FRINGE F EAT U R E 2 0 1 7 Amanda Palmer
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Trainspotting
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Joanne Hartstone
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Filament
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SOAP
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AMANDA PALMER DOWN UNDER
THE SIMPLE ART OF LAUGHTER There are immersive shows and then there is Butt Kapinski, Deanna Fleysher’s hilarious gender-bending flip of infamous fictional private dicks, such as Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe, where the audience is integral to the shenanigans.
By Walter Marsh ––---––
A
manda Palmer is heading south for the winter. Decamping to Australia has been a regular and fruitful seasonal migration for the songwriter and author, having spawned her 2011 album Amanda Palmer Goes Down Under, bestselling 2014 book The Art of Asking and many friendships along the way. “I’ve come to Australia almost every winter for the past 10 years,” Palmer says. “I absolutely love the place: I love the food, I love the strong flat whites, I love the art, I love my friends. I’m in a long-term nonmonogamous relationship with the country.” It’s an open relationship that even the Australian Government has been happy to make official, recently granting Palmer and author husband Neil Gaiman five-year ‘distinguished talent’ working visas. For one of the most prominent success stories
By David Knight ––---––
of online fan crowdfunding, “work” for Palmer is quite a flexible term. In the last two years, “the lion’s share” of Palmer’s income has come directly from fans via subscription website Patreon. “It’s overwhelmingly liberating,” she says. “I still wake up most days and cannot believe that I can simply make the art I think up, push a button and get paid. It seems too good to be true. I can literally work in any medium, I can put out any kind of product or art or act of creation. Basically, if I can think it up, and it’s good work, my fans will support it.”
her father to a Bowie tribute album recorded soon after the singer’s death. But there’s one thing that Palmer’s been lacking since 2012: a crop of new, original songs.
Like all good things, there is a cost. Commercial autonomy has unleashed a torrent of unconstrained creativity, from a folk album with
Now she’s in Australia to break some eggs, renting a room near Fitzroy with little more than a piano and a notebook, and performing a run of shows around the country to test new material, including two nights as part of Adelaide Fringe.
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“I’m going down to Australia with the specific task of sitting at my desk and actually penning some new material. I’m not like Nick Cave, I don’t sit down at my songwriting desk and get up in the afternoon, I’m one of those guilty undisciplined songwriters who’s never had a set schedule,” she says.
“My life has been so explosive that I have to build a wall within it to be able to close the door behind me and write without also needing to feed a baby, or deal with a phone call, or a husband or all of the mundane beautiful projects of adulthood. So, Nick Cave may be on to something. He often is.”
Amanda Palmer Her Majesty’s Theatre Friday, February 24 and Saturday, February 25 amandapalmer.net
FRINGE SEASON STREET ES THEATR
Holden Street Theatres 8225 8888 holdenstreettheatres.com | thebartontheatre.com.au adelaidefringe.com.au | ticketmaster.com.au THE WESLO GUIDE 2017
B
utt Kapinski might seem like you’re average whiskey-slugging, hardboiled private investigator who lurks in constant shadows while wearing a trench coat and fedora. But not is all as it seems. There’s a lamp fixed to Kapinski’s back to complete the film-noir look while the private investigator’s exaggerated lisp means this ain’t a smooth talking Humphrey Bogartlike character that would impress whatever femme fatale might cross this gumshoe’s path. Instead, Kapinski is a send-up of classic noir tropes by American actor and comedian Deanna Fleysher. “I’m a lifelong fan of film noir and the private eye genre,” Fleysher says of Butt Kapinski’s origins. “The character came first. The character developed on one train of my performance and my interest in immersive, interactive kind of [theatre] developed on a parallel track. At some point it made sense to really put them together. “I’m attracted to juxtaposition,” she says. “There’s a term in noir, chiaroscuro; the contrast of light and dark as a cinematic technique. The way I look at the world is very chiaroscuro.” Fleysher, who also directed and co-wrote the polarising show Red Bastard, says she grew up loving and identifying with the voice of men, especially that of crime writer Raymond Chandler and his most famous character
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Philip Marlowe, who was immortalised on-screen by Humphrey Bogart in Howard Hawks’ 1946 classic The Big Sleep. “What does it mean when a woman loves the narrative voice of a man, and not just a man but a sexist macho man? It creates a very complicated space to be in,” she says. “I think the show comes from the confusion that I’ve always experienced loving the words and voice of a man and also feeling left out from that.” The immersive and interactive nature of Butt Kapinski means that even though there are lines and situations that are switched in and out of each show, ultimately, it’s the character’s spontaneous interaction with the audience that drives the performance.
