DANCING ON MY OWN
BATS Theatre, The Heyday Dome, 1 Kent Tce, Wellington
09/07/2019 - 13/07/2019
Production Details
She’s back! And potentially better than ever!
“An absolute joy to watch on stage!” – Audience Member
After a successful award nominated development Fringe season of ‘Dancing On My Own Because I Didn’t Invite Anyone Else – A Development’, Maddy Warren is back with a shorter title and less sweaty palms*!
Maddy is still pretty new at this solo performance thing, and has a lot of feelings to work through. The world is a big place and sometimes it’s mean and that can be hard on anyone. Watch as she decides if it’s worth it.
Come for a laugh, stay because leaving The Heyday Dome mid-show is quite difficult and she’ll definitely call you out.
*Just kidding, they’ll be just as sweaty.
BATS Theatre: The Heyday Dome
9 – 13 July 2019
6pm
Full Price $20
Concession Price $15
Group 6+ $15
BOOK TICKETS
Accessibility
*Access to The Heyday Dome is via stairs, so please contact the BATS Box Office at least 24 hours in advance if you have accessibility requirements so that appropriate arrangements can be made. Read more about accessibility at BATS.
Theatre , Solo , Dance-theatre ,
1 hr
Upsides and downsides
Review by Margaret Austin 11th Jul 2019
I’m never sure, given the challenges specific to a one person show, how it’s going to leave me feeling. Is it going to be a bit of a structureless ramble or a taut, even slick delivery? Is it going to be composed of personal revelation or witty objective observation? And to be fair, there are audience preferences.
In the case of Maddy Warren’s performance at Bats’ Heyday Dome it’s soon evident that we are going to hear a lot about her. “I feel I’m on drugs” is her way of expressing her exuberance at being in front of an audience. This sentiment is to become a theme.
Her development season, entitled Dancing On My Own Because I Didn’t Invite Anyone Else – A Development, performed in the BATS Studio at Wellington’s Fringe Festival earlier this year, earned her a Most Promising Emerging Artist nomination. Now she has made a trip from her current home in Adelaide for this five-day run.
“We’re going to have fun,” she assures us – and my reaction is that it’s unwise to tell an audience how it’s going to experience your performance; we’ll make up our own minds.
If we’re expecting to hear about dancing, we’re going to be disappointed, though we do get to see some. The dance referred to in the show’s title has more of a metaphorical application. Our performer has gone solo from her first classroom pun to playing male roles complete with “a middle parting even Moses would be proud of”. My favourite part of her theatrical recall is a vignette about backstage life: work that’s surely vastly underrated.
There are upsides and downsides to this kind of informal, unscripted-sounding monologue. The upside is the intimacy that’s sometimes gained from personal revelation and the impromptu comments made possible. The downside is a lack of tautness.
It’s always reassuring that there are performers willing to let us into their lives and loves. Maddy Warren’s chief love is being onstage. As for her dance experience, we get closest to it with the line, “My body wanted to fight the dance authority.”
And I get the idea she might say, “Never mind the review, see the show.” [Also see her Facebook page.]
Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer
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