MIDNIGHT CONFESSIONS
BATS Theatre, The Stage, 1 Kent Tce, Wellington
23/08/2022 - 27/08/2022
Production Details
Written, Performed and Directed by: Mia Oudes, Anna Barker, Abby Lyons, Alia Marshall
Presented by Heartbreaker Productions
Sssssshhh we’ve got a secret!!! The boys won’t be listening and our parents are in bed, so the real talk can begin. Friends, get your parents to call ours because we’re having a SLEEPOVER!
The makers of Conversations with the Ghost in my Bedroom (NZ Fringe Festival, 2021) and performers of Susan Glaspell’s Trifles (Six Degrees Festival, 2022) are bringing their pillows to BATS for their debut stand-alone show, Midnight Confessions.
Inspired by Caryl Churchill’s Love and Information, Midnight Confessions is an experimental anthology piece exploring powerful friendships and the love, loss, joy and vulnerability that follow. These snippets of life are an ode to childhood.
Heartbreaker Productions consists of Abby Lyons, Alia Marshall, Anna Barker, and Mia Oudes – four female creators bringing their own stories to a stage where stories are normally told for them. Each creator writes, directs, produces and performs in this collaborative process.
“It is still rare in entertainment media to see the rituals of girlhood treated as worthy of in-depth exploration rather than trivial, and the heartbreaker team are well-placed to treat the quintessential experience of the childhood sleepover with nuance and empathy.” Cassandra Tse, Red Scare Theatre Company
SOOOO…. Get your jammies on, grab your pillows and come share all the goss <3 See you at ours this August!
This show is entirely written, directed, produced, performed, designed, operated and marketed by female identifying.
MIDNIGHT CONFESSIONS
BATS Theatre, The Stage
23 – 27 AUGUST 2022
6.30pm
FULL: $18
CONCESSION: $14
GROUP 6+: $13
THE DIFFERENCE: $40
BOOK
Written, Performed and Directed by:
Mia Oudes, Anna Barker, Abby Lyons, Alia Marshall
Marketing and Publicity: Ashton Marla
Stage Management: Kate Hudspith-Gooch
Stage Design: Rebekah De Roo
Theatre ,
1 hr
Original, entertaining, funny, moving, inspiring
Review by Maryanne Cathro 24th Aug 2022
As we enter the BATS Stage, we’re greeted by a diaphanous tent of a set (by Rebekah De Roo). The floor is covered and strewn with sheets and bedding. Four young women in pyjamas are excitedly rehearsing and fussing on stage. My first thought is, “What is this, a sleepover??” and it turns out that it is.
The four performers, Mia Oudes, Anna Barker, Abby Lyons and Alia Marshall, start the show with an exuberant and satirical dance routine. As a youthful participant in sleepover dance routines myself, I am instantly drawn into their world. With this comes the realisation that this show is something special – real ‘herstories’ on a theatre stage. So rarely do we see the stories of girls and young women told outside the context of other people’s lives. And when they are told by young women – unheard of.
The show comprises scenes from sleepovers through a range of ages. And it is instantly clear to us what age they are as the performers’ physicality alters to cleverly show the shifts. Through these scenes we see stories of love, conflict, tenderness, conflict … Allegiances form and disband, confidences are shared, giggling is committed.
At various points, each performer takes centre stage with the mic stand to share a confession. These are all very different and what strikes both myself and my companion is how well these confessions show our own verbal processing as women; of realisation and self-awareness through speaking and being heard.
In my own performing world of burlesque and cabaret, I am so used to women having complete agency over what they put onto the stage – it’s why I have chosen it. So to see a women-centric theatre work where the four performers are also the writers and directors, showing experiences that are so often dismissed and trivialised – I am living for it.
It is an entertaining, funny and moving piece of theatre. Their stories – OUR stories – are worth showing and worth centre stage. Thank you Heartbreaker Productions for bringing your original and inspiring work to the stage.
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