CHOOSE LIFE
they’ve just thought, ‘I’ll go along because it sounds really exciting’.
With Trainspotting author Irvine Welsh calling the In Your Face Theatre Company production the best way to experience Trainspotting; this will be one of this year’s most talked about Fringe shows.
“I think this production is great because it marries so many genres: literature, film and music. It just takes a nice snapshot of a certain time in the world, time that actually, with the inauguration of Trump, the conservative government in Australia and the epidemic of ice in Australia, just feels timely to be bringing it down under.”
By David Knight ––---–– “It’s important at the beginning of a show to establish some ground rules and establish the world,” she says. “I do switch things around a little bit depending on what I feel like and what the audience feels like. I also think that I, like all of us, are continually affected by current events and what’s going on in the world. I think that is certainly having an effect on how the show is evolving.” She means Trump, the new president of the United States, who was battling to become the Republican nominee when Fleysher was in Adelaide for the Fringe last year. “All my new Australian friends were coming up to me, ‘Oh so Donald Trump, right? Donald Trump!' I was like, ‘You guys are crazy. Everybody is overreacting; he’s not going to be the nominee.’ I didn’t even think he was going to be the Republican nominee. As my tour in Austrlaia continued I just had to eat my words, you know? Then, of course, I didn’t think he would be president, so it’s been a horror.”
NOONAN
“This production is an immersive production, a non-traditional production, there is no space between the action and the audience,” Spreadbury-Maher says from London. “I’ve noticed that a large number of people who are coming along to see it are young and they don’t know anything about Trainspotting, but it’s been packaged in a way that they’ve heard about it through social media or by word of mouth, and
Butt Kapinski Campanile (Garden of Unearthly Delights) Friday, February 17 to Saturday, March 19
KATIE
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rainspotting is experiencing a revival after first thrilling and shocking readers and film fans in equal measure some 20 years ago with the upcoming film sequel T2 Trainspotting and the theatre version of Irvine Welsh’s infamous book. A collaboration between Edinburgh’s In Your face Theatre and London’s King’s Head, Trainspotting is codirected by Adam Spreadbury-Maher, an Australian expat who, for the last 11 years, has been directing opera and fringe theatre in London. He is the artistic director of King’s Head, a pub theatre in London which promotes edgy productions, including Australian work such as Strangers In Between and Holding the Man. This is Trainspotting for the new generation.
AND
KARIN
SCHAUPP
songs of the latin skies
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For Adelaide, the production (about urban isolation and heroin addicts in late ‘80s Edinburgh) will be staged in an abandon CBD area, so it will be more like entering an illegal rave from the ‘80s or ‘90s than a traditional theatre show. “It’s got that dangerous, like, we’ve just broken in and are having a rave kind of vibe to it,” he says. With the sequel hitting cinemas, Spreadbury-Maher says they have thought about producing a theatre sequel.
“There’s definitely a desire to look at that and also to look at other Welsh work,” he says. “It really is an ensemble mentality [the collaboration with In Your Face], so it’s been discussed between me and the actors and Greg [Esplin] of what will be the next project.” Has Welsh given the troupe his blessing to do more of his work? “We haven’t specifically spoken to Irvine about other work, but he has been incredibly supportive. He’s come along to see the show a few times, he’s very vocal on Twitter, to the point where he’s saying things like, ‘The best way for you to experience Trainspotting is to go and see this production’, which is so humbling to have that kind of praise from the author.”
Trainspotting Station Underground Friday, February 17 to Sunday, March 19
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PERFORMING ARTS
#NOFILTER FAIR Carclew, 11 Jeffcott St, North Adelaide February 19, 1pm to 6pm adelaidefringe.com.au/fringetix/ nofilterfair BARBU.
#NoFilter Fair is the perfect way to start this year’s Fringe fun. Relax at the stunning Carclew garden while sampling some local brews and gorging on SA’s finest food truck delights. Enjoy the atmosphere provided by talented local musicians and Fringe performers. For those more active, there will be games and workshops to keep you occupied and plenty of market stalls to browse. Come enjoy a fun filled day at the carnival with a unique hipster twist. Tickets available at the door or the FringeTix website.
