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HOT - HIP HOP SHOWCASE at The Auckland Performing Arts Centre: TAPAC reviewed by Mark James Hamilton 9 Oct 2007 |
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How do you keep it real in the You Tube era? DJ Consciousness’s pre-show mixing got the audience rocking. A lad climbed on stage to bust some moves. Hot brings street culture to the theatre – actually, it’s truly dance from suburban garages and church halls transposed to a big posh place. [more] |
 reviewed by Renee Liang (The Lumiere Reader) 12 Oct 2007 |
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Bedazzling, bemusing and bittersweet In this hilariously twisted adaptation by Patrick Graham, a band of motley tramps capture two modern-day girlies gossiping on the edge of what appears to be a Mad Max-esque rubbish tip, and inexplicably force them to perform in their staging of Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew ... [more] |
 reviewed by Renee Liang (The Lumiere Reader) 2 Jun 2008 |
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No character is blameless “Morality has no home”, proclaims the tagline of this epic production by Silo Theatre, but in its own twisted way this tale of debauched gangsters and petty hoes has a morality all of its own. Brecht never wrote theatre as spectacle alone. He intended always to challenge the audience, often by inducing a discordance in their viewing, and director Michael Hurst has succeeded admirably in this. [more] |
 reviewed by Renee Liang (The Lumiere Reader) 16 Jul 2008 |
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Competent rather than stunning In this revival of the classic play by Tennessee Williams, the action is transposed from a 1950’s Mississippi river estate to a modern day “hotel”, complete with designer furniture (promoted in the programme!), plastic walls and obeisant hotel staff. The reasons for this staging decision are never entirely justified, and I found myself confused as to which era this play was set - the dialogue and themes seeming to refer more to the original 1950’s while the set and soundtrack suggested a contemporary setting. [more] |
 reviewed by Renee Liang (The Lumiere Reader) 23 Jul 2008 |
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Intimate, funny, and will keep ticking over in your brain “Every now and then… strangers break into our carefully arranged worlds, leaving us with no point of reference, no language, no understanding…” This is the program’s introduction to the closeted world devised by Medlock and Musgrove in their two plays, Spurs and Blinkers. Each two-hander play is complete in itself, but the link is the performers, and the fact that both involve horses. [more] |
 reviewed by Renee Liang (The Lumiere Reader) 23 Jul 2008 |
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Tantalising glimpses “You don’t find your own happiness,” they say, flashing smiles over confidently tossed shoulders. “You make it.” It is a statement that these eleven young women truly live. The Girls Show is about being young, about being a woman and about being an Aucklander – all things which have received bad press in the past, but which is celebrated in this pastiche of true stories. [more] |
 reviewed by Renee Liang (The Lumiere Reader) 9 Sep 2008 |
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Enjoyable? Not sure. Thought-provoking? Definitely. ‘Blackbird singing in the dead of night Take these broken wings and learn to fly….’ The stage is dark. Otherworldly strains of the familiar song ‘Blackbird’ permeate the space as glowing figures move along behind a green frosted window. Two figures eventually open a door and tumble into what is revealed as a messy staffroom. The lights come up on a complex and disturbing psychological drama. [more] |
 reviewed by Renee Liang (The Lumiere Reader) 26 Sep 2008 |
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Highly recommended “Best not drop the baby!” How many first-time dads have heard this joke and inwardly groaned. After all, in today’s modern world, surely Dads are as well-equipped as Mums to handle the pressures of full-time parenting. It is with this thought that Laurence Dolan’s new play, Daddy’s Home, opens. [more] |
 reviewed by Renee Liang (The Lumiere Reader) 22 Sep 2008 |
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War in microcosm To say that Oleanna is about sexual politics is overly simplistic. To say it is about harassment is missing the point. To say it is about a war – both personal and universal – is getting closer to the truth. [more] |
 reviewed by Renee Liang (The Lumiere Reader) 19 Sep 2008 |
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unashamedly nostalgic and romantic Whero’s New Net is a striking new play which asks those quintessential Kiwi questions: who are we, where do we come from and where do we really belong? And perhaps because I’ve spent my whole life asking those same questions, I found myself immediately captured by its premise. [more] |
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