The latest Theatreview Weekly includes reviews from Paper Chains and Black Holes, Mary Poppins, and Widows.

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

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The latest Theatreview Weekly includes reviews from Paper Chains and Black Holes, Mary Poppins, and Widows.

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

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*NZSD GRADUATION SEASON 2015: SHINE IN ABUNDANCE, BUT WE WANT MORE
Te Whaea National Dance and Drama Centre, 11 Hutchison Rd, Newtown, Wellington
Choreographers: Marius Petipa, Thomas Bradley, Sarah Foster-Sproull, George Balanchine, Kuik Swee Boon, Sir Kenneth MacMillan
Costumier: Donna Jefferis
- reviewed by Chris Jannides

Sarah Foster-Sproull shows that she is a major dance-making force in our community. Beyond making well-crafted work, Sarah is establishing her choreographic signature. Powerful, poetic and highly distinctive. She is also a graduate from the NZSD, which must make them proud. Despite reservations I have about the costumes and lighting, this work features an extremely inventive and highly visual use of choreographic motifs involving a chain-like linking together of hands, and in one extraordinary moment, also of legs and feet, to make images that unmistakably recreate the human spine, the wings, feathers and flight motion of birds, an umbilical cord passing through a dancer’s mid-region… The images are sculptural, kinetic and surreal. They etch themselves like branding irons into the brain! It is rare to find such striking clarity in contemporary dance that sticks in memory.

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ROGER HALL’S ROBIN HOOD THE PANTOMIME 2015: The more things change …
Circa One, Wellington
Directed by Susan Wilson
Music and Lyrics by Paul Jenden and Michael Nicholas Williams
Musical Direction by Jane Keller and Oliver Devlin
Choreography by Sacha Copland
- reviewed by John Smythe

The Hoods are in the ’hood again. Last year it was that Red Riding Hooded girl; this year her outlawed cousin Robin returns t0 Circa Theatre in Roger Hall’s Robin Hood to spin us into ‘The Pantomime Whirl’.

Reincarnated from the 2010 version, its still-relevant satire is richly endowed with astute topical updates.

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WIDOWS: Grim and very powerful
The Dark Room, Cnr Pitt and Church Street, Palmerston North
by Ariel Dorfman
Directed by Lilicherie McGregor
Music by Rob Thorne and Vikki Clayton
Diploma in Performing Arts at UCOL graduation production
- reviewed by John Ross

In the rural valley this river flows through, the ‘widows’ of men who have been ‘disappeared’, the ‘desaparacedos’, survive. These men, one and all – husbands, fathers, brothers, sons – have been abducted by the soldiers serving a tyrannical, murderous military dictatorship, and all knowledge as to what has happened to them has been denied to these women.

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MARY POPPINS: Honours the story’s magically restorative powers
The Court Theatre, Bernard Street, Addington, Christchurch
The Court Theatre Production of Disney and Cameron Mackintosh’s Broadway Musical
based on the stories of P.L. Travers & The Walt Disney Film
Directed by Ross Gumbley & Stephen Robertson
Musical Direction by Richard Marrett
Choreography by Stephen Robertson
- reviewed by Naomi van den Broek

For an Edwardian heroine, Mary Poppins is modern, uncompromising and has a philosophy that still resonates with a modern audience almost 100 years later. This opening night performance at The Court Theatre is a joyous celebration of this wonderful literary icon, and the impact that one person is able to have on the lives of those around them.

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CROSSINGS: Youthful exuberance fills theatre with joy
Raye Freedman ARTS CENTRE, Gillies Avenue (Cnr Silver Road) Epsom, Auckland
Choreographers; Katie Burton, Michael Parmenter, Sarah Foster-Sproull, Tim Podesta, Ross McCormack & James Vu Anh Pham and Okareka Dance Company,
- reviewed by Jenny Stevenson

In Sarah Foster-Sproull's Image Test 3: Entanglement... extraordinary images of elongated arms appear and re-appear as a central figure seems to reach out and enfold everyone else, closing them inwards into a protective circle. It is a powerful manifestation of the obvious collaborative practice of these dancers.

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PAPER CHAINS AND BLACK HOLES: Rigorous interrogation required?
BATS Theatre, Studio, 1 Kent Tce, Wellington
Written and performed by Andrew Clarke
- reviewed by John Smythe

The trouble is Andrew Clarke, in his early twenties I’m guessing, doesn’t have much to account for. He has a charming personality, a facility with words, a relaxed and affable manner … Fifty minutes in his company is a pleasant experience.

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CROSSINGS: Worthy of showcasing
Raye Freedman ARTS CENTRE, Gillies Avenue (Cnr Silver Road) Epsom, Auckland
Choreographers; Katie Burton, Michael Parmenter, Sarah Foster-Sproull, Tim Podesta, Ross McCormack & James Vu Anh Pham and Okareka Dance Company,
- reviewed by Bernadette Rae

Reece Adams and Rodney Tyrell exhibit a burgeoning choreographic skill in their Seethe for seven dancers. The work begins darkly, lit by suspended lanterns. Elson, Geary, Lydia Connolly-Hiatt, Cushla Roughan, Sione Fataua, Reghis Malonzo and Taniora Motutere smoulder in the etched gloom, then from that subterranean place erupt into a passionate creation that would grace any of the city’s main stages – and beyond. It is skilful, sophisticated and a totally honest and heartfelt statement from a group of emergent talent.

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*NZSD GRADUATION SEASON 2015: A real graduation gala
Te Whaea National Dance and Drama Centre, 11 Hutchison Rd, Newtown, Wellington
Choreographers: Marius Petipa, Thomas Bradley, Sarah Foster-Sproull, George Balanchine, Kuik Swee Boon, Sir Kenneth MacMillan
Costumier: Donna Jefferis
- reviewed by Deirdre Tarrant

The standout work of the night is Sarah Foster-Sproull's Forgotten Things. Grotesquely beautiful and compelling images unnerve and mesmerise as this extraordinary choreography to equally extraordinary music by Andrew Foster manipulates both physical and mental senses. The futility of much of the experience of humanity comes to mind in a plethora of haunting images formed by flesh and bones as core figures are pulled from the group and returned .Referencing all those things in life that spit us out and suck us in, the movement is invigorating, inventive and bordering on the surreal. A compelling work that totally enthralls at the same time as it sets challenges on the dark side in the back of our minds.

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

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