A selection of reviews from Theatreview from the last week including: Keep/Self, Between the Sheets, Boeing Boeing, and A Festival of Russian Ballet.

See more recent reviews at theatreview.org, the NZ Performing Arts Review & Directory.
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A selection of reviews from Theatreview from the last week including: Keep/Self, Between the Sheets, Boeing Boeing, and A Festival of Russian Ballet.

See more recent reviews at theatreview.org, the NZ Performing Arts Review & Directory.
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The Basement, Lower Greys Ave, Auckland - BETWEEN THE SHEETS: Lessons in Love
- reviewed by Sharu Delilkan

The tension was palpable from the start. Between the Sheets opens with a go-getting high-flying power suit-wearing woman Marion (Jennifer Ward-Lealand) grilling her son’s teacher Teresa (Beth Allen) on his successes, failures, weaknesses and future.

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Musgrove Studio, Maidment Theatre, Auckland - KEEP/SELF: Meaningful encounters and gentle social commentary
- reviewed by Raewyn Whyte

Presentable SELF, choreographed by Serene Lorimer from Flux, is all playful wit and charm, a somewhat tongue-in-cheek series of tactical interpersonal encounters and costume changes illustrating some ways to exploit societal norms of self-presentation for our own purposes.

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The Basement, Lower Greys Ave, Auckland - BETWEEN THE SHEETS: Mesmerising, powerful, clever and deeply human
- reviewed by Heidi North-Bailey

Between the Sheets is a gripping, piercingly well-executed and complex piece of theatre where two women are stripped bare as their lives are wrenched open by their most unlikely opposite.

The piece is set in a year 3 classroom, at the end of a parent teacher evening. Career woman Marion (Jennifer Ward-Lealand) enters the classroom late, smoothly claims the last spot from Teresa (Beth Allen), her son’s young teacher.

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Fortune Theatre, Dunedin - BOEING BOEING: Pushing physical boundaries
- reviewed by Terry MacTavish

Well, it’s holiday fare, no point in being a prude over such light-hearted nonsense, and indeed I’ve already been over this ground in 2010, reviewing Camoletti’s Ding Dong. But the day it opens, Saturday 16th November, is the National Day of Action: Bust Rape Culture Now. What Bernard does – lying, bribing his employee into helping cover, obtaining sex through false pretences, then boasting to his friend about it, even corrupting that friend who is tempted to emulate him – is uncomfortably close to the actions of the infamous ‘Roastbusters’ that have outraged New Zealand.

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Opera House, Wellington - DANZDANCE20: Inclusive and eclectic celebration
- reviewed by Ann Hunt

This eclectic celebration of twenty years of DANZ (Dance Aotearoa New Zealand,) was entertaining, informative and a total tonic.

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Opera House, Wellington - A FESTIVAL OF RUSSIAN BALLET: Ecstatic reception despite poor production standards
- reviewed by Ann Hunt

The Company contains some extremely fine dancers and a strong corps de ballet. Technique here is not the issue. What disappoints are overall poor production standards, including over-amplified poorly recorded music and incomprehensible programming. The dancers and Ballet itself deserve better.

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The Basement, Lower Greys Ave, Auckland - VERBATIM: The shock of the true
- reviewed by Janet McAllister

"Grimburgers," said a friend when told them I was going to a revival of two-thirds of Miranda Harcourt's trilogy about violent offending. But this simply staged Last Tapes and JustSpeak production, directed by Jeff Szusterman, is anti-histrionic, and all the more gripping for it.

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Circa One (season continues), Wellington - MOTHER GOOSE: THE PANTOMIME: Panto keeps laughter coming and coming

- reviewed by Laurie Atkinson

This year’s Christmas festivities have started with an explosion of fun and laughter. The opening night audience, young and old, at the end of Mother Goose poured into the foyer beaming and chattering having been royally entertained.

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Circa One, Wellington - MOTHER GOOSE: THE PANTOMIME: All elements of panto truly honoured
- reviewed by Maryanne Cathro

Mother Goose is a bit of a watershed for Circa pantos. Instead of Roger Hall, Michele Amas has stepped up with a fresh new style. Instead of Michael Nicholas Williams directing the music, Michelle Scullion is “Mrs Music.” And of course the late Paul Jenden’s clever lyrics still sparkle throughout the tunes written by Gareth Farr, but his presence on stage was missed.

