The World’s Festival. Botanic Park. 11 to 14 March 2016.
As sure as the sun rises every morning, March hails the arrival of the festival season in Adelaide. For lovers of world music Botanic Park is the only place to be and WOMADelaide, The World’s Festival, the party to be at!
Botanic Park will once again be transformed with over 60 performers, guest speakers, workshops, street acts, cultural food vendors and vibrant dance, as well as nearly 100,000 world music lovers from all over Australia and beyond.
Instore for 2016 is first timer to WOMADelaide, Angélique Kidjo, who will be accompanied by a 60 strong Adelaide Symphony Orchestra for a premiere performance of her unique orchestral repertoire. Including the amazing Ifé, a three part orchestral collaboration between Kidjo and Phillip Glass, the one off performance will be an absolute highlight on the festival’s opening night and not to be missed!
Also taking to the stage on opening night are the famed Cat Empire. As WOMAD stalwarts, with three WOMADelaide appearances already under their belt as well as performances in the UK and New Zealand festivals, their presence will definitely be something special.
Guest speaker and globally renown environment scientist, David Suzuki, will be in attendance to give an eco-talk on Saturday, followed by a panel discussion entitled What’s Love Got To Do With It?, with Sir Tim Smit, Indira Naidoo, Amelia Telford and Suzuki examining if winning the battle for our hearts is more important than economics, politics and carbon numbers.
Also appearing for the first time at WOMADelaide is revered South African choir Ladysmith Black Mambazo, who give stirring a cappella performances singing traditional Isicathamiya songs.
There will be a one off Adelaide show by cult heroes the Violent Femmes after a 15 year hiatus; Australian debut performances by Palestinian hip hop act 47SOUL with their "electro-mijwez, shamstep, choubi" sound that synthesises Palestinian debka music with electronic pulse; Sumtuous tempered ballads and fizzing electronic pop songs from American singer-songwriter John Grant who will plumb dark, penetrating spaces with his self-effacing lyrics; and a major site installation in the form of Sacrilege, an interactive, life-sized inflatable replica of Stone Henge measuring 34 metres long and 5 metres high!
The UK’s Mercury Prize nominated and politically charged electronic act Asian Dub Foundation will make their WOMADelaide debut on closing night in a sound sphere where raga meets sitar, dub meets bhangra, and punk rock meets hip-hop. Also the eight-piece New York ensemble Hazmat Modine will transform 1920s American music into 21st century verve like a cocktail of Tom Waits and gypsy-flavoured tinpan alley blues.
All the usual festival delights will be there including Taste The World, the Global Village, Womade, and the Healing Village. Acrojou will roll their elaborate circular house around the park unfurling a curios narrative tale which blends acrobatics and their amazing hand built structure, while Fair Play Comedy will delight festival crowds with their walkabout show featuring dancing prawns, animated octopuses and a worrying seafood smoothie!
There is set to be some fervent debate in the Planet Talks with discussions about off-the-grid innovation and activism in Off The Grid Game Changers; the future of clean and green economic development in a climate constrained world in A Green Growth Economy; and a discussion about science, communication, misinformation and debunking science skeptics with Dr Karl, Naomi Oreskes and Professor Tanya Monro in Should We Trust Scientists?.
WOMADelaide and independent Adelaide-based label Pilot Records are teaming up to bring more fresh electronic sounds to Speakers Corner to chill out or fire up before the DJ sets. Performers include Datãkae, Mortisville vs The Chief, Problems, and Zeequil.
The KidZone will also feature plenty of interactive events for the little ones including cool activities, immersive theatre, science discoveries, storytelling, dress ups, face painting, bouncy things and much more. There will be multiple opportunities to see amazing performances over the 4 day festival, with a timetable of events available online at womadelaide.com.au.
The Barefoot Review has been at WOMADelaide for many years, capturing the highlights, celebrating the performances, interviewing the artists and previewing the festival! In 2015 we had the great pleasure of capturing a day of the event on film, so be sure to check out our WOMADelaide experience and don’t miss the festival, this March, under the Morton Bay Figs at Botanic Park!
Paul Rodda
When: 11 to 14 Mar
Where: Botanic Park, Adelaide
Bookings: womadelaide.com.au
WOMADelaide experience
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dchWlrcS1qA&feature=youtu.be
CREDITS:
Video Production, Editing, Direction - Chris Daniels, Chris Daniels Productions
Presenter, Camera Assistant, Assistant Direction - Paul Rodda, The Barefoot Review
The Adelaide Critics Circle awards were again held at the University of Adelaide's Little Theatre this year with an excellent crowd in attendance. The awards, which took place on Monday 7th of December, are now in their 18th year. Members of the arts community, supporters, friends and family all turned out to learn who the winners for 2015 would be.
