Rachael Bloom: Death, let me do my show, Lucille Lortel theatre, September 6-30

 Rachel Bloom's hit TV show "Crazy Ex Girlfriend" brought her to wide attention - a contempory romcom with a strong musical background, it featured Bloom frequently singing songs about modern issues in lust, love, and professional womanhood. With songs like "Let's generalize about men", "the sexy getting ready song" and "I have friends", she took a hilarious modern woman's approach to a genre that could be simplistic and reductive, and delighted a cult audience.

Now, in her first solo show since Covid, she claims she's going to just do a light fluffy show full of silly pleasant songs. But as the ttile suggests, more is going on here, as some of her experiences from the last few years refuse to be carefully packaged away in joke form. 

This is definately a solo comedy show with a few twists in its tail, and it's difficult to realy get into the meat of the show without giving away some of these twists. But it's not a spoiler to say, yes, some of the show does involve dealing with how a young aetheist deals with the spectre of death as part of life, given personal losses and the potential for further losses. It rounds out into a conclusion that is simultaneously ridiculous and deeply moving, and Bloom performs throughout in a style that is simultaneously welcoming and completely controlling of the evening. It's a deeply personal show, heartfelt and honest, and is performed immaculately throughout. If ever she tours anywhere near where you are, catch her, she's charming, delightful, intelligent and witty. 

Hadestown, Maria Isaacs, Dale Frazier, Hunter Arnold, Tom Kirkaday et al, Walter Kerr Theatre, Currently selling to June 16 2024 and on tour

 "Hadestown" pulls a story from ancient Greek myth straight into a modern telling, using the Orpheus and Eurydice story to tell of love, loss, art, practicality, power, and tragedy - a purely theatrical telling of a myth, embracing its familiarity in a tribute to storytelling and its metaphorical power.

Anais Mitchell's score starts with a strong New Orleans trombone riff and maintains in that style as Lillas White as Hermes introduces the players and the world - the boy composer, the lost young woman, the god of the underworld, his party-girl wife and the three fates, guiding everyone. Rachel Hauck's scene design resembles a low-down bar with everyone gathered to have a good time, to tell old tales - with some risers around for the 8-piece band to sit in that also gives a little bit of a greek-ampitheatre look. As the story continues and boy meets girl, the risks of poverty grow and the temptations of escape increase,  Rachel Chavkin's production builds in intensity til everything heads straight to the titular destination. 

Winner of 8 tony awards in 2019 and running (covid interrupted) ever since, in its current incarnation (with four of the lead five cast members recast) it's holding strong and powerful as one of the best shows on broadway - an emotional, musical and visual feast. White in the role of Hermes absolutely makes it her own (the role has previously been cast as, and is understudied by, males, but with White in the role there's no doubt she's perfect for it). Reeve Carney, who's been playnig the role of Orpheus since the beginning of the run, gives the role a delicate power, almost semi-autistic in the way his concentration on his art cuts him off from the dangers around him. Solea Pfeiffer has a tough-front-but-deep-emotional power behind her as a young woman tormented by the fates. Phillip Boykin oozes power and confidence up until the point where the front cannot be kept up as Hades. And Betty Who gives party-girl Persephone depth and emotional power as it seems the party may get cut-off for her. 

There's no definate plans for this show to come to Australia any time soon, though it is touring in the US and also is planning a UK return in the near future. But if it comes here it's absoultely a show to catch and be bewitched by again - a powerful telling of an old myth in ways that are absolutely modern, impressive and strong. 

Colleen McCulloch's Tim, Christine Dunstan Productions, The Q, 25-26 August (and subsequent season at Riverside Theatre Paramatta Aug 30-Sep 2 - to tour further in 2024)

Colleen McCulloch is one of the more eclectic Australian novelists - starting with this suburban romance, moving onto the epic mad passions of "The Thorn Birds", moving onto a wartime romance in "An Indecent Obsession", the religious-sci-fi meld "A Creed for the Third Millenium" an 8 book series chronicling Roman History around the rise of Julius Caesar into the collapse of Antony and Cleopatra, and five mystery novels. It all began almost 50 years ago with this romantic drama about an older professional woman and her relationship with her gardner, as it grows from a simple friendship to something much more entwining as she begins to be caught up in his life and his potential future. 

There's a lot of hotbutton issues here - even more so as Tim McGarry has updated the novel into 2023 - our heroine, once a personal assistant to a mining executive, is now a mining executive, and as issues of caring emerge we get discussions of the NDIS and its possibilities - but it's still fundamentally the same May-December romance where Tim's open, positive nature affects Mary's solid, professional demeanour in ways that take her and us completely by surprise. The messy family dynamic of a group built around caring for one member comes to light as the various members try to help and protect Tim, and it becomes clear how they are not the same thing. 