BARBU ELECTRO TRAD CABARET The Peacock at Gluttony March 8 to March 19 adelaidefringe.com.au/fringetix/barbuelectro-trad-cabaret Angel by Henry Naylor.
ANGEL BY HENRY NAYLOR The Studio, Holden Street Theatres, 34 Holden Street February 14 to March 19 holdenstreettheatres.com
#No Filter Fair.
From Henry Naylor, writer of the award winning sell-out show Echoes, comes the third and final piece of his Arabian
Nightmares trilogy. Kobane, 2014: there’s a siege as fierce as Stalingrad. ISIS, having steamrolled through Iraq, expects to take the town easily. But the citizens have found a heroine: a crackshot sniper, with 100 kills to her name. And she appears indestructible. She’s the Angel of Kobane. This Fringe Firstwinning play received 13 five-star and four-star reviews from publications including The Times, Edinburgh Festivals Magazine and The Stage.
Bold, absurd, and sexy as hell, BARBU conjures a strange and wonderful world, fusing traditional and contemporary circus with a beautiful irreverence. The most talked about show of Adelaide Fringe 2016, BARBU is at once hilarious, audacious, surreal and spectacular. Performed by one of the world’s leading circus companies – Canada’s Cirque Alfonse – BARBU delivers edge-of-your-seat entertainment set to a thundering electrotrad soundtrack from the skilful and frenetic live band. May the best beard win!
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FAULTY TOWERS: THE DINING EXPERIENCE The Strathmore Hotel, 129 North Terrace February 17 to March 19 Saturday and Sunday lunch performances at 1pm (doors, 12.30pm). Dinner performances at 7pm (doors at 6.30pm) 1300 308 193 info@imagination-workshop.com
Returning to Adelaide Fringe for its 10th consecutive year, chaos reigns in this fully immersive show where you become the diners served by Basil, Sybil and Manuel. Complete with a three-course meal, lashings of laughter and spoonfuls of spontaneity, this is a true blend of ingenious comedy, a unique theatrical script and heaps of improvisation. A multi-sensory experience perfect for comedy fans, theatre fanatics and anyone who just fancies going out for a dinner they will never forget. Picking up five-star reviews all over the world, this show is simply not to be missed. Tickets include a threecourse meal and two-hour interactive show.
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P R O M O T I O N MOJITO! Magic Mirror Spiegeltent, Garden Of Unearthly Delights March 5, 4pm and March 6, 7pm emotionmusic.com/mojito
The Hemingway Cabaret. Literary giant Ernest ‘Papa’ Hemingway orchestrates a soiree of Latin music in Havana’s mojito bar, La Bodeguita del Medio. The mojito
weaves its magic and the singers find themselves in a web of amorous intrigue and mojito madness! MOJITO! The cabaret, is an exotic mix of Rumbas, Flamenco, Baladas and Boleros performed by a nine-piece Latin orquesta of outstanding musicians who, like Hemingway, traverse the Latino world. Adelaide’s chanteuse Charmaine Jones-Devasagayam joins an impressive line-up featuring Nancy Ruth (Spain), Lazaro Numa (Cuba) and a host of others to ignite a fiesta of fire and flair.
Katie Noonan & Karin Schaupp.
SONGS OF THE LATIN SKIES KATIE NOONAN & KARIN SCHAUPP
Magic Mirror Spiegeltent, The Garden on Unearthly Delights March 18 and March 19, 6.45pm gardenofunearthlydelights.com.au
Katie Noonan and Karin Schaupp have an intuitive musical connection. Their latest
co-creation, Songs of the Latin Skies, promises to enchant audiences. Together they journey through the great South American songbook of bossa nova, samba, salsa and tango. Renowned for breaking down genre boundaries, Katie Noonan’s technical mastery and pure voice makes her one of Australia’s most versatile and beloved vocalists. Guitarist Karin Schaupp is an internationally sought-after recitalist and soloist. They combine forces to create a unique sound, putting a fresh spin on Latin jazz and classical pieces from the musical masters of South America.
Mojito.
SCORCH The Studio, Holden Street Theatres, 34 Holden Street, Hindmarsh February 14 to March 19 holdenstreettheatres.com
A story of first love, Scorch examines how the real story often gets lost amidst the headlines. For those who don’t feel like they’re in the right life, online is a place to be yourself. This compelling and breathtaking new play portrays a troubled teenage girl struggling to find herself and her identity and whose first love leads to devastating effects both legally and personally.