The Adelaide Critics Circle has faced a few funding challenges in the past 2 years, particularly with the withdrawal of funding by Arts SA at the end of 2013, and this year only managed to confer the awards, with the cash prize, due to the support of the Independent Arts Foundation (IAF) and the generous support of other individual donations.
Presented by the ACC Chair, Peter Burdon, the audience heard how the funding challenges had meant the well-known trophy, designed and created by Christine Pyman, was no longer financially viable. Burdon continued by acknowledging the generous donors for the cash prizes, but admitted that the amount had been reduced by fifty percent due to the challenges of fundraising. Despite this reduction the awards remain the only ones in Australia to be accompanied by a cash prize and, with $500 going to Professional categories and $250 to the Amateur/Community category, still represents a huge boost for the recipients.
The winners of the awards for 2015 were:
Group Award – Amateur & Community Theatre
University of Adelaide Theatre Guild - Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf
Individual Award – Amateur & Community Theatre
Julie Quick, actor - Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf: University of Adelaide Theatre Guild
Professional Group Award
Brink Productions - The Aspirations of Daise Morrow
Professional Individual Award
Michelle Ryan, dancer - Intimacy: Body Torque
Emerging Artist of the Year
Elena Carapetis, writer - The Good Son: The Other Ones
Independent Arts Foundation Award for Innovation
Zephyr Quartet - Music for Strings and iThings
Visual Arts - Emerging Artist
Julia McInerney
Lifetime Achievement Award
Michael Fuller
Critic, Michael Morely delivered an empassioned, well-recieved, speech in the absense of Michael Fuller, who was unable to attend due to health reasons.
With ongoing support from the community and the plan to incorporate in the New Year, the Adelaide Critics Circle is confident in its plans to continue into the foreseeable future.
Critic, Ewart Shaw also made a personal plea on behalf of his media outlet, Radio Adelaide, for support in the face of potential closure. Attendees and award winners were encouraged to have their photo taken with the banner #SAVEradAD to show support for Radio Adelaide and help guarantee its future.
Paul Rodda
When: 7 Dec
Where: The Little Theatre
Photography by Paul Rodda
Adelaide Festival Centre 2016 Season. 4 Nov 2015
OzAsia Festival, Guitar Festival, Adelaide Cabaret Festival, Adelaide Festival of Arts, inSPACE and Jerry Hall in The Graduate. This set of marquee events is well known. Jerry Hall you ask incredulously? (Good. You're paying attention.) Yes, Adelaide Festival Centre is presenting her as Mrs Robinson in 2016. The fact that the Adelaide Festival Centre is involved directly in these events, or via partnerships, is also well known. There's this sense the AFC is not only a building where exciting stuff happens, but once again a place where exciting stuff is created.
Back in the day, 1995 to be precise, the Adelaide Festival Centre (AFC) launched its World Theatre 1996 programme: A programme containing within it the best theatre Australia and overseas could offer. It was the culmination of an era in which the identity of the Adelaide Festival Centre as a producer/co-producer was clear and strong alongside its many partners and competitors nationally and locally. The AFC held its own as a recognised creative cultural identity rather than just a mere building in which work was shown.
How? Branding, brand development and identity: They're marketing terms and promotional practices central to getting the general public to remember a logo, associate it with a company name, what that company does and what product it produces. Consistently good product ensures not just good sales, but reinforces reputation and strong cultural identity and capital. The AFC mix then, was spot on.
Twenty years later, a slew of political, financial, infrastructure, cultural changes and difficult challenges have significantly impacted on the Adelaide Festival Centre, particularly from the late 90s to the mid 2000s. When Douglas Gautier, AFC CEO and Artistic Director took on running the organisation, he confessed to me in an interview published by dB Magazine in 2008 he was initially "not confident" about the company of which he was about to take the reins.
Since 2008, Gautier has led AFC out of debt, and rebuilt the organisation and its brand from something ‘old’, moribund and debt-ridden into something once again vibrant, alive and ‘new’. Straight after the Welcome to Country address, the AFC 2016 Season launch kicked off with a video address from Gautier. Reflective and wide ranging, Gautier’s address detailed the building’s rich history, the artists and big names it has hosted, and recent developments that have seen record numbers drawn to not just the building, but the newly landscaped surrounds as well.
