By Julian Wagner

On Friday, 21st June 2013 you’ll be mesmerised with Louise Isackson’s chic seductive vocals at Brisbane’s Powerhouse as she sings her heart out for the much awaited performance launch of her album Red to Blue.

It seemed appropriate somehow, upon leaving the theatre and rushing back to Circular Quay Station that the night would gradually become lost in some of the thickest mist I have ever seen in Sydney. Appropriate in that The Maids is steeped in sweet obfuscation, in phantom identities emerging and receding like vapour, like the brief shapes seen huddled on station platforms as the train shunts by. Such is the psychological complexity of this performance that even at the close, with the stage lights cut and the cast awaiting applause in the dark, the audience seemed reluctant to clap; not unmoved, but perhaps unwilling to have this production end with so many questions of relationships and repercussions unanswered.

Reviewed by Lachlan Williams

Meet Gerry and his daughter Sally. Gerry's got problems – drink, inner (and outer) violence, and some awful churning turmoil beneath it all that he keeps in check with an exterior of aggressive, all-knowing cynicism lubricated by cheap wine. Sally's sick of his shit, and wants him to get the help he needs, because she's done with taking care of him, family or not. Gerry and Sally live on a living-room sized raised wooden platform in the middle of a theatre that spins when they need to be somewhere else, which is a very impressive and expensive way of doing scene changes. It also must have taken some getting used on the part of the seasick cast.

Reviewed by Fiona Scotney

Red is a play about a colour, a painter, and a life-changing commission. In 1958, the Russian born American painter Mark Rothko (Marcus Yakovlevich Rothkowitz) accepted a commission to decorate the Four Seasons restaurant of the new Seagram building in New York, designed by Philip Johnson and Mies van der Rohe. This commission should have been in many ways the highlight of Rothko’s career. It was not only a prestigious and lucrative job; it was also at the time the largest commission ever offered to an artist. Yet by the following year, even though he had painted thirty canvases for the room which could hold only seven paintings, he cancelled the commission and returned the money. Rothko never revealed the reasons behind his change of mind and abandonment of the project. Red dramatises Rothko’s struggle with the commission, speculating on the tension between success and integrity, and Rothko’s desire to be known but appreciated on his own terms.

This year SPLENDOUR IN THE GRASS finally moves to its idyllic, permanent home at North Byron Parklands. Picture wide green meadows, flower covered dams, trees, trees and more trees. From July 26 – 28 this eden will be transformed into a nirvana for music and arts enthusiasts.  
Over three monumental days, punters can random shuffle their feet between 80+ of the hottest acts on offer today. From global tastemakers, “ones to watch”, festival favourites as you’ve never seen them before, to seasoned internationals and truly iconic Australian acts.
SPLENDOUR 2013 will include all of the event’s popular festival features plus some super new additions, and is headlined by the amazing Mumford & Sons.

I was in a good mood before arriving at the TAP Gallery for this curiously titled production. Some drinks at the Abercrombie, a stroll through the CBD, some nice food, dog owners jogging through Hyde Park. Warm breezes, impatient cab drivers. How's the (kinda) serenity? I was looking forward to revisiting the TAP theatre, despite the last production I'd seen there having left me somewhat underwhelmed. The space itself is tiny but full of charm, accessed by walking down a long, portrait-laden hallway that puts one more in mind of Freemason enclaves than inner city theatre. Adjoining this is a small lounge room lined with bookshelves and ramshackle decorations, complete with a small café bar and gallery space. As ambience goes, the TAP Gallery gets full marks, though I was still somewhat hesitant about the play itself. Turns out, I needn't have worried, as One Scientific Mystery is SO GOOD I MAY NEVER USE LOWER CASE LETTERS AGAIN.

Reviewed by Fiona Scotney

Did you grow up with Seinfeld, Friends and The Secret Life of Us? Did you read Nick Hornby’s High Fidelity and Nick Earls’ Zigzag Street? Did you watch Reality Bites, Trainspotting and enjoy the fast talking banter of Pulp Fiction? If you did, then Stephen Vagg’s Trivia might be for you. This play is filled with that certain kind of existential angst that comes from being thirty and single while your friends are getting married and your family is hassling you about settling down and having babies. It’s the kind of angst that comes from having a job you hate with few prospects of anything different. It’s Ethan Hawke being unemployed in Reality Bites, it’s Nick Earl’s relationship prospects in most of his novels from the 1990s. It’s Claudia Karvan, Deborah Mailman, and Samuel Johnston as they go through life struggling to make meaning, while pausing to reflect at the end of every episode (truly, life needs more soliloquies). Or, it’s trivia quiz masters.

 

Reviewed by Katherine Johnson

The experience of Bombshells begins with your arrival at the Ensemble Theatre, one of the few professional theatre venues this side of the bridge. As many will already be acquainted with, the theatre is located on the picturesque waters of Kirribilli, and is equipped with a bar and friendly staff that facilitate a pleasant pre-show drink while enjoying the view. The petite space of the theatre itself means you have an excellent view of the performance even in the back rows. The modest space is complemented by a thrust stage (which seats the audience on three sides) creating a more intimate experience, ideal for the nature of this solo performance.

If we were to put our inhibitions aside, to lay our furtive cards out for all to see and damn the consequences, who among us could deny the secret urge to one day enter that seductive, shadowy world of the in-store detective? To don trench coat and Maglite, to patrol the garish shopfronts, the hive of loading docks with the grace and poise of a latter-day Columbo, to venture beyond the door marked Staff Only and investigate whatever grim mystery there resides… Sure, for most of us, it will only ever be a dream. The life of a Retail Jack Reacher or Produce Poirot will forever be the stuff of fantasy, and our real lives will trundle on with the tired desperation common to all those whose lot it is not to wear polished shoes or brandish expensive walkie-talkies.

Billy Joel and Van Halen have been confirmed to headline the inaugural STONE Music Festival to be held over two days at Sydney's ANZ Stadium on Saturday 20 and Sunday 21 April, 2013. Supporting these global superstars on the Festival bill will be a massive array of legendary international and Australian rock acts that amongst them have accumulated a plethora of album sales and awards, and plenty of smash hit singles for festival goers to celebrate.