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

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GIRL YOU WANT: Open-hearted, frank, captivating and highly entertaining
Basement Theatre, Lower Greys Ave, Auckland
Written and performed by Tessa Mitchell 
Directed by Prue Cunningham and Chris Jannides 
Presented by Luminary Pictures
- reviewed by Nik Smythe

Tessa Mitchell is a born and bred Grey Lynner, now raising her own family mere blocks from the streets she grew up on. Her adult life as an artist and performer is noteworthy, and in Girl You Want she takes herself – and us along with her, to a certain degree – back to her formative years as a teenager in the mid-eighties.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
CHANGES: Moving in contested spaces
SKY CITY Theatre, Auckland
Choreographers: Neil Ieremia & Kuik Swee Boon
Producer: Dolina Wehepeihana
- reviewed by Francesca Horsley

Both works [in this double bill] carried powerful messages and suggested that collaboration had created new choreographic insights. The dancers embraced each style with flair and sensitivity. However there were gaps with the integration of dancers, and some ideas within the works needed to be more fully realised. These will be smoothed out no doubt as the works mature.

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THE WHOLEHEARTED: Exemplary commitment
Mangere Arts Centre, Auckland
Directed by Sam Scott and Scotty Cotter
Presented by Massive Theatre Company
- reviewed by Raewyn Whyte

In this new devised production, The Wholehearted, codirected by Sam Scott and Scotty Cotter, questions about love and what it is to be true to yourself are brought into focus, along with a multitude of interlinked emotions, ideas, and states of mind and being which tend to be experienced in similar ways, despite social and cultural differences.

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JEKYLL & HYDE: Flair, fun and panache with a purpose
Circa Two, Wellington
A reimagining of Robert Louis Stevenson’s 
The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde 
Devised and presented by A Slightly Isolated Dog 
Directed by Leo Gene Peters
- reviewed by John Smythe

Just as we all know what ‘being a Don Juan’ means, the ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ dichotomy has entered the language as concept without its origins having to be known in detail. It speaks to the capacity for good and evil within us all; the public versus private self; the inner demons we deny at our peril and everyone else’s. It also references self-esteem issues and everyday hypocrisy.

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New Zealand Festival 2016
CAFÉ MÜLLER / THE RITE OF SPRING: Unforgettable
St James Theatre, Wellington
Choreography: Pina Bausch
- reviewed by Ann Hunt

There is only one word to describe this performance and that is unforgettable. The power and beauty of these works particularly that of Rite of Spring, sear indelible images in our minds.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
MILONGA: Ultra-focussed, passionate intensity
ASB Theatre, Aotea Centre, Auckland
Choreography: Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui with Nelida Rodriguez de Aure
Music: Astor Piazolla
- reviewed by Jenny Stevenson

Cherkaoui’s choreography, which he acknowledges has been made in conjunction with the dancers and tango consultant Nélida Rodríguez de Aure, often disrupts the traditional male/female partnering, showcasing the movement sequences in multiple differing formations –so that we in the audience begin to have an intimate knowledge of what constitutes tango

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New Zealand Festival 2016
CAFÉ MÜLLER / THE RITE OF SPRING: Living works of performance history, here in Wellington
St James Theatre, Wellington
Choreography: Pina Bausch
- reviewed by Sam Trubridge

Bausch’s style has been repeated so often and in so many ways that we cannot deny that her dance-theatre is a norm now. And so, fittingly, the orange wig and the black overcoat are passed on to this new dancer, this new figure: a mantle has been passed, and it is her turn to haunt the stage. She is now a part of the establishment, both the ghost and the godmother of contemporary dance. It may pass many by, but it was a haunting and moving moment of transition portended in one of her earliest works that she made.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
CHANGES: Cross-cultural work ranges from intimate to explosive
SKY CITY Theatre, Auckland
Choreographers: Neil Ieremia & Kuik Swee Boon
Producer: Dolina Wehepeihana
- reviewed by Corazon Miller

