TW: Suicide Jean Cocteau wrote La Voix Humaine in 1928 as a one-act play. Francis Poulenc set it to music 30 years later, despite having already known Cocteau well for years, and gave the reason for the delay as having needed more life experience to do it justice. During those years he struggled with depression […]
Late January 2020 and the summery weather is here. I finally feel like I’m waking up in 2020 – which is a bit awkward given I’ve been back at work for a few weeks…but enough about work! Brace yourselves for a busy theatrical start to the year. We’ve got three Festivals coming our way in […]
With its largest ever programme, the Show Me Shorts Film Festival opens at cinemas across Aotearoa from the 5th of October. With sixty short films and three music videos – all chosen from a record 2040 entries – this festival is sure to be one to remember. Eight Kiwi films will be making their word […]
Sarita So revisits her Toi Whakaari solo show, turning it onto a longer exploration of making memory and history telling. “Through words, movement and songs from Cambodia’s 1960’s rock era – Digging to Cambodia is a letter to her past, present and future self, it asks us all “What is worth remembering?”” So wears a […]
Wow, did I misunderstand the marketing for this show. “Fierce and visceral, Windigo resonates like a scream, the vibrant echo of a long history of hu-man ransacking and destruction, a violation of a land and its culture.” I went in bracing myself for the emotional equivalent of a hurricane. This is not that. For me, […]
Lara has only the weekend to track down her partner as she traverses the world of public housing, drug dealing, and addiction. The Weekend is based on a situation that first time playwright that Henrietta Baird (from Kuku Yalanji/Yidinji country in Queensland’s Far North) experienced. From this she’s written an extremely funny, emotionally horrifying one-woman […]
This is the world premiere of the play by Jason Te Mete. The script shared the Adam New Zealand Play Award for Best Play by a Māori Playwright in 2018. It is a theatrical representation of one way depression can manifest. It starts with a mihi from Te Mete (also director and musical director) welcoming […]
A sparse set – two walls, some tape on the floor – is given character by lighting (Natasha James) and projection effects (Jason Wright). Flickerings along the edges of furniture, spinning triangles, water on the base of the wall, clearly defined shadows. A light rectangle becomes something to investigate. The score (Jason Wright) is an […]
The good spaceship Yesterday is the first rocket ship to launch from Aotearoa New Zealand and we get to come along for the ride! Her new crew are determined to show us a good time. What a pity they’re stuck in the middle of professional rivalries, confusing personal relationships, and an asteroid belt… All those […]