Gautier's theme was clear: the AFC is again a cultural hub, a people's place, a collaborator, an innovator willing to lend its expertise, through creative and commercial partnerships, to both South Australian artistic companies and those further afield. Video interview spots at the AFC launch with staff including Programmers, Box Office, Head Chef and House Supervisor showed guests the sense of genuine humanity and passion at the core of the grand AFC edifice within which they work.
All this served to frame Director of Programming Liz Hawkins' peppy presentation of the 2016 season in a context putting more focus on 'AFC creates'. The AFC did create the marquee festivals mentioned above. It did put finance and resources towards commercial and in-development works. It is still innovating across markets and genres, as the new Onstage school holiday programme demonstrates. So flicking through the AFC 2016 Programme, you not only get tasty teasers for Festivals yet to announce full programmes; you also get an overview of what the ‘AFC makes, made and supported'.
Adelaide Cabaret Festival lovers can look forward to Tom Burlinson performs Sinatra in The Sands, or go for Starman: A Show with the music of David Bowie by Sven Ratzke.
Guitar Festival fans have the Wolfgang MuthSpiel Trio to look forward to if their passion is jazz, as well as guitarist Karin Schaupp and actor director Tama Matheson's production of Don Juan, in which solo guitar compositions by Turina, Pujol, and more intertwine with Lord Byron's tale. Keen followers of the inSPACE programme have Larissa McGowan's Mortal Condition waiting to ask them the intriguing question: What would their avatar look like, if they could choose to construct it from every part of themselves? Australian Ballet devotees will be well excited that productions of Swan Lake and Nijinsky are coming to the AFC next year. And there's so much more. Is your wee tacker a fan of Judith Kerr's book, The Tiger who Came to Tea? Well get excited now: A musical play adaptation of the classic tale will be here in January 2016.
David O'Brien
More information available online: adelaidefestivalcentre.com.au
Company. The Hills Musical Company. Nov 2015
For actors Jessica Rossiter and Jonathan Knoblauch, playing the roles of Amy and Paul in Company is like a case of art imitating life… imitating art!
The onstage couple, Amy and Paul, are engaged to be married. Offstage Jess and Jonathan were dating, until Jonathan popped the question!
“It’s been a bit surreal really!” declares Jess.
“How often do you get to play opposite your partner, whilst playing an engaged couple onstage and offstage…!”
For Jonathan, the mid-scene proposal was a strategy to catch Jess off guard.
“Jess is rather hard to surprise” he says.
“She’d never guess that I’d do that at a rehearsal.”
It all happened just after their main song together when Jess’s character Amy is supposed to interrupt with a lengthy monologue. Instead, Jonathan dropped to one knee and asked for her hand. The whole thing was captured on film and has since racked up and impressive 4,300 views.
“It’s been great for publicity” laughs Jess.
The show, which opens at the end of the week, will be the first performance of Sondheim’s Company in Adelaide for 16 years.
Company is a 70s musical, with a timeless message. It tells the story of bachelor, Robert, and his three girlfriends April, Marta, and Kathy. Crucially, Robert is afraid of commitment and sees only the negatives in the relationships of his friends, a string of couples called Sarah and Harry, Susan and Peter, Jenny and David, Amy and Paul and Joanne and Larry.
“I feel so lucky to be part of such a talented group of people” says Jess of her fellow cast members.
“I love watching them every night; they are all very funny and very clever”.
For Jonathan, Company is a first foray into musical theatre.
“There’s nothing like a baptism of fire,” says Jess, referencing the difficulty of Sondheim for a musical theatre novice.
“It brings me back to my high school days,” Jonathan continues. “I used to be in ensembles and choirs.”
Behind the scenes of the production is another couple. The show's director Fiona DeLaine is married to its musical director Mark De Laine.
“Fiona has got a really great take on it” says Jess.
“She is pushing a few conventional boundaries in the show.”
“She gave us scrapbooks and encouraged us to write things in there that reminded us of our characters. We also had one-on-ones and did character profiles.
“We had a really great time putting that profile together… obviously we live together, so whenever we’ve got free time [we] look at Company.”
In the play, Amy is neurotic and prone to wedding day jitters and Paul has learnt to put up with her manic spells.
“I definitely hope I’m not as neurotic as Amy” Jess laughs,
“She’s a nutbag who just flies off the handle.”
The cast of 14 incorporates some old faces but many new ones, for Jess.
“It’s a new company for me with lots of new people,” she explains.
“My favourite thing about theatre was always the new friendships that are formed.”
“It’s [also] great being part of a small group, everyone has important roles… they are equals”
Company is a concept musical. It doesn’t have a linear plot but rather jumps around between short vignettes, all tied together by the celebration of Robert’s 35th birthday. In these vignettes his married friends explain the pros and cons of taking on a spouse.
