murraybramwell.com

July 01, 2002

Cabaret Season

Filed under: Archive,Cabaret

Adelaide Cabaret Festival 2002
Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

Despite the fact that the weather has been wintry and the Festival plaza still looks like the Blitz – the decrustation process apparently taking forever – the Centre itself hasn’t looked so busy since… the last Adelaide Cabaret Festival.

As we don’t need reminding, the Centre was not the focus for much of this year’s Adelaide Festival and, otherwise, usage has been sporadic. So, with sixteen nights of programming – in the …

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Another Country

Filed under: Adelaide Companies,Archive,Theatre

2002

Despoiled Shore

Medeamaterial

Landscape with Argonauts

The Border Project

Queen’s Theatre

Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

The Border Project is a new company committed, you might say, to pushing the boundaries. And with their first venture, based on the texts of German writer Heiner Muller, they have taken on the themes of exile, persecution and betrayal. Muller uses the story of Medea, the sorceress who betrays her father and slaughters her brother in order to help her lover Jason steal …

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June 10, 2002

Rocky Horror and a Pack of Droll Models

Filed under: Archive,Cabaret

10 June, 2002
ADELAIDE
Cabaret

Murray Bramwell

Sleepless Beauty
Christa Hughes , Imogen Kelly, Ruby May Fox, Minx Contortionista.
Michael Lira, Neill Duncan and Svetlana Bunic
The Space, Adelaide Festival Centre until 9 June, 2002
The Studio, Sydney Opera House 12 – 22 June.

The Rat Pack
Paul McDermott, Mikey Robbins and Sandman
with the Club Luna Band
Festival Theatre
Adelaide Festival Centre
June 8.

It may look like the blitz outside, but in every available performance space inside the …

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June 01, 2002

Cold Comfort Farm

Filed under: Archive,Interstate,Theatre

The Beauty Queen of Leenane
by Martin McDonagh
Sydney Theatre Company
with The Druid Theatre and Royal Court
Optima Playhouse

Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

There are nearly as many cliches about Ireland as there are people willing to perpetuate them. It’s not just the leprechaun pubs and the soft core music – it’s as though the whole place has become a theme park. James Joyce once said Ireland was the mother that ate her farrow. Nowadays, she’d sell them to …

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Great and Small

Filed under: Archive,Australian Texts,Theatre

The Great Man
by David Williamson

State Theatre Company
Dunstan Playhouse
May, 2002

Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

David Williamson has an excellent instinct for currency. Not the folding kind, although his present London show won’t be doing his wallet any harm. I mean the currency of ideas and manners, the zeitgeist writ large, small or merely fashionable. He has done the professions, he has splendidly done footy, he has looked at the etiquette of wealth, or at least of not …

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May 01, 2002

A Little Night Music

Filed under: Archive,Music

Faithless
The barton Theatre
Dirty Three
Governor Hindmarsh

Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

It is three years since Faithless were last through and they were also a late scratching from the 2002 Big Day Out. So there is a strong sense that the Wednesday 9.15 show at Thebarton is overdue. The Faithless faithful certainly think so as they pack in, moving close to a stage bathed in thick red light – drum kit, percussion rig and a double stack of keyboards …

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April 01, 2002

The Festival That Was

Filed under: Archive,Festival

2002
Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

It has been said that the 2002 Adelaide Festival has been misunderstood, that it was too innovative and far-sighted to be fully comprehended. That its impact will not be realised for years, say some. For a decade, says the former Director.

On the contrary, the Festival was very clear. Its purpose was empowerment and recognition to groups and creativity usually marginalised or colonised by hierarchical concepts of high culture. It was to privilege the local …

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Fringe Wrap

Filed under: Archive,Fringe

2002
Reviewed by Murray Bramwell

Things were always going to go well for the Fringe this year. Everything, from the logo launch of that underdog-looking little bambi to the setting up of its ambitious on-line ticketing, had an assurance and energy about it. This not only came from director Katrina Sedgwick, CEO Jodie Glass and an army of workers and volunteers but was evident in the vibrant response from an Adelaide crowd looking for something more edifying, and certainly more …

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March 18, 2002

Adelaide Fringe Theatre

Filed under: Archive,Fringe

2002

Shut Up and Love Me
Karen Finley
Union Hall, Adelaide University until 15 March.
Bookings FringeTIX 08 8201 4567. All tickets $36.
Brisbane and Sydney dates

Murray Bramwell

The Adelaide Fringe has been going gangbusters. Already a week ago, more tickets had been sold than 2000 – an increase of forty percent – and, running seven days after the truncated Adelaide Festival, that margin is likely to increase.
Especially with imaginative local work such as Fresh Track’s production of …

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March 08, 2002

Adelaide Festival 2002 Theatre

Filed under: Archive,Festival

My Life, My Love
by Pat Rix
Tutti Ensemble Holdfast Choir
State Theatre Company of South Australia
with State Opera.
Norwood Concert Hall, Adelaide
Until 10 March. Tickets $49.75 and $44.75.
Bookings: BASS 131 246

Murray Bramwell

My Life, My Love is a joint venture between State Theatre, State Opera and the Holdfast Choir. Just the sort of companies you might expect to be involved in an Adelaide Festival. Except that the 2002 program, assembled by Peter Sellars and his …

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