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April 21, 2021

Theatre review : The Gospel According to Paul

In ninety engaging minutes, writer and performer, Jonathan Biggins’ Gospel brings us, not just a fascinating study of Paul Keating but an account of a transformative time in Australian political history.

Murray Bramwell

You might say, that for satirist Jonathan Biggins, Paul Keating has been his bread and butter for a long time. As part of the Sydney Theatre Company’s Wharf Revue, along with Phillip Scott, Drew Forsythe and a select group of associates, Biggins has made an art form …

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December 12, 2020

The Bleeding Tree (Theatre Republic)

Vengeance and resolution, exorcism and benediction, this excellent new production captures the visceral drama of Angus Cerini’s remarkable play.

Four and a Half Stars . Ngunyawayiti Theatre, Tandanya National Aboriginal Cultural Institute, Adelaide.

Reviewed December 11, 2020
by Murray Bramwell, published online December 12, 2020.

Amongst the anxiety and havoc of Covid-19, the performing arts in 2020 have been systematically clobbered. So many productions abandoned and cancelled, so much effort and commitment brought to nothing.

Adelaide independent company, Theatre Republic’s …

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August 22, 2019

Excellent cast does justice to a great Aussie gothic yarn

Jasper Jones
Based on the novel by Craig Silvey
Adapted by Kate Mulvany.
State Theatre Company South Australia.
Dunstan Playhouse. Adelaide Festival Centre.
August 20. Tickets: $32- $67. Bookings 131 246 or online.
Duration 2 hours 30 minutes (including interval)
Until September 7.

When 13 year old Charlie Bucktin is woken in his bedroom sleep-out by a knock on the window, little does he knows this marks the end of his childhood. Called by his new friend Jasper Jones, an …

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April 11, 2019

Three women storm a male bastion to revel in ocker posturing and gender satire

The Club
by David Williamson
State Theatre Company and Kojo presents an isthisyours? and Insite Arts production.
Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre.
April 9. Tickets: $32- $61. Bookings 131 246 or online
Duration 2 hours 20 minutes (including interval)
Until April 20.

First performed in 1977, The Club ranks among the best of David Williamson’s extensive dramatic repertoire. Set in an unnamed AFL football club, its brisk farce and pungent satire captures the niggle, back-biting and shameless hypocrisy of male …

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November 19, 2018

Revisiting the foreign country of the past

The Gods of Strangers
by Elena Carapetis
State Theatre Company South Australia
Dunstan Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre.
November 15. Tickets: $32- $67.
Bookings . Bookings 131 246 or online
Duration: 2 hours 40 mins (including interval)
Until December 2.

“If a stranger knocks, you let them in – they could be a god in disguise.” But the publicity notes for The Gods of Strangers, a tri-lingual commissioned work, by Adelaide playwright Elena Carapetis, do not mention it might also …

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September 25, 2018

Struggle for truth in a police state

Welcome the Bright World
by Stephen Sewell.
House of Sand in association with
State Theatre Company South Australia.
Queen’s Theatre, Adelaide.
September 21. Tickets: $22- $42. Bookings 131 246 or online
Duration 2 hours 25 minutes (including interval)
Until October 6.

Welcome the Bright World and welcome back Stephen Sewell. His turbulent, engrossing, digressive, disputative drama has been greatly missed. It is 36 years since Nimrod first staged their Welcome, and, while others of Sewell’s works, with their glorious …

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August 30, 2018

Hallelujah to a compelling revival

That Eye, The Sky
A stage adaptation of Tim Winton’s novel
by Justin Monjo and Richard Roxburgh.
State Theatre Company South Australia.
Dunstan Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre.
August 28. Tickets: $32- $67. Bookings 131 246 or online
Duration: 100 minutes (no interval)
Until September 16.

Tim Winton wrote That Eye, the Sky when he was 25, describing it as the novel where his work turned a corner. In it he embraced a vigorous vernacular, and explored layers of belief, mysticism …

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July 26, 2018

Who’s afraid of August Strindberg?

Creditors
by August Strindberg.
A new version by Duncan Graham
State Theatre Company South Australia.
Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre.
July 24. Tickets: $32- $61. Bookings 131 246 or online
Duration 1 hour 45 minutes (no interval)
Until August 5.

Asked why he had a portrait of the Swedish playwright August Strindberg above his writing desk, Henrik Ibsen said : “He is my mortal enemy, he must hang there and observe everything I write.”

Strindberg’s febrile, hallucinatory drama is unfiltered, …

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June 22, 2018

Songs for Those Who’ve Come Across the Seas

Created by Cameron Goodall, Quincy Grant, Andy Packer,
with Gareth Chin.
Slingsby.
Dunstan Playhouse, Adelaide Festival Centre.
Adelaide Cabaret Festival.
June 20.

This captivating song cycle, from Adelaide based theatre company Slingsby, begins with a children’s book given to a boy by his grandmother. It is called An Island in Time and it is the factual story of geological land formation from volcanic upheaval through, by natural selection, to the establishment of flora and fauna, habitat and ecological diversity.

Performed …

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May 28, 2018

Looking to the heavens for escape

Terrestrial
by Fleur Kilpatrick.
State Theatre Company South Australia.
Space Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre.
May 24. Tickets: $32- $61. Bookings 131 246 or online
Duration 60 minutes (no interval)
Until June 2.

Playwright Fleur Kilpatrick dedicates her newest work, Terrestrial, “to lonely girls, to bored boys, to quiet towns.” Part of State Theatre’s State Ed schools program, it has already toured regional schools and centres, with more to come when this Adelaide season concludes.

In State’s 2018 season brochure, Terrestrial

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