“All the couples should be couples that you recognise in your everyday life,” says Jess.
“You should be able to see yourself in them or someone else you know.
“It is very human, very relatable, very intelligent, and very funny.”
The Hills Musical Company will perform Company as their November production.
The show opens at the Stirling Community Theatre on Friday the 6th of November and closes on the 21st.
Bookings can be made online at hillsmusical.org.au/tickets/.
Paul Rodda
When: 6 to 21 Nov
Where: Stirling Community Theatre
Bookings: hillsmusical.org.au
Superb cast announced for Australian Premiere.
The Producers of Ghost The Musical have today announced that after an exhaustive casting process by Tony Award-winning director Matthew Warchus, a superb cast has been assembled. The supernatural power of love will explode onto the Australian stage on 7 January 2016 headed by Rob Mills as ‘Sam Wheat’, Jemma Rix as ‘Molly Jensen’ (Wicked fans will be overjoyed), Alex Rathgeber as ‘Carl Bruner’ (direct from his Helpmann Award Winning performance in Anything Goes) and introducing remarkable British theatrical and television actress Wendy Mae Brown as ‘Oda Mae Brown’ (the role made famous by Whoopi Goldberg).
Matthew Warchus, director of Matilda, and Australian born choreographer Ashley Wallen, Kylie Minogue’s personal choreographer, are delighted to announce that the Australian tour cast also includes, Ross Chisari as Willie Lopez; Blake Appleqvist, David Denis, Nicholas Eaton, Xander Ellis, Simon Fairweather, Samantha Hagen, Childi Mbakwe, Joshua Mulheran, Justine Puy, Elenoa Rokobaro, Monique Salle, Drew Weston as well as Lydia Warr and Evette White direct from the US and Asian tour productions.
Set in modern day New York City, Ghost The Musical is a timeless fantasy about the power of love. Walking back to their apartment one night after a romantic dinner, Sam and Molly are mugged, leaving Sam dead on a dark street. Sam is trapped as a ghost between this world and the next and unable to leave Molly, whom he learns is in grave danger. With the help of Oda Mae, a phony storefront psychic, Sam tries to communicate with Molly in the hope of saving and protecting her.
Nominated for an Academy Award for Best Film in 1990, Ghost became a blockbuster hit and an instant classic, winning numerous awards worldwide. The film starred Patrick Swayze, Demi Moore, Tony Goldwyn and Whoopi Goldberg and was directed by Jerry Zucker. Bruce Joel Rubin’s script won an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and Whoopi Goldberg won the Academy Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role for her portrayal of psychic Oda Mae Brown.
The musical features book and lyrics by Academy Award winner Bruce Joel Rubin and original music and lyrics by Grammy Award-winners, Dave Stewart (half of the multi-Grammy Award-winning Eurythmics) and Glen Ballard (Michael Jackson's Man in the Mirror and Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill). The score also includes the iconic song Unchained Melody, written by Hy Zaret and Alex North and famously performed in the film by The Righteous Brothers.
Employing special effects never before seen in an on-stage musical, Ghost The Musical features an incredible array of illusions; Sam, as a ghost, walks through a solid door; inanimate objects take on a life of their own; spirits ascend to the heavens; subway passengers are thrown in the air; and people disappear and reappear right before your eyes.
Ghost The Musical premiered in Manchester in 2011 before transferring to the West End and later Broadway. It has been enjoyed by over a million people worldwide and nominated for numerous awards including five Olivier Awards and three Tony Awards.
The Adelaide season will run at the Festival Theatre from the 7th to the 31st of January. Bookings can be made through Bass.
ADELAIDE
Venue: Festival Theatre, Adelaide Festival Centre, King William St, Adelaide
Dates: Thursday 7 January to Sunday 31 January, 2016
Press Night Saturday 9 January at 7pm
Times: Evenings: Tuesday 7pm, Wednesday to Saturday 8pm
Matinees: Wednesday 1pm, Saturday 2pm, Sunday 3pm
(Sunday 31 Jan 1pm & 6pm)
Prices: Adults from $74.90 to $129.90, Concession from $64.90 to $99.90
Groups 6+ from $84.90
Transaction and payment processing fees apply
Bookings: BASS 131 246 or bass.net.au
More info: ghostthemusical.com.au
Other national dates:
Regent Theatre, Melbourne from Friday 5 February 2016
Theatre Royal, Sydney from Friday 18 March 2016
Crown, Perth from Saturday 21 May 2016