The first piece, Change and Constancy, begins with little drama but gradually builds to a crescendo of primal, raw movement. Choreographer Kuik Swee Boon's aim is to explore the parallels between his Singaporean/Malaysian society and that of the Black Grace dancers.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
NIXON IN CHINA: Ingenuity within restrictions
Auckland Town Hall, Auckland
Composer: John Adams 
Libretto: Alice Goodman 
Conductor: Joseph Mechavich 
Director: Sara Brodie 
Chorus Director: John Rosser
Set design - John Verryt
AV Design - Louise Potiki Bryant, Matt Gillanders (for Act 2 Scene 2 The Revolutionary Army)

Presented by Auckland Arts Festival in association with Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra and NZ Opera (Aotearoa/New Zealand)
- reviewed by William Dart

Auckland Arts Festival's Nixon in China, co-produced with Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra and New Zealand Opera, cements why John Adams has created an operatic survivor.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
THE CHORUS; OEDIPUS: A beautiful, physical, musical paean to the horror of self-knowledge
Q Theatre, Rangatira, Auckland
더 코러스; 오이디푸스 
Script and Lyrics: Han Areum 
Director: Seo Jae-Hyung
Composer: Choe Uzong 
Presented by LG Arts Centre and Juk-dal (Republic of Korea)
- reviewed by Janet McAllister

Sixteen figures in flowing cream reclaim the King of Thebes from Freud in this melodic contemporary opera. This is a straight retelling of the original Oedipus tragedy exquisitely presented with swirling choreography, spare imagery and wonderful music.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
BIGMOUTH: Masterclass from the chameleon
Q Theatre Loft, Auckland

- reviewed by Janet McAllister

This excellent one-man show is not chatty or casual. Tight, dramatic spotlights focus sharply on the orator in the dark. With the help of five microphones and four glasses of water, Belgian chameleon Valentijn Dhaenens gives a masterclass in the delivery of persuasive rhetoric, with a side of melodious self-harmonising.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
BIGMOUTH: The Best Words
Q Theatre Loft, Auckland

- reviewed by Matt Baker

Performed and directed by Valentijn Dhaenens, Big Mouth addresses addresses through history, and, in doing so within a prescribed time and space, provides its audience with the ability to see past the men and woman who said them, and truly listen to the words spoken.

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PANNZ Tour-Makers 2016
THE BOOK OF EVERYTHING: Theatre magic
Gallagher Academy of Performing Arts, Univeristy of Waikato, Hamilton
Adapted by Richard Tulloch 
from the novel by Guus Kuijer 
Directed by Sophie Roberts 
An Auckland Arts Festival and Silo Theatre co-production
- reviewed by Gail Pittaway

In a show where every role is a cameo and every character undergoes a transformation either in their lives or in the audience’s eyes, the cast is outstanding. Carroll’s characterisation as Thomas is faultless and in his mannerisms we see not just the boy but the endearing man he might become.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
NIXON IN CHINA: Triumphantly directed
Auckland Town Hall, Auckland
Composer: John Adams 
Libretto: Alice Goodman 
Conductor: Joseph Mechavich 
Director: Sara Brodie 
Chorus Director: John Rosser
Set design - John Verryt
AV Design - Louise Potiki Bryant, Matt Gillanders (for Act 2 Scene 2 The Revolutionary Army)

Presented by Auckland Arts Festival in association with Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra and NZ Opera (Aotearoa/New Zealand)
- reviewed by Raewyn Whyte

United States President Richard Nixon's visit to China in 1972 to meet with Premier Chou En Lai and Chairman Mao Zedong was a momentous occasion, far reaching in its consequences for East-West relationships, the future political economy of Communist Russia and the course of the Vietnam War.