Darren Yap directs with attention foremost on the performances, on building and developing the complex relationships as the characters get more entwined. James Browne's set is surprisingly grand for a touring show, using a large sweeping screen, a wall of foliage and a small revolve to move us around various homes and locations smoothly and beautifully. 

Jeanette Cronin has played a great array of tough, strong women, and relishes the chance to play a character gobsmacked by how deeply she's fallen in love, in the most beautiful of ways. Ben Goss as Tim is beautful in his sweet nature and vulnerability, arousing the protective instinct in the entire audience. Valerie Bader is always a great presence and steals every scene she's in as Mary's lusty neighbour, while also bringing warmth as Tim's mother. Andrew McFarlane builds our affection as Tim's dad - his quiet-spoken affection feeling slightly controlling until you realise later in the play how deeply his caring goes. Julia Robertson plays Tim's sister as a character whose protective nature manifests in all the ugliest ways they do within families - it's a brittle character but she lets us see the heart behind the wall. Akkeshy Caplash plays three smaller roles giving them each individual vibes - scoring best, perhaps, as Mary's friend in the caring industry Raj, who's allowed to be a bit more than just an exposition magnet.

This is a very accomplished, beautiful show, largely worth it for the sheer joy of seeing Cronin in a defining role, showing off her warmth and her toughness, and to get involved in a complexly emotional story where things are allowed to be left with a little bit of messiness. 

You Can't Tell Anyone, Canberra Youth Theatre, Courtyard Studio, Canberra Theatre Centre, August 10-20

 

Joanna Richards' play is the best premiere work I've seen from Canberra Youth Theatre, a thriller with a lot going on underneath the surface as 8 teens, mostly in that period between Year 12 and beginning University, gather for one final party, and find themselves drawn into a brutal game that they can't escape from. There's a real sense that Richards knows these characters intimately and has thought about what makes them tick, and about how to push them up against each other to maximum effect as they push buttons they shouldn't, cascading crises and tensions higher and higher. Richards has been a powerful stage presence in the past as an actor, and she now shows powerful skills as a writer, giving all the cast strong engaging roles to play in the drama. There are some familiar elements here (you can spot one device from Stoppard, and another from Bunel), but they're combined in a way that feels new and invigorating. 

Director Caitlin Baker manages the complex play with aplomb, as the story switches focus across the group, including multiple simultaneous conversations across the stage as the group divides and recombines, without ever losing focus or lessening the tension.  There's a real sense of lived-in-character performances from the entire cast - making everybody immediately recongisable yet complex, with multiple motivations going on.She brings out all the strengths in Richards' script and serves the work very well. 

Ella Buckley is transformed from her charmingly quirky performances in such plays as "Crimes of the Heart" and"Brighton Beach Memoirs" to play the tense, driven Gwen to perfection. Jessi Gooding absolutely suits the role of the deeply thoughtful, questioning, sweet-natured but willing to bite back Willa. Lachlan Houen steals laughs with every line as the dry, standoffish Benny but is also able to invest deeply when things get emotional. Breanna Kelly is a sweet presence as the friend who's left but is able to bring the darkness when required. Emily O'Mahoney's youth and sibling rivalry pushes all the right buttons as the drama accumulates around her and ultimately captures her. Isaiah Pritchard makes a character who could be an unappealing caricature into something much more engaging, his surface goofiness giving way to pain with aplomb. Jake Robinson pushes the malleable Jeremy into increasing stresses as he's required to adjust to the escalating circumstances again and again. And Paris Scharkie as the edgy Kat knows when to bring the vulnerability when it comes through. 

This is one of the best two new plays I've seen this year, tying with David Finnegan's "Scenes from the Climate Era" - it shows a group of new talents playing as well and as strongly as any of the more established performers I've seen this year, and it's absolutely great theatre. Well worth catching if you can. 

Jailbaby, Griffin Theatre Company, Stables Theatre, 7 July-19 August

 Suzie Miller's Griffin follow-up to "Prima Facie" is another look at how the legal system mistreats people, this time a young first-time prisoner caught up in something he barely understands, only realising what's coming after it's too late to do anything about it. The wider focus of this narrative compared to "Prima Facie"s direct spotlight means this feels a little more rambling, widening the perspective to show how things could have gone differently if our protagonist was wealthy rather than poor, how the good intention of a well-meaning witness mean nothing, and how the systems set up to protect our protagonist barely seem to work. There's a mounting tension as it's increasingly clear how over-his-head protagonist has set himself up for. 

