The latest Theatreview Weekly includes a review of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Julia Deans – Both Sides Now, Shadowland, and Ollie is a Martian.

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

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The latest Theatreview Weekly includes a review of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Julia Deans – Both Sides Now, Shadowland, and Ollie is a Martian.

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

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JULIA DEANS – BOTH SIDES NOW: Putting the OH! into folk
Concert Chamber, Town Hall, Auckland Live, Auckland
- reviewed by Kathryn van Beek

Whether you’re a dedicated Joni Mitchell fan or a sour sceptic, you’ll be enchanted by Julia’s urban take on Joni’s pastoral songs. Julia evokes the same sad fragility she showcased with Fur Patrol’s Lydia on Joni’s Blue and The Last Time I Saw Richard. She adds a welcome earthiness to Joni’s ultra-feminine songs while effortlessly gliding over the demanding high registers.

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SHADOWLAND: Subliminal fantasies performed in the shadows
Civic Theatre, Auckland
- reviewed by Jenny Stevenson

The choreography in these front-of-screen sections utilises Pilobolus’s signature acrobatic movement and weight-sharing partnering to create beautiful sequences of hypnotic, lyrical dance. One such segment show-cases a down-trodden band of jaded circus performers who only execute their tired tricks at the behest of a whip-cracking ring-mistress performed with ferocious disdain by Krystal Butler. However these interludes are all too short, as the main focus of the work clearly lies in creating shadow performance.

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OLLIE IS A MARTIAN: Out of this world
The Basement, Lower Greys Ave, Auckland
- reviewed by Andrew Parker

Ollie is a Martian. Or to go into a little more detail, he’s a man in a nifty blue track-suit with hair like Christopher Lloyd in Back to the Future and who sounds like Jemaine Clement on helium. Also he’s from Mars, represented by a red ball with a heart on it. He’s come to Earth, a planet he doesn’t fully understand in search of... well, a few things, but mostly just to comprehend it.

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OLLIE IS A MARTIAN: Comically eccentric otherworldly discourse
The Basement, Lower Greys Ave, Auckland
- reviewed by Nik Smythe

Introducing himself, our exotic visitor explains that he thinks he’s here for a reason, only he doesn’t know what it is. From there he proceeds to enlighten us in the ways of his culture, and to share his experiences with Earth and its fascinating inhabitants.

Cox’s comically eccentric performance is entirely as one might imagine an extraterrestrial creature trained in classical Earth oratory and dramatic techniques and subject to intensive direction.

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TWELFTH NIGHT: A rollicking good night sans melancholy
Unitec Theatre, Entry 1, Carrington Rd, Mt Albert, Auckland
- reviewed by Lexie Matheson

Having thoroughly enjoyed Elena Stejko’s work with the other half of UNITEC’s third year acting class the night before (The Merchant of Venice) I won’t deny I was looking forward to Ben Crowder’s production of one of my personal favourite Shakespeare plays, Twelfth Night. I’ve always enjoyed Crowder’s playful style and can imagine that the student cast would have appreciated and enjoyed his unique and effective way of working, as always collaboratively, on a play subtitled ‘What You Will’.

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THE MERCHANT OF VENICE: Fun evening despite bemusing cuts
Unitec Theatre, Entry 1, Carrington Rd, Mt Albert, Auckland
- reviewed by Lexie Matheson

While I don’t resile from the views already expressed – loud feet in clunky shoes and a palpable lack of evident ‘craft’ – something else much more powerful than either of those perhaps pretentious fripperies is going on and I find myself liking this Merchant very much indeed.

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THE HISTORY BOYS: Exuberance, fluid movement, great timing
Globe Theatre, Dunedin
- reviewed by Barbara Frame

There are seven of them: seniors at an undistinguished school whose status-driven headmaster hopes they can make it to Oxford or Cambridge. Intellectually sophisticated and gleefully bright, they owe their erudition to Hector, an eccentric teacher nearing retirement, whose largely unfocused teaching emphasises learning for its own sake.

