murraybramwell.com

June 01, 1997

Newfangled

Filed under: Archive,Music

Guinness Celebration of Irish Music
Thebarton Theatre

Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

In its eleventh year, Jon Nicholls’ touring Irish mini-festival is more of an achievement than ever. Like the Barossa Festival and Womadelaide it is a South Australian initiative which has established a format pleasingly familiar, keenly awaited, and widely regarded as a showcase of the best available.

Over a decade the Guinness Celebration has introduced audiences to talents who were already, or have become, major figures in the rapidly …

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Future Tense

Filed under: Adelaide Companies,Archive,Theatre

Magpie2 opens at Queen’s Theatre in Adelaide with the double header Future Tense, directed by Benedict Andrews.

Murray Bramwell

Magpie has returned. It now has a series number -like a software package, or an engine. Magpie2. Reconfigured by former State Theatre Company Executive Producer, Chris Westwood, the company has set aside its theatre in schools charter to provide theatre works with the eighteen to twenty-six year old constituency in mind. It is a big move and there are no guarantees. …

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Adelaide

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

The Secret Death of Salvador Dali
by Stephen Sewell

The Court of Miracles
Directed by Peter Dunn
Lion Theatre
Adelaide

“The difference between a madman and me”, Salvador Dali once said, “is that I am not mad.” More, you might say, crazy like a fox. The pre-eminent artist celebrity before Andy Warhol, Dali forms the link between the anti-bourgeois Dada comedy of Alfred Jarry and the zany popularity of the Marx Brothers. With his melting watches, lobster telephones and a …

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Dance

Filed under: Adelaide Companies,Archive,Theatre

Fast Editing
Simone Clifford
The Space
Adelaide Festival Centre

Murray Bramwell

Adelaide based Simone Clifford’s current program of work, Fast Editing , is part of the Festival Centre Trust’s Made to Move season. Formerly a dancer with ADT during Jonathan Taylor’s artistic directorship in the early Eighties, Clifford went on to work in Jiri Kylian’s Nederlands Dans Theater for five years.

Fast Editing consists of two works- a new piece entitled Reluctant Relics , created in October and November of …

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May 28, 1997

Adelaide – Future Tense

Filed under: Adelaide Companies,Archive,Theatre

Future Tense
Magpie 2
Queen’s Theatre
Adelaide

The Magpie has landed. Magpie 2, that is. For a long time the theatre-in-education wing of the State Theatre Company, it is has now pitched its energies towards the eighteen to twenty-six age group, not exactly a theatre-friendly demographic. Not exactly a demographic at all. So, newly appointed artistic director Benedict Andrews has nailed his doubloon to the mast with a program to his own liking – a double feature of contemporary European …

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May 01, 1997

Looking About

Filed under: Archive,Festival

Take Over 97
Australian Festival for Young People

Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

Come Out has a new name. After more than twenty years the festival and the concept have had a makeover and the Australian Festival for Young People has emerged anew – as Take Over, with a mission, as they say, to stimulate, entertain and challenge young people of all ages from 3-26. Artistic director Nigel Jamieson has taken on this daunting task, mounting a massive seventeen day festival.…

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April 01, 1997

Sleepy

Filed under: Archive,International,Theatre

A Midsummer Night’s Dream
William Shakespeare

Royal Shakespeare Company
Festival Theatre

Reviewed by Murray Bramwell.

It may take forty minutes for Puck to put a girdle round the earth but it takes the RSC a little longer. It is ten years since we saw Anthony Sher’s Richard III and a lot longer back to Peter Brook’s legendary Dream. Now, boosted by a British Council celebrating its jubilee, the RSC returns like an infrequent comet, bringing with it a considerable reputation …

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Parklife

Filed under: Archive,Womadelaide

Womadelaide
Botanic Park

Reviewed by Murray Bramwell.

It is the fourth Womadelaide and by now we have very much got the hang of it. The protocols are set, the format is immediately recognisable, the production values continue to be high. There is nothing for it but to join the throng and enjoy Adelaide’s most successful musical picnic.

Womadelaide is quite unique. There can be few other events involving more than sixty thousand participants which run so amiably and smoothly. The …

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Tivoli Recitals

Filed under: Archive,Music

Stan Ridgway
Dirty Three
Tivoli Hotel

Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

Stan Ridgway’s set at the Tivoli would have had the significance of the Second Coming – if he’d ever been a first time. Among the modest sized crowd, gathered on day seven of the century celsius, were ticket holders from the cancelled Stan show slated for February 1987. Ten years and one day it has taken us to get to Adelaide, Stan bellows good-naturedly. Yessiree Bob. We may have lost …

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Hot Days and Nights

Filed under: Archive,Music

1997

Big Day Out

Wayville Showground

Stan Ridgway

Dirty Three

Tivoli Hotel

Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

In five years Big Day Out, the Australian version of the Lollapalooza roadshow, has become a summer institution. Promoters Ken West and Vivian Lees have officially declared this year’s model to be the last. Big Day Out is no more. Now the legend can begin. And history will be kind to this rite of summer. It has been, in every sense, good value. For …

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