Andrea James' production uses the small stage of the Griffin well to tell the story, using a trio of actors playing multiple roles from parents to cops to lovers, doctors, family, and police, using a simple institutional set using some large mirrors to allow for a greater range of angles onstage than is usually available. It's a tight, expertly drillled production that mounts in tension to some truly brutal moments, allowing Miller's words to tell the story and not overloading the show with flashy devices. 

Anthony Yangoyan plays the young man at the centre of the play - the show uses his first-person perspective throughout to drive the action, and Yangouan keeps the character just the right side of naivety - the character makes several bad decisions throughout the evening but we never feel he's unrealistically dumb. He also switches into an alternate role as another young man, to illustrate how the law treats the privileged versus the underprivileged, and it's a tribute to Yangoyan that this doesn't feel as blindly schematic as it might - he creates two distinct personas that he can (as in the climax) switch betwen at will. Lucia Mastrantone and Anthony Taufa play everyone else, switching between various institutional roles as characters who offer to help or to further endanger our protagonist - Mastrantone gets the best of this material as a woman realising the limitations and effects of her own role in participating in the justice system, but both performers deliver with power.

This isn't the masterwork that "Prima Facie" was, and it can feel in the after-effect a little too diffuse and unfocussed - but it's a powerful night in the theatre provoking a lot of thoughts about the effects of our system of justice in a confronting way. If it doesn't quite capture lightning in a bottle the way "Prima Facie" did, it's still an effective evening. 

On the Beach, Sydney Theatre Company, Ros Packer Theatre, 8 July-12 August

 

Nevil Shute's 1957 novel tells a very much of-its-time apocalypse, as isolated people in Melbourne wait for inevitable doom to drift down after a short northern hemisphere nuclear war has left everything irradiated and created a cloud of fallout which is slowly enveloping the earth. Set in the near future of 1963, it's a slow collapse as our characters meet and attempt to reason their way out of their fates. Tommy Murphy and Kip Williams' adaptation keeps it very much in period - the opening image of characters strolling across a beachside on a summers day evokes Max Dupain's photography, and there's care to keep the attitudes very much of the period - these are not characters who would rant against their fate, more quietly breaking inside. Kip Williams gives it a staging that is simultaneously epic enough to fill the Ros Packer stage and simple and beautifully scaled - a multipurpose platform, walls of four white cloths (one of which sweeps towards the audience and away again for scene changes), and a couple of set elements coming in from the flies to represent a periscope or a trellised veranda. It's beautifully paced, to Grace Ferguson's moving score, striking and impressive in its precision.

There's strong work from the performers - Tai Hara as the US commander quietly mourning his wife and assuming his responsibility as one of the last representations of his nation as he drifts into a relationship with Conessa Treffone's young woman eager for experience, Michelle Lee Davidson and Ben O'Toole as the young couple trying to bring up a child in the face of disaster, Matthew Backer as the scientist looking to find escapism away from the truth he already knows, and a number of other performers taking on multiple roles as various other figures finding a dignified way to face their fate. 

It's a very melancholy piece but with great moments of soul and beauty - particularly the final image. This should feel like an oddity - a previous generation's fantasy of doom, superseded by the last 60 years of history, but instead, it feels just as relevant as we see what's been happening in the northern hemisphere this summer and await what will come for us in the next six months or so. It's a thoughtful, reflective piece that reflects its source material well without feeling particualrly retro. 

The Weekend, Belvoir Street Theatre Upstairs, 5 Aug-10 Sept

 Three friends gather at the coastal weekend property of a recently deceased friend, and over the course of a weekend, discover secrets about each other and about the nature of their friendship. As a short plot synopsis, this sounds somewhat familiar - it's a familiar trope in literature to use this kinda post-funeral device to bring people back together, and it's true that the nature of the secrets, when they are revealed, aren't necessarily all that exciting, but there's a building power in Sue Smith's adaptation of Charlotte Wood's novel, particularly as it's brought alive in Sarah Goodes' smooth and stylish production. 

Played out largely on a raised deck designed by Stepehn Cirtis, the three women and the impaired, incontinent dog that accompanies them play out the tensions as it turns out they didn't know their mutual friend nearly as well as they'd hoped, and as they find out details about the past that threaten to shatter their bond - and some very present threats, from the temptation of a new role for the actress (Belinda Giblin) whose most praised role is very much in the past, the isolated academic (Melita Jurisic) trying to care for the dog her friend left behind, or the organised businesswoman (Toni Scanlan) whose brittle contempt for her friends breaks when she needs them most. The observing, bewhildered dog (played in puppet form by Kelia Terencio) is a constant quizzical presence, whether just observing the humans or losing control of his bladder or his stomach. 

This is a rare case of Belvoir serving up something fairly conventional, but they do it pretty well, and the ending brings everything together strongly in an emotional climax that rewards the viewing. audience. It's touching and heartfelt and a beautiful evening.