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A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM: Transporting dreams
Court Theatre, Bernard Street, Addington, Christchurch
- reviewed by Lindsay Clark

The dream and the bed are at its heart, underpinning design choices as well as the shaping of the play. Bottom's Dream begins and ends the scene arrangements. The “Are we all met?” piece wherein the wonderful Mechanicals set up their own play, is what we see first, instead of the pomp of Theseus and Hippolyta. In place of the accompanying grand ducal music which often announces the court, we have a chorus of tradesmen's tools at work, led by the eerily beautiful sound of Bottom's saw, making music, not cutting wood.

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ASIAN INVASION PLAYS FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF AOTEAROA: Borrow or steal a school uniform to gate crash a performance near you
The New Place, Waikato University, Hamilton
- reviewed by Gail Pittaway

Subtitled ‘Ten token tales’, this is a fine compilation of short scenes from ten mostly contemporary plays showing interactions between Asian, Pasifika, Maori and Pakeha New Zealanders. The four young performers of this ensemble are equally energetic, youthful and talented, yet each brings a particular quality to the dynamism of this well-paced short show.

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WHORE – STORYTELLING ABOUT SEX WORK: Valid, engaged, under-developed
Lifewise Merge Cafe, 453 Karangahape Road, Ponsonby, Auckland
- reviewed by Cherie Moore

WHORE is a collection of six monologues – stories about street sex workers in Auckland – performed by three actors at Lifewise Merge Café on Karangahape Road. Writer and Director Melissa Fergusson was prompted to write the piece by a friend who is a social worker and an ex-sex worker. With her help, and the support of the New Zealand Prostitutes Collective, Fergusson met with sex workers who are also homeless, to hear their stories. WHORE is a creative elaboration based on those conversations and people’s lives.

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THE HISTORY BOYS: Engaging, likeable examination of complex issues
Globe Theatre, Dunedin
- reviewed by Brenda Harwood

The clever, high-spirited young men of Alan Bennett's The History Boys are brought to life by a group of equally clever young performers at the Globe Theatre.

A packed and supportive opening night audience were kept entertained by high jinks, music, poetry, and quick-fire dialogue, in this fast-moving show.

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COPPELIA: Coppelia at ASB Thetare, Auckland
ASB Theatre, Aotea Centre, Auckland
- reviewed by Bernadette Rae

Willowy Katherine Grange and handsome Jacob Chown as Ima and Zoltan led out a picture-perfect lineup of the Friends on opening night at the Aotea, and the Czardas, a troupe of wild and sexy gypsy women, headed by the riveting Abigail Boyle, added spice.

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NOW 2014: Mystery, intrigue, difficulty, challenge and fantastic moments
Hannah Playhouse (previously Downstage), Wellington
- reviewed by Sam Trubridge

The final half of the evening is reserved for Olive Beiringa and Otto Ramstad's work Low. It is an awkward, frenetic, punky, funky piece of contemporary dance, structured around six or so songs by artists like Peaches, The Roots, PJ Harvey, and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Like a badly DJed party or game of musical chairs, there are big lapses between the tracks, which the dancers fill with vague movements before exploding into action when the music recommences.

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EGLANTYNE: Engaging, informative, and very entertaining
Hannah Playhouse (previously Downstage), Wellington
- reviewed by Ewen Coleman

The suffragette movement at the end of the 19th century brought to the fore a number of women who made a name for themselves championing their cause.

In the UK there was Marie Stopes with her pioneering work on birth control, in America Alice Paul fighting for women’s rights and here in NZ our own Kate Sheppard leading the fight for women to get the vote.

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COPPELIA: A sparkling production
ASB Theatre, Aotea Centre, Auckland
- reviewed by Jenny Stevenson

Lucy Green as the young Swanhilda and Kohei Iwamato as Franz revel in the comic elements of their roles and their contagious joie-de-vivre enlivens their characterisations. Green performs a marathon three acts of dance with strength and confidence, and has in only four years become a star of the Company, and Iwamato looks set to follow in her footsteps. Their performance in the pas-de-deux of Act III is assured, musically astute and beautifully realised.

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ASIAN INVASION PLAYS FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF AOTEAROA: Vitality, variety, versatility
The Dark Room at Te Manawa, Palmerston North
- reviewed by John Ross

As our nation gets more and more ethnically diverse, how much do we genuinely mix and mingle with each other? How far do we really get beyond stereotyping to mutual understanding and empathy? This show’s certainly entertaining, yet it also throws up some fascinating challenges.

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

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