SOAP The Peacock at Gluttony February 17 to March 19 adelaidefringe.com.au/fringetix/soap
SOAP, the indisputable hit of Fringe 2015, returns in 2017 to delight Adelaide audiences with its striking originality. Immediately enthralling and accessible for all ages, SOAP is an intelligent and splashfilled fusion of contemporary circus,
Sun Rising.
SUN RISING: THE SONGS THAT MADE MEMPHIS Dunstan Playhouse, Adelaide Festival Centre February 24 and 25, 7.30pm adelaidefestivalcentre.com.au/ shows/sun-rising/ Scorch.
comedy, physical theatre and cabaret. A dazzling range of water-soaked routines performed to an exciting and eclectic soundtrack delivers 60 minutes of genuine showmanship with seemingly effortless grace. From moments of divine beauty, a captivating gymnastic performance on a bath ledge, to a humorous love story between two feet, SOAP has captivated more than 1.5 million audience members around the globe. It’s steamy, funny and absolutely jaw-dropping! SOAP
Imagine Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis and Roy Orbison all recording their hits in one recording studio. Well that’s what happened at the famous Sun Records in Memphis Tennessee and they weren’t alone! Critically acclaimed production Sun Rising – The Songs That Made Memphis pays tribute to the artists and music from Sun Records in a spectacular cabaret show that has sold out across Australia. A rock‘n’roll ride of incredible music and amazing stories about Memphis royalty.
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LITTLE DEATH CLUB The Black Forest, Royal Croquet Club, 9.30pm February 22 to March 19 adelaidefringe.com.au
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deliciously salacious, utterly hilarious, multi-award winning queen of kink Bernadette Byrne (EastEnd Cabaret).The infamous Mistress of Mayhem and London Cabaret Award winner, Bernadette Byrne is here to shake up the Royal Croquet Club with her dysfunctional family of misfits, miscreants and fantastic freaks. Welcome to the Little Death Club!
The darkest, funniest and most debauched variety show in town. Hosted by the
Sirqus Alfon.
SIRQUS ALFON – I AM SOMEBODY Ukiyo, Royal Croquet Club, 9.30pm February 16 to March 19 adelaidefringe.com.au
musical innovations... and lasers. Skilfully crafting a high-tech performance imbued with rhythm, humour and a touch of magic, they represent a genre entirely of their own in which the audience gets to be the star of the show. A crossover of artistic creation and stage engineering solutions, I Am Somebody provides an immersive experience of light and sound like you’ve never witnessed before.
Hailing from Sweden, Sirqus Alfon head to Adelaide Fringe with their unique high-tech
Little Death Club.
C O M E S W E AT THIS SUMMER! VISUAL ARTS
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2016 STENCIL ART PRIZE VARIOUS ARTISTS
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T I C K E T S $ 6 0 + B . F T H R O U G H E V E N T B R I T E .C O M . AU
Flinders University Art Museum, Flinders University City Gallery, State Library of South Australia February 11 to April 9 Tuesdays to Fridays, 11am to 4pm, Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm to 4pm artmuseum.flinders.edu.au
With its origins in New York’s 1960s counter culture, stencil art has taken the world by storm in recent decades. This exhibition checks the pulse of this phenomenon, showcasing the work of more than 80 Australian and international artists from all corners of the globe. Influenced by
Tinku, Tributo 2016.
the ephemeral nature of street art, the mixed media stencils on display blend pop culture imagery with social and political messages to canvas myriad modernday concerns. Now in its eighth year – and making its South Australian debut – the Stencil Art Prize is the world’s largest stencil art event.
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MIRRORSTATE JOEL GAILER, DEBORAH SLEEMAN AND PHILLIP DOGGETT-WILLIAMS
West Gallery Thebarton, 32 West Thebarton Road, Thebarton February 16 to March 18 (opening night: February 16, 5pm), Wednesdays to Saturdays, 11am to 5pm westgallerythebarton.com.au
"Blues in the Night' Magistrate Jay McGrath and the Law of Domestic Violence" Artist- Sophie Downey Photographer- Jimmy Allnutt.
