murraybramwell.com

February 20, 2025

Fringe: Why I Stuck a Flare Up My Ar** For England

Filed under: Archive,Current,Fringe,International,Theatre

Adelaide Fringe

Theatre: Why I Stuck a Flare Up My Ar** For England

In a frenetic, perceptive, often brilliant sixty minutes, writer and performer Alex Hill explores the agonies, ecstasies and desperate endgames of a London football fanatic.

Written by Murray Bramwell

Bursting into the confines of the Holden Street Studio comes Billy. Amped up, dressed in his national team’s strip, he is ready for battle – for England, St George, and Harry Maguire. So ready, in fact, that in …

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Fringe: Shellshocked

Filed under: Archive,Current,Fringe,International,Theatre

Adelaide Fringe

Theatre: Shellshocked

This excellent new English play from the Edinburgh Fringe, written and directed by Philip Stokes and featuring his son Jack Stokes, is an intriguing and disconcerting meeting of damaged minds.

Written by Murray Bramwell

The scene is an artist’s studio. There is a large blank easel in the centre of the stage with paint-spattered tarps suspended behind it. There is a desk with drawers and, beside a well-used drinks cabinet, stands a disheveled man – bearded, …

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Fringe: Dear Diary

Filed under: Archive,Current,Fringe,Interstate,Theatre

Adelaide Fringe

Theatre: Dear Diary

A diary from a younger self is explored and reinterpreted in storytelling and song. It is a vivid portrait of the artist as a young woman.

Written by Murray Bramwell

“My name is Kay (says Kay Proudlove) and I want to tell you a story.” And it is a beguiling, pensive and candid one. Dear Diary is a history -or rather, a herstory – based on a relic from the turn of the century, her …

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February 12, 2025

Theatre: Housework

Filed under: Archive,Australian Texts,Current,State Theatre Company,Theatre

In Housework, a droll new play from State Theatre Company, we are invited behind closed Parliamentary doors to glimpse the best that is aspired to – and, funnily enough, quite a bit that falls well short.

Written by Murray Bramwell

In a recent interview Emily Steel describes her wittily-named parliamentary drama, Housework – “I guess what this play is about is who is getting into these positions of power ? What does it cost them ? How much should …

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December 12, 2024

The Best of 2024

Filed under: 2024,Archive,Current

As I look over my year’s attendances, I saw less of the festivals – the Cabaret Festival, Fringe Festival and OzAsia in particular. State Theatre Company South Australia had a less impressive year than in 2023 but we owe much to Mitchell Butel for bringing such energy, generosity and variety in his six years as State Theatre’s AD. We wish him well in his new lead role at Sydney Theatre Company.

The second-tier independents remained quiet. Brink produced works under …

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October 25, 2024

OzAsia Festival Dance/Theatre : Scored in Silence

Filed under: 2024,Archive,Festival,Theatre

The title is a paradox –Scored in Silence. There is no music, in fact, at crucial moments no sound at all. But its message is loud and clear. OzAsia opens with a visually intriguing theatrical experience that reminds us to hearken to the lessons of history.

Written by Murray Bramwell

This solo performance by Japanese performer/choreographer, Chisato Minamimura (who is herself deaf) is a description of the dropping of the A-Bomb on Hiroshima in 1945, as experienced by …

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October 20, 2024

Chameleon Man

Filed under: 2024,Archive,Music

Herbie Hancock
Festival Theatre.
October 20.

It was (almost) fifty years ago today that Herbie Hancock got the band to play : Head Hunters. The million-seller jazz fusion break-out of 1974. It was a much acclaimed album along with the first releases from Weather Report and Mahavishnu Orchestra and indicative of Hancock’s versatility and keen sense of the way the wind was blowing.

A classical prodigy, at the age of eleven he played a Mozart piano concerto with the …

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September 26, 2024

Theatre: The Almighty Sometimes

Filed under: 2024,Adelaide Companies,Archive,Australian Texts,Theatre

While mental illness is often a “sometimes” thing, it is managed with debilitating treatments which are total and often life-diminishing. This memorable production from Theatre Republic powerfully depicts both the human cost and the fleeting triumphs.

Written by Murray Bramwell

In an epigraph to her outstanding stage debut, The Almighty Sometimes , Australian playwright, Kendall Feaver cites a medical textbook on The Bipolar Child which quotes advice from a nine year old, outlining what should be done when a child …

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September 15, 2024

Adelaide Guitar Festival: Rolling Stones Revue

Filed under: 2024,Archive,Festival,Music

The Rolling Stones Revue gathers some of Australia’s best and fairest singers and instrumentalists for the celebration of a classic album and a non-stop, knees-up eisteddfod of Greatest Hits.

Written by Murray Bramwell

Last year’s Adelaide Guitar Festival featured an excellent tribute to the incomparable Jeff Beck. This time around it is the pre-eminent rock and roll guitar band, The Rolling Stones. Sixty years on, and they are still out there on the (gold paved) road, filling stadiums like there …

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September 05, 2024

Theatre: Shore Break

Filed under: 2024,Archive,Australian Texts,Theatre

This solo work, written and brilliantly performed by Chris Pitman, explores how, in our midst, the lives of many are beached and marooned.

Written by Murray Bramwell

“I have tried to write a version of this story for many years but was never quite able to finish. A solitary figure, unable to connect, abandoned at the edge of the world.”

In Shore Break Chris Pitman has undoubtedly succeeded with this succinct monologue which crests and breaks like the intimidating waves …

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