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New Zealand Festival 2016
SMALL METAL OBJECTS: Stirring, powerful and transformative
Queens Wharf Square, Wellington
Back to Back Theatre (Australia)
- reviewed by Lena Fransham

The incongruity of a seated theatre audience plonked in a public thoroughfare establishes the initial intrigue that makes this experience compelling from the beginning. Incongruities continue to generate mystery and tension throughout. The sense of profundity in the slow notes of the musical soundtrack throws everything we see around us into fresh perspective.

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BALLS: Outstanding and passionate performances
Te Pou Theatre, 44a Portage Road, New Lynn, Auckland
Written by Joshua Baty 
Directed by Dawn Glover 
Presented by Navi Collaborative
- reviewed by Nikau Hindin

I am not prepared for the F-bomb to be dropped every second word but I am reassured by my coaching friend that this kind of language is a realistic reflection of what goes on in rugby clubs throughout our country. I can see their egos swerve, duck and lash out, as they tell funny anecdotes that point out each other’s flaws and victories.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
THE GREAT DOWNHILL JOURNEY OF LITTLE TOMMY: Full of energy and pizzazz
Spiegeltent, Aotea Square, Auckland
By Jonas Vermeulen and Boris Vanseveren 
Theater Aan Zee and Richard Jordan Productions (Belgium)
- reviewed by Penny Dodd

Boris and Jonas are two extraordinary front men, both charismatic and great singers, actors, musicians. They are well supported by Pieter-Jan Janssen on bass, and Thomas Deckx on drums. All the characters in the episodes that describe Tommy’s journey (or odyssey) are played by Jonas and Boris, in monolgue and song, utilizing their full vocal ranges from sweet falsetto to punk scream.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
THE CHORUS; OEDIPUS: Group precision creates collective perspective
Q Theatre, Rangatira, Auckland
더 코러스; 오이디푸스 
Script and Lyrics: Han Areum 
Director: Seo Jae-Hyung
Composer: Choe Uzong 
Presented by LG Arts Centre and Juk-dal (Republic of Korea)
- reviewed by Vanessa Byrnes

Director Seo Jae-Hyung and Composer Choe Uzong have created a remarkably choreographed piece of sung theatre about a man whose quest to root out the cause of Thebes’ plague leads him to question who he really is. “I want to know who I am” is the driving force for Oedipus, but as the tale cautions, self-awareness and truth bring pain that must be met head-on.

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
360 ALLSTARS: Pure skill, showmanship and A-Grade entertainment
The Civic - Auckland Live, Auckland
Presented by Onyx Productions
- reviewed by Hadleigh Pouesi

Each performer has their own bracket to showcase their unique set of skills. Each solo is about 5 minutes long and is accompanied by a great arrangement of live-looped music and stunning custom AV effects. My personal highlights would include the hilarious Basketball Man, the spellbinding performance from the roue cyr wheel artist and the kiwi flavour brought to the stage by New Zealand’s very own Bboy Leerok.

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SPEED OF LIGHT: Wow - such discipline and attention to detail
Regent Theatre, Dunedin
Choreographers: 
Andonis Foniadakis - Selon désir
William Forsythe - In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated
Alexander Ekman - Cacti
- reviewed by Hannah Molloy

The dancers were amazing. They looked to be in incredible physical form with muscle definition well beyond even their usual and as I watched the three choreographies, I could see exactly why. Their timing was exquisite, their expressions bold and funny, their jumps and lifts were high and steady and the tiny movements were crisp and sh

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Auckland Arts Festival 2016
CHANGES: Constancy and change, embattlement and death - new works in development
SKY CITY Theatre, Auckland
Choreographers: Neil Ieremia & Kuik Swee Boon
Producer: Dolina Wehepeihana
- reviewed by Raewyn Whyte

The strongest elements of Constancy and Change, performed by six dancers from Black Grace and the three dancers from T.H.E. Company, arise from the juxtaposition of often very stylistically different movement sequences of individual dancers, the melding of these styles into shared phrases in occasional group sequences, and an extended duet between Ruby Alai'i, in plaid shirt and jeggings, and Mi Wu in burgundy shirt and grey corduroy pants.

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

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