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Musgrove Studio, Maidment Theatre, Auckland - THE IMPROV BANDITS 2013: Coming into their own
- reviewed by Joanna Page

According to the Improv Bandits, they’re finally legal! And to celebrate 16 years of improvisation Kiwi-style, double-world improv champion Wade Jackson and co (Michael, Matt, Paul, and Greg) take to the boards for a suitably debaucherous evening of mirth.

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Te Karanga Gallery, Auckland - LAMB (YOU'LL BE A SHEEP SOON): A fizzer

- reviewed by Johnny Givins

I applaud creative artists with the gumption to get a show together and show it to the public. The energy and passion overcomes many of the flaws in scripting, production, direction, and theatre skills. Unfortunately Leigh Fitzjames accomplishes all these limitations with few of the benefits.

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The Williamson (old fire station) Private Meeting Room, Grey Lynn, Auckland - ‘SALT’: A life-long 56-minute journey

- reviewed by Lexie Matheson

There is no sense of fear in Fergusson’s exquisite text and it’s like she has completely come of age as a writer ... She’s edgy, unafraid of her content, funny, and ‘salt’ is seriously the real deal. It’s complete, psychologically cohesive, ragged in a good way – and actor friendly, always actor friendly.

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BATS - Out Of Site - Cnr Cuba & Dixon, Wellington - WHISTLE SOLO: Whistling up a fine piece of theatre

- reviewed by Laurie Atkinson

If you want a refresher course about the eighties - and a funny one to boot – then Whistle Solo will jog your memory.

‘Greed is good’ and nuclear annihilation, Hayley’s Comet, the nuclear war TV movie, The Day After, and the end of the Cold War all feature in this hour-long show which has a convoluted plot that feels like a revue inspired by the fantastical logic of The Goon Show.

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CBS Canterbury Arena, Christchurch - SKY DANCER: Bold step not fully achieved
- reviewed by Elizabeth O’Connor

Gareth Farr’s music, played with sensitivity and with sweeping power when the sombre score requires it, is the highlight of this collaboration. There are long, sustained builds, where textures move seamlessly from one part of the orchestra to another, and a handful of stunning climaxes, where the musical peaks are enhanced by impressive manipulation of paper birds and Johan Nortje’s projections on the rear screen. At these times, children around me comment with awe and delight.

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Lower NZI, Level 1, Aotea Centre, Auckland - LIVE AT SIX: A contemporary blast of intelligent and entertaining satire
- reviewed by Paul Simei-Barton

The rise of digital media presents a challenge to live drama that has been met by a number of recent shows which make digital technology an essential part of the theatre experience.

Live at Six is a finely crafted satire on the rapidly evolving relationship between social media and news services.

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Lower NZI, Level 1, Aotea Centre, Auckland - LIVE AT SIX: Not the Six O'Clock News... but close enough

- reviewed by James Wenley

Recall when Judy “Mother of the Nation” Bailey had to read the auto-cue about herself on the six o’clock news when her pay packet became a top news story? That’s one way to respond when the newsreaders become the newsmakers: continue on as normal.

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The Pumphouse, Auckland - MIX & MATCH: Surreal sketches amusing enough

- reviewed by Nik Smythe

The emergent production from Herd of Cats is a little rough around the edges but nevertheless fulfils the company’s mission statement, to “bring fun and frivolity to the stage”.

It’s a curious gimmick: three short comedy plays are performed by five actors, the roles they play being chosen by the audience in a clumsily amusing casting process involving democracy in time-consuming action.

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Founders Theatre, Hamilton - DAVID STRASSMAN CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR: The inmates take over the asylum
- reviewed by Liza Kire

His show has incorporated big screens and flashing lights that add an unreal depth to his performance. Strassman is so good at what he does that sooner or later you forget that it really is a one man show. You start to see each puppet for the character that they are.

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See more recent reviews at theatreview.org.nz, the NZ Performing Arts Review & Directory

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