APPETITE FOR PRODUCTION SOPHIE DOWNEY
The Producers Bar, 235 Grenfell St, Adelaide Until March 19 sophiedowney.com
Back by popular demand, rock star portrait artist Sophie Downey is opening her new exhibition Appetite for Production in support of raising awareness and funds for the Prostate Cancer Foundation. Downey’s brilliant ability
to sketch and prepare masterpieces that sync with rock’n’roll is something of a show within itself. Armed with a saxophone, Downey charms her guests with honest and raw social justice values mixed with introverted shyness. Appetite for Production, a visual art project, will raise awareness about prostate cancer and recognise great international live acts in the wake of the deaths of David Bowie, Leonard Cohen, Sharon Jones and Prince, using live art as a ticket-selling device to counteract internet copyright piracy. In addition to this, the project will celebrate Ronnie Wood and the Rolling Stones, with a view to doing an exhibition with them when they are in Sydney in 2018.
HILLS EDGE CLAY VARIOUS ARTISTS
Gallery 1855, 2 Haines Road, Tea Tree Gully Exhibition launch: February 5 ( 2 pm). Exhibition: February 8 to March 18, Wednesdays to Saturdays, 12pm to 5pm teatreegully.sa.gov.au/gallery1855 The Iron Canvas, Mermaid, found objects.
Hills Edge Clay features a selection of South Australian ceramic art and design created by 20 early career and established artists. Also, look out for ceramic workshops by Alison Smiles (Introduction to hand building and surface decorating clay figures) and Anna Couper (Surface decorate vessels), as well as an artist talk by Philip Hart.
Phillips vertebrae creature.
LIFE’S A BEACH VARIOUS ARTISTS
Pepper Street Arts Centre, 558 Magill Road, Magill Community launch: February 19 ( 2 pm). Exhibition: February 21 to March 24, Tuesdays to Fridays, 10am to 5 pm and Saturdays, 12pm to 5pm pepperstreetartscentre.com.au
This quirky and fun show will be a wonder to see. The popular theme of the ‘beach’ has been interpreted in a variety of ways by more than 30 local artists. Enjoy a number of different art forms such as pottery, sculpture, paintings, mosaics, jewellery, woodwork, prints, textiles and glass. Artist demonstrations on each Saturday of the exhibition from 2pm to 4pm. Free entry. All welcome.
Deb Sleeman, Seven Sisters.
Mirrorstate brings together three artists whose worldviews are reflected through their sculpture and prints. Joel Gailer’s work brings together large-scale sculpture, car tyre prints and more traditional print works. Deborah Sleeman’s practice arises from the wilds of Kangaroo Island often using found materials that reflect that environment. And Phillip Doggett-Williams’ bronze sculptures and prints speak of the environment, politics and self.
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Quentin Chester
QUENTIN CHESTER AND AMY PFITZNER Chancery Lane Gallery, 24 Chancery Lane, Adelaide February 22 to March 31 (opening night: February 23, 6pm) chancerylanegallery.com.au
This is an unmissable photographic art exhibition at the spacious and modern exhibition rooms of Chancery Lane Gallery. Quentin Chester, Amy Pfitzner and special guests present vivid and dazzling images of nature and the subconscious in a spectacular large-scale format.
A GARDEN OF THEATRE DELIGHTS With her theatre hub in the Adelaide Botanic Garden, and producing work across the city, this year’s Fringe sees Joanne Hartstone present a wide range of emerging and small scale fringe works.
TRACK
By David Knight ––---–– CO-CURATED BY SASHA GRBICH AND ANDREW PURVIS. ARTISTS: JACOBUS CAPONE, SASHA GRBICH, TANYA LEE, JENNA PIPPETT AND KATE POWER
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Ted Secombe.
THE PURSUIT OF BEAUTY TED SECOMBE
Adelaide Central School of Art, Adelaide Central Gallery, 7 Mulberry Road, Glenside February 20 to March 18 acsa.sa.edu.au
Babs Sinclair, Landmarks.
WINDS OF CHANGE RSASA MEMBERS
Gallery J on Lincoln, 10 Lincoln Ave, Manningham February 18 to March 5, Thursdays to Sundays, 11am to 4 pm
The Pursuit of Beauty is a rare opportunity for Adelaide to see an exceptional exhibition of ceramics by one of Australia’s leading contemporary and internationally renowned potters, Ted Secombe. Secombe’s ceramic forms are meticulously thrown and contain a simple graceful line and are the perfect foil to carry his intricate and sublime crystalline glazes. With multiple glaze applications, and a complex firing cycle, he creates a rich colour palate that mirrors the subtle hues and colours of the changing seasons. This graceful and elegant exhibition will inspire and captivate all who view.
