Tim Carney - Page 3

Richard Bean's One Man Two Guvnors has to be one of the funniest plays written to date. It is nonstop hilarity from beginning to end. The show opened in 2011 on the West end, transferred to Broadway and has been on an International tour in 2013. With a multitude of musicals opening in Melbourne over the next 4 weeks, it feels like the National Theatre of London's production in conjunction with MTC could slip in and out of Melbourne without much mention, especially with King Kong dominating every available publicity space in the city. If every performance of this show is not sold out it will be a travesty. It deserves it ten fold along with an extended season.

Legally Blonde opened in Melbourne to a standing ovation that was well deserved for a particularly talented cast . This production is slick. From beginning to end it has everything a musical comedy needs. It's light, camp and fun with a clever score from Laurence O'keefe and Nell Benjamin that combines humorous lyric with catchy vibrant melodies.

From the opening moments of Bangarra dance theatre's Blak it was obvious there was something magical occurring before us.

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is an interesting show to define. Part musical, part children's spectacle, it ultimately settles as a big budget pantomime. It is a clever route for Roger Hodgeman to direct this show as its virtually non-existent script does little for both actor and audience. Everything in this production of Chitty is big and over dramatized, which for the most part works particularly effectively. There are moments and performances however, that aren't in sync with the collective pantomime energy on stage and these become particularly obvious throughout the show.

Cirque du Soleil's latest venture to Australia is with the insect themed OVO, a show celebrating the biodiversity and wonder of the ecosystem and all things that move within in it. The particularly impressive set design by Gringo Cardio opens with a giant inflated OVO (portugese for egg) looming over the stage. The sense of the egg is never lost throughout and is the heart of the piece as 'The Foreigner' (Barthelemy Glumineau) travels into the colony with an egg strapped to his back much to the amusement and intrigue of all of the insects led by Master Flipo (Simon Bradbury)

Four years after first opening in Melbourne, Jersey Boys re-opened last night for a brief return season. The cast is predominately new but the gutsy and moving story of The Four Seasons remains timeless and entertaining as ever.

Fem Bellling, Andrew Dunne and musical director Warren Wills guide their audience on a journey from the beginning of time through varying musical styles and cultural influences leading to the great white way. The show provides few highlights with wills' arrangements and virtuoso accompaniment being one of them. Both Dunne and Belling are seasoned performers with fine voices, however, their harmonies are flawed, their movement awkward and unfortunately for them Frank Howson's dialogue is limited and particularly cheesy. To compound these issues the sound was incomprehensible . How two microphones and a small band can pose an issue for any sound designer is beyond belief, yet it cut in and out all night and was at no moment ever truly balanced.

The wafting sounds of Christmas Carols in the foyer pre performance set the tone for what was to be a beautiful performance by a wonderful craftsman. As Charles Dickens, Phil Zachariah takes us on a journey through four staves, three ghosts and protagonist Scrooge. Zachariah embodies and portays every charcater in the Dicken's masterpiece with acute precision both vocally and physically capturing the true essence of the piece. For 90 minutes it is one man alone on a bare stage telling a story and it is more than enough to hold our attention, make us laugh and empathise with one of the most recognisable characters in literature.

None of the actors on the stage looked comfortable at last nights second instalment of 5pounds of Repertory Theatre, Sally...the musical. Precisely because it was a musical and the cast and director Celeste Cody were exposed to the challenges of the genre. It's understandable as well, because even the most talented of musical theatre performers can look out of their depth and treading water with material they are uncomfortable with. What this cast did have however, was the courage and the through line of character and plot to present to the audience the story of Sally, a young girl working as a dishwasher at the Alley restaurant who is thrust into the spotlight posing as a famous Russian dancer.

