Review: A Bit Dramatic
This show was incredibly popular and got reviewed multiple times during the Improv Fest! Check out a variety of those reviews below. – Reviewed by Thalia Kehoe Rowden In an intense, moving 60-minute show, the cast of four take inspiration from real-life journal entries – unseen until the performance – and invent and explore the […]
Review: NO SLEEP
Reviewed by Rebecca Stubbing. Friday the 13th was the perfect occasion for NO SLEEP, a joyfully chaotic improv show presented at this year’s New Zealand Improv Festival. The show began at 9:30pm on the wonderful Stage at BATS Theatre, and the slightly sleepy audience were immediately reassured by the performers not to worry, we were […]
Nelson Designer Takes Out WOW’s Top Award for Second Time
Nelson Designer Gill Saunders was awarded The World of Wearable Art’s Supreme Award this Friday for her design, Earthling (pictured). Taking its inspiration from the rising popularity of adult colouring books and promoting mindfulness in a “world under increasing stress”, Earthling celebrates earth’s natural wonders in a beautifully crafted garment made from EVA foam, acrylic […]
Review: Mamma Mia!
Te Auaha’s Musical Theatre cohort for 2023 is bringing Mamma Mia! to our shores this September, and we are all better for it. A spellbinding, fabulous version of Catherine Johnson/ABBA’s jukebox musical knocked my absolute socks off last night, and I’m seriously considering going back to see it again. You might have seen the 2008 […]
Review: Music To Die For
Noted Wellington improv troupe Best on Tap is back performing this month with a new iteration of their grounded and clever improv in a show using your music suggestions! Music To Die For takes six songs that you (the audience) would play at your funeral and uses them to inspire layered, complex scenes about the […]
Review: Dirty Work
By Talia Carlisle An ode to joy! For the first time recently I joined a choir, and as we joined together as strangers to sing, holding our music and raising our voices in harmony, I could feel such joy and togetherness lifting everyone up, and connecting us together while also creating a melodic story told […]
Review: Prima Facie
By Nadia Freeman Prima Facie shares an authentic story of a woman’s experience of assault and navigating the judicial system to seek justice. The nearly sell-out season demonstrates that despite the raw and challenging subject, there is a strong calling for stories like this. Rape is a word people don’t want to say, and for […]
Review: 35mm
By Talia Carlisle Everyone is talking about 35mm, and it’s not a measurement, but a movement it seems, from the sound of new fans I’ve talked to. 35mm is a musical written by Ryan Scott Oliver on at Gryphon Theatre until Saturday, which incorporates music, original choreography and a live band led by musical director […]
Review: The Coven on Grey Street
The first thing that grips me as soon as I walk into Circa Two is Lucas Neal’s gorgeous set design for this show – a huge pohutakawa that stretches up and across the entire stage, a white picket fence, and the outside edge of a traditional weatherboard kiwi house. Cicadas chirp (beautiful sound design by […]
Review: Fifty Shades of Ray
Reviewed by Talia Carlisle. On a rain-splattered Wellington evening, I find myself refuge in BATS Theatre’s Studio space where paper “worries” are hung on string across the small stage. An eager smattering of audience members buzz in excitement, waiting for Ray Shipley to enter, fresh from a popular Christchurch season with a well-crafted set ready […]