TRACK is a group exhibition of local and interstate artists, showcasing a range of innovative and exciting performance-based art practices through video and photography. The exhibition examines the ways in which artists negotiate the world with their bodies. Some of these performances are tentative and sensuous engagements with place; some are humorous strategies for navigating social, familial and sexual relationships.
Jacobus Capone, Saudade.
laissez les bon temps rouler
28 Vardon Ave, Adelaide Function Enquiries: Cheers@nolaadelaide.com /NOLAAdelaide
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Royal South Australian Society of Arts RSASA Gallery, Level 1, Institute Building, corner of North Tce and Kintore Ave February 19 to March 12, Mondays to Fridays, 10.30am to 4.30pm, Saturdays and Sundays, 1pm to 4pm rsasarts.com.au
RSASA members, such as Babs Sinclair, Philip David, Iroda Adil, David Baker and Camilo Esparza, highlight the winds of change with their bold vivacious artworks. Other artists will exhibit mixed media works, photography, textiles, sculpture and jewellery. This is very much a mixed and talented bunch of artists. Having celebrated 160 years, the society is pushing forward the boundaries of art and its artists.
artstone is a true theatre all-rounder: an acclaimed actor, producer and presenter, who, for many years, has performed and brought admired work to the Adelaide Fringe. Hartstone take an artistic, as well as production, leap this year. She has written and will perform her first solo show and follows last year’s staging of the brilliant Bunker Trilogy at the Botanic Garden’s Noel Lothian Hall with a suite of local and international productions at the Hall, which becomes the Black Box Studio for the Fringe season. “It’s a great space that I felt was being underutilised considering how Adelaide is crying out for bricks and mortar theatres rather than tents,” Hartstone says. “It’s still got that popup feel to it, it’s being created for the Fringe, but we can have a blackout: shut the doors with air conditioning and there is silence, which is so much better for theatre.” There will be seven shows at the Black Box Studio, six of which will be produced by Hartstone. She says she wants to promote small scale local
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Joanne Hartstone
musicians on stage who perform a live electronic soundtrack. I think it’s such an amazing piece, it just broadens your horizons so much, and I think that’s what theatre should do.” Presenting fringe theatre is time consuming and expensive. Hartstone says she takes a massive risk each year with a suite of local and international productions because she simply loves it. We Live by the Sea
and international theatre from different artistic points of view. “I want the shows to sell themselves rather than show how fancy the surroundings of the theatre can be. I want the theatre to be humble and for the shows to be the heroes.” Her solo performance, The Girl who Jumped off the Hollywood Sign is one of these shows. She says it is fan fiction to the golden age of Hollywood and is a “bittersweet look at the era through a fresh perspective”. “I grew up on movies of Judy Garland, Marilyn Monroe ,Bettie Davis and all these glamourous Hollywood stars, and the stories of what happened to these women and how they had to give so much of themselves in order to work in this industry. I’ve written this after years of study and research and
based it around a fictitious character who witnesses all of these things happening in Hollywood, so it’s a bit of a fusion of imagination and reality.” Hartstone, who has worked with Guy Masterson’s Centre for International Theatre in the past, will be collaborating with young local groups such as Actors Ink and Cabbages & Kings Collective, who will perform Blink. Cabbages & Kings Collective is a group of mainly recent graduates, who Hartstone has taught and worked with in the past. “I found them a script which was Blink, which has been done at a lot of other Fringes around the world but has never been done in Adelaide. It is a great piece about modern love, voyeurism and romantic intimacy.”
A highlight production is Eva O’Connor’s My Name is Saoirse, which Hartstone calls a “beautiful coming of age story”. “It’s about a young girl in Ireland who finds herself pregnant and can’t have an abortion because it’s still illegal in Ireland so she has to travel to England to do it. It’s a real life awakening kind of thing, beautifully written, beautiful performed and she’s [O’Connor] a stunning monologist. I’m really excited for people to see her.” Hartstone will also produce work that appears in the Royal Croquet Club as well as St Peter’s Cathedral. We Live by the Sea is one of this year’s hyped theatre shows that Hartstone compares to the Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time. “It’s a cast of four actors and three
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“That’s such a cop out thing to say, but it’s true. I love it. I also think because I’m from Adelaide, I know that in my career I’m elevated to a point where I do feel like I’m contributing to the arts scene and I’m giving back, that’s what it feels like. I’m not making any money, so it’s certainly not for profit. I do it because I engage people with great theatre that I’ve seen from around the world, and I get to inspire young people to join in, do something, and take risks.”