Opening 5pound theatres repertory season last night was Daniel Lammin's adaptation of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion. Lammin's adaptation is a feature of this performance with the 90 minute one act version managing to tell an often drawn out story in a particularly succinct and stylish way. Coupled with this was the theatre in the round-esq stage design which complemented the play and gave it a particularly personal feel. Performances were varied throughout the evening, with Tom Molyneux providing the nights highlight as Colonel Pickering. There were also a couple of dynamic scenes between Jason Cavanagh's Henry Higgins and Freya Pragt's Eliza Doolittle which nailed the dramatic tension required and kept the action humming along. For the majority of the evening however, the play was at that particularly uncomfortable level for both performer and audience where the script isn't fully secure. Lines were dropped and fumbled constantly throughout and on occasion the play was on the brink of stopping due to lost lines. Thankfully it didn't and rounded itself off to be quite a successful performance.

The bland MIDI tracked 'overture' that opened More Sex Please We're Seniors gave an indication that none of Peter Sullivan's songs were going to be memorable. They were, however, particularly memorable for one reason; being musically and lyrically feeble. The script by Jon-Michael Howson is boring with jokes that have already been overused, don't work or just simply aren't funny.

The Laramie project, written by Moises Kaufman and members of the Tectonic Theatre Project, is a play that has been particularly overdone since its opening in Denver in 2000. In part because it deals with real human responses to the tragic beating and subsequent death of Matthew Shephard and in part because it has the ability to illicit a distinct response from its audience.

In 1962, the original production of A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum was struggling in its off broadway try out. Audiences were not turning up and so producer Hal Prince hired director Jerome Robbins to come in and offer some advice to the creative team. Robbins biggest influence in the piece was to scrap the opening number 'Love is in the Air' and commission Stephen Sondheim to write a new uptempo tune that introduced the piece as a wild bawdy comedy. 'Comedy tonight'was born and so to the show which went on to win a number of Tony Awards including Best Musical.

Promises promises is a 'musical' of two halves. I say 'musical' loosely as it is more a play with songs that don't particularly enhance the story. On top of this Burt Bacharach's score never reaches any great soaring heights, it is more a commentary of the action taking place. Its highlight is Turkey Lurkey Time at the conclusion of Act 1, by this stage, unfortunately, the audience has already been lost by some pretty uneventful script and direction.

Trevor Ashley returns to the Arts Centre in his riorous four hander Fat Swan. The writing is some of the most wickedly funny, sharp, edgy work to be presented on an Australia stage and is performed to perfection by Ashley himself, along with Genevieve Lemon, Brendan Moar and Danielle Barnes.

Sport and theatre collide in this biographical depiction of AFL legend Ron Barassi written by Tee O'Neill and directed by Terence O'Connell. The play is long...too long, with very little conflict to keep you interested. The cast tries hard and is aptly led by Jane Clifton as narrator, Melba, a fanatical Collingwood supporter who commentats on both the action and the statistical facts of the time. Steve Bastoni as Barassi, whos monologues as the inspirational coach of Carlton, North Mebourne and Melbourne are perfectly executed and Matt Parkinson as Norm Smith, whose calm and effortlessness are particularly resfreshing for a show whos cast are trying too hard throughout to save it. Special mention to former AFL footballer Russel Robertson who provides a sea of highlights in his featured ensemble role.

5Pound Theatre's Jason Cavanagh directs his original work Kiss Them All Soundly, an Into The Woods esq look at the darker, grittier side of three re-imagined nursery rhymes. Cavanagh delves into the realm of fantasy versus reality, digging into the sub-conscious of four famous childhood characters, Simple Simon, Georgie Porgie, Mary Had A Little Lamb and Alice (In Wonderland). It is an insighful look at the darker side of these characters and their stories, their motivations and their existence.

Gale Edwards' Production of Chess is without a doubt one of the best shows of the year and has to be one of the greatest of the show since its West End opening in 1986.

Let's not beat around the bush, Rhonda Burchmore is a sultry sizzling smouldering smoking hot siren. From start to finish she filled the show with a combination of presence and flesh, matched with a voice that transports you back to the time of the smokey jazz clubs of LA.

David Hare's The Blue Room is a study of sexual desire through the interconnecting web of life. Two actors play over ten characters all of whom share sexual experience both proximately and or indirectly. It is an accurate snapshot of sexual connection by Hare and a fascinating insight into the predisposition of society.