WILD DOGS UNDER MY SKIRT Comes to the Illawarra Performing Arts Centre in April

Merrigong Theatre Company will present one of New Zealand’s most successful theatrical exports, Tusiata Avia’s Wild Dogs Under My Skirt at the Illawarra Performing Arts Centre from the 10th to 13th April.

Touring across New Zealand and performing off-Broadway in New York snapping up awards since 2016, Wild Dogs Under My Skirt breathes fierce life into poetry, womanhood and the unsettling challenge to tradition and conformity.

Adapted from Tusiata Avia’s poetry collection, Wild Dogs Under My Skirt is a provocative and unapologetic examination and celebration of what it is to be a Samoan woman. In the wake of the unending colonial earthquake, five Samoan characters make their lives between two cultures: playing, gossiping, enduring, enforcing the patriarchal status quo, and carving out powerful new identities.

Writer, Tusiata Avia said, “I’m thrilled Wild Dogs Under My Skirt is coming to Wollongong. It’s been around the world so it’s definitely time it crossed the ditch. Wild Dogs Under My Skirt will make you laugh, make you think, and may well make you squirm. Sometimes all three in quick succession. It will give you a look into another world but the themes are universal ones: love,  childhood, violence, racism - to name a few. Whatever your background, there is something there for you.”

Tusiata Avia is a recipient 2024 Prime Ministers Award for Literature, and was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to poetry and the arts in 2020. 

Merrigong Theatre Company's Artistic Director and CEO, Simon Hinton said, "I am so excited to be able to bring this stunning piece of international theatre to our audience here in Wollongong. There are times when theatre provides a captivating window into the lived experience of people in other places or times. Wild Dogs Under My Skirt is one of those works that envelope us in the vivid, humourous, joyful and challenging lives of modern-day Samoan women. Brace yourselves for an immersive and heart-touching production."

An exhilarating theatrical poetry experience, Anapela Polata’ivao’s commanding direction introduces nuance, power, and dramatic sophistication into Avia’s deeply personal view of Pacific Island life and its sometimes-uneasy collisions with New Zealand.

Vivid, passionate, and compelling, Wild Dogs Under My Skirt is flush with humour and pure entertainment.

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