Preview: Your heart looks like a vagina

After suc­cess at LitCrawl last year, Domin­ic Hoey  is return­ing to Wel­ling­ton with Your Heart Looks Like A Vagina at BATS Theatre next week. It’s a one man show about being dia­gnosed with Ankyl­os­ing spon­dylit­is, a form of inflam­mat­ory arth­rit­is that affects the spine and joints in the lower back. Treat­ment aims to min­im­ise symp­toms and pre­vent […]

Review: One Night Only

“The world’s most fam­ous boy band, FourE­ver, is nearly ready to take the stage for their only New Zea­l­and show. All that stands in their way is each oth­er, their fans, the media, and the ghosts of their dodgy past.” Stella Reid dir­ects this Young & Hungry play by Finni­us Tep­pett. In her Director’s note she describes […]

Preview: Kia Mau Festival

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 fundraiser preview ‑White Rabbit Red Rabbit

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 […]

Review: Onstage Dating

In the age of ‘swip­ing right’ and ‘real­ity’ dat­ing shows, the concept of live onstage dat­ing by far provides more enter­tain­ment. Bron Bat­ten so bril­liantly proved this on her open­ing night of Onstage Dat­ing. In this show, there’s no oppor­tun­ity to accept or reject based on appear­ances and no pro­du­cers or edit­ors decid­ing on the […]

Shows on this week

At BATS Theatre: Start­ing this week is an encore sea­son of Onstage Dat­ing by per­form­ance artist Bron Bat­ten. Watch as she goes on first dates on stage. (These are actu­al first dates with a stranger, not with a per­form­ing audi­ence plant.) Wit­ness the vul­ner­ab­il­ity, thrills and heart­break of the dat­ing exper­i­ence up close, as Bron […]

Preview: I am Tasha Fierce

From the mind of Wel­ling­ton based artist Rose Kirkup, the recip­i­ent of the 2016 Fringe Fest­ivals’ NZ Pacific Artist Res­id­ency award, comes I Am Tasha Fierce. We’re intro­duced to Kirkup’s alter ego Tasha: your typ­ic­al Kiwi chick.  Her time at poly­tech, as well as fol­low­ing the teach­ings of Bey­on­cé, has helped her get out of […]

Preview: Dido and Aeneas: Recomposed

Dido and Aeneas: Recom­posed is a fringe fest style opera brought to BATS by Unstuck­O­p­era.  Dir­ec­ted by long time Wel­ling­ton cre­at­ive Frances Moore and re-com­­posed by one of NZ’s lead­ing young com­posers, Alex Taylor, their re-work of Henry Purcell’s clas­sic includes samples from Strav­in­sky, Jazz Greats, and even Bey­on­cé and is per­formed by sing­ers in over-the-top gowns, crazy make-up […]

Preview: Theatre shows on this week

  It’s all singing and dan­cing this week at Circa and BATS. (Just what I need to get me through my second to last week at work before the hol­i­days tbh.) Scar­let and Gold con­tin­ues at Circa Theatre as does Roger Hall’s “Jack and The Bean­stalk”. (My review of Scar­let and Gold here. I haven’t […]

Preview: The Better Best Possible Album Party That Anybody Has Ever Been Two

I’m pretty excited that Album Party is the first show to bene­fit from BATS Theatre and The Base­ment Theatre (Auck­land) work­ing togeth­er to sup­port the best new emer­ging shows to tour to both cit­ies. A con­cert, a com­edy gig and a play all rolled into one, The Bet­ter Best Pos­sible Album Party That Any­body Has […]