressed in boys’ shorts and a Planet8 hoody, coinciding with ridiculous welcome-to-the-stage flashing coloured lights, sets us up for a show that approaches recollections of juvenile life with a blend of merriment and regret. |