Following a sold-out Auckland season in 2016, and a 10-centre tour of the United States, Black Grace and Tour-Makers are proud to tour the critically acclaimed As Night Falls to seven national centres from 22 June – 6 July around Aotearoa. A poetic ode to our troubled world, As Night Falls is Artistic Director Neil […]
Layered with myth and fable, The Mooncake and the Kūmara is a moving story about a mixed-up, Māori-Chinese love affair that sprouts among rows of potatoes. Told in a mixture of English, Māori and Cantonese, the play is showing in Wellington as part of the Kia Mau Festival. Māori-Chinese playwright Mei-Lin Te Puea Hansen talked […]
Told through movement, dance and text, this is a modern statement on climate change, colonisation and Christianity across the Pacific Rim. It’s an untangling of the greatest collision to have affected the Pacific — western imperialism. Fire In The Water, Fire In The Sky has various performance times during the mornings. It shows in Tangata Le […]
The newest and naughtiest Maori showband on the Aotearoa entertainment scene plays at BATS Theatre during the Kia Mau Festival. Self described as “Funny Māoris with funny songs” this show is more of a gig than a theatre piece for the actors involved. Band member Jamie McCaskill talked about the origins of the group and what they do. “Rob Mokaraka, […]
The Purple Onion peeps into the world of Wellington’s infamous burlesque parlour as part of the Kia Mau Festival. Established in the mid 1960s, the Purple Onion was Wellington’s premiere strip club which attracted some of New Zealand’s social elite as well as its fair share of dubious characters. Combining text, dance and a live funk […]
Riverside Kings opens in Upper Hutt today and plays in BATS Theatre next week as part of the Kia Mau Festival. The creators Sarita So and Natano Keni, describe it as “a physical weaving of brotherhood, nostalgia and change.” Their new company, I Ken So Productions, aims to create, diverse works of a high quality. They […]
Set against the backdrop of 1850’s Russia. Serfs (aka slaves) still work the land under the estate holder’s control. Reform is coming and the country is restless. Rakitin is visiting his friend Arkady at his country estate. Arkady’s wife Natalya is recovering from her illness. Their son Kolya, and their ward Vera, are spending time […]
New Zealand’s only contemporary indigenous theatre and dance event Kia Mau Festival returns to Wellington from Friday 2 – Saturday 24 June. It’s a unique and innovative opportunity for whānau and communities across the Wellington region to engage with today’s tangata whenua and First Nations artists from across the globe. Led by Wellington’s own Māori and Pasifika theatre […]
BATS is bringing the “audacious theatrical experiment“ White Rabbit Red Rabbit to Wellington for a fundraising season. Written by Iranian playwright Nassim Soleimanpour, the play premiered in 2011 and has since been translated into 20 different languages. There are no rehearsals, no director, a different actor each performance, and a script waiting in a sealed […]
Penny Ashton presents a new musical inspired by the writings of Charles Dickens as part of Comedy Festival 2017. Olive, a beautiful virtuous orphan, teaches the younger orphans at Mrs Sourtart’s squalid orphanage in exchange for a place to live. Her suitor, Edward Goodsort, was reclaimed from the same establishment by his moneyed family and now lives […]