Black Box Studio (various shows) Noel Lothian Hall, Adelaide Botanic Garden February 17 to March 19 We Live by the Sea Royal Croquet Club February 16 to March 19
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SOME KIND OF WONDERFUL With Filamant, American acrobat Joseph Pinzon wants to show that circus can work with a narrative, as he celebrates ‘80s movie tropes with his coming-of-age acrobatic theatre. By David Knight ––---––
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I always wanted to see a circus show that had a complete storyline: a beginning, middle and end,” Pinzon says. “I discovered, while creating it, the reason why it hasn’t existed before is because it’s really hard to do,” he laughs. To create the narrative, Pinzon, who has performed in La Clique and SOAP and for Cirque du Soleil, went back to the future to the world of ‘80s teen films, especially those of John Hughes. The eternal tropes and characters from films such as The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off are instantly recognisable to today’s audience, as the ‘80s is back in fashion with television shows such as Stranger Things. “Eighties films are what I grew up with and I relate well to their subject matter,” he says. “Even though they are from the ‘80s, a lot of those movies still have relevancy because they deal with coming of age themes: growing up, discovering who you are, falling in love and getting your heart broken, that doesn’t really change.”
Even though Filament is inspired by the ‘80s, it isn’t set in the ‘80s like the Duffer brothers’ pop culture Netflix hit Stranger Things. “It’s set in modern times but it does have a throwback feel to it, even with some of the music. It’s not all ‘80s music’ it is current music that sounds like it could be timeless. Another ‘80s reference is the name of Pinzon’s company, Short Round Productions, which is named after the character Short Round from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. “When I was younger I always played Short Round when we played Indiana Jones, because I was the Asian one. I wanted to honour that but in a fun way.” It took Pinzon five years to get Filament off the ground. A difficulty of the show is weaving in three different storylines into an circus show featuring eight acrobats who don’t speak. “There are no words, at all. The story had to be simply told through movement and through circus. Circus actually serves as a medium for the storytelling. They’re not just performing acts, the story continues through their acts, and everything is told through the acrobatic movement.”
Filament The Panama Club (Royal Croquet Club) Thursday, February 16 to Sunday, March 19 royalcroquetclub.com.au/adelaide2017
BEAUTY IN THE BATHTUB Having delighted audiences in multiple Fringe outings, SOAP returns once more in 2017 to dazzle crowds with its daring, bathtub-based performance. By John Dexter ––---––
The humble bathtub is not the first thing one thinks of when pondering potential performance spaces. Aside from bubbles, rubber ducks or (god forbid) a calamitous slip, what activity could this ancient bathing apparatus provide? It was SOAP, the energetic, high flying and sopping wet theatrical performance that proved the bathtub’s mettle on stage. “Bathtubs have been part of our creative process for a long time,” SOAP co-director Markus Pabst tells The Adelaide Review. It was a sudden realisation for Pabst, that indeed, bathtubs were under-appreciated outside of the bathroom, and very rarely seen on stage. Pabst says that his team developed an act based entirely around a tub, and went on to tour it around Europe. “Many years ago, we created a straps act above a bathtub and presented it to her Majesty the Queen at the Royal
Variety Performance and she was totally excited and amazed,” says Pabst. Queen Elizabeth’s blessing is evidently a strong motivator, as from that point Pabst realised “we should really do a full show dedicated to this wonderful prop”. While it might seem a restrictive apparatus, Pabst says the tub “allows us to be sensual in a very intimate and personal way”. “Every audience member, from young children to adults and grandparents, has a relationship to our toy, they all know how it feels to be in it and they can easily identify with anything we do with it and share our humour and understand our jokes.” A box-office hit in the 2015 Fringe, SOAP will return with some squeaky clean tricks to show Adelaide audiences. Keeping things fresh is important to Pabst, who says that the show is under constant renovation. “Every time we perform SOAP, we add a few small things,” he explains. “We improve the show a little bit. We change the running order to make it smoother. We introduce a new performer and he or she brings additional skills or a different joke or another personality to the show.”
SOAP The Peacock, Gluttony, Rymill Park Friday, February 17 until Sunday, March 19 adelaidefringe.com.au/fringetix/SOAP