Theatre Review: Destination Beehive: 2017

You pos­sibly couldn’t get more Wel­ling­ton than head­ing to the theatre, regard­less of the weath­er, to watch a music­al about polit­ics. Last week, I went along to Des­tin­a­tion Bee­hive: 2017, writ­ten by the clev­er and witty duo of Lor­ae Parry and Pinky Agnew. The seat of Tinakori Heights is highly con­ten­ded this elec­tion as every […]

Preview: Young & Hungry

For 24 years Young & Hungry and BATS Theatre have been provid­ing young people with a plat­form to per­form, pro­duce and cre­ate great theatre. With the Play­wrights’ Ini­ti­at­ive pro­du­cing three new kiwi plays a year and the annu­al Fest­iv­al of New Theatre at BATS – Y&H feeds the the­at­ric­al hun­ger and quenches the cre­at­ive thirst […]

Preview: Project Glow

At a pos­sibly not-that-secret loc­a­tion in the heart of Te Aro, The Wel­ling­tonista was invited to pre­view the entrants for this year’s Pro­ject Glow. We had to tap on the win­dow to gain entrance, and while there only man­aged to take the blur­ri­est of pho­tos. That’s because the judges were busy at work; and we […]

Review: Oikos Hellenic Cuisine, Miramar

Oikos is the new Greek Res­taur­ant, in the the south­ern most southest part of Miramar,  on the 2 bus route, and close to the cycle tun­nel. This is firmly in Greek ter­rit­ory of Wel­ling­ton. The loc­al fish’n’­chip shops also serve a vari­ant of Greek food (yer­os mostly), which is a deli­cious altern­at­ive to fried fish. […]

Preview: Black Grace – As Night Falls

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 […]

Preview: The Mooncake and the Kūmara

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 […]

Preview: Fire in the water, fire in the sky

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 […]

Preview: The Māori Sidesteps

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, […]

Preview: The Purple Onion

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 […]

Preview: Riverside Kings

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 […]