George Glass Comedy. Gluttony - The Speakeasy. 16 Feb 2018
Falsely advertised as a musical, this workshopped idea has only reached the madcap band play-act stage for George Glass Comedy (GGC) to test on an unsuspecting Fringe audience.
Scientology The Musical is brought to you by the same folk who delivered that excellent and sad indictment, Abbott The Musical, to the Adelaide Festival in 2015, which did very much resemble a musical, in that instance, three-quarters of the way there.
Having said I feel I've been had, there is much to admire in this nascent comedy show. The cult of Scientology, and its enigmatic founder, L. Ron Hubbard, are ripe targets for satire. It's easy to ridicule Dianetics and pooh-pooh it as science fiction, until GGC do a word association game in comparative religion studies, "Q: Slavery and incest (Note: I think they meant paedophilia). A: Christianity." There is much to laugh at and some of the songs are witty in places.
Dressed in creased pseudo-Navy uniforms harking back to Hubbard's dubious career as a US Navy ship commander on the home front in the Pacific itching for action, GGC swung between banter, original satirical songs, and goofy physical comedy, and provided a metaphor for the secret knowledge of Dianetics with the rabbit of Alice in Wonderland.
Nicholas Conway, who played with aplomb the eponymous Tony Abbott in the aforementioned earlier work, played something like the eponymous Gilligan of the famous TV island. Drummer Henry Gazzola played nothing but drums, even refusing to don the requisite Navy duds; it was like he was in another show. Daniel Murnane showed up late for work and did what he had to do. Alister McMichael was less than fetching in a dress while Braden Hamilton was left with the task of explaining everything. They are all exceptionally ordinary musicians.
But wait, there's more. The stage area was too small, and the noise from even more boisterous shows in nearby tents was odiously overwhelming at times. Director Lisa Harper had a lot to answer for. The action was haphazard, the costumes were sloppy, and the sound was fuzzy and indistinct - I could not make out much from Conway's closing two songs. At least I think it was the equipment.
Maybe I got it wrong. Go see the show and audit it yourself; hook it up to the electropsychometer.
David Grybowski
2.5 stars
When: 16 Feb to 4 Mar
Where: Gluttony - The Speakeasy
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
a priori projects. Bakehouse Theatre. 17 Feb 2018
Writer, producer and performer Rowan McDonald could write another show about the near death experience of First Name Unknown. A few weeks before the opening, the other actor in his show bailed, leaving McDonald to re-cut the original 45-minute show to the 30-minute - and consequently overpriced - one-man show currently on offer.
Don't know about the missing fifteen minutes, but it's now nothing as advertised. No exposé of secret dossiers of the CIA, ASIO or [Australian] Border Force agencies, nothing too horrifying to believe, no strong sexual content nor any violence.
But what is on view at The Bakehouse is a little gem. McDonald, an average, white suburban Sydney-sider male, began the show with an imploring recognition of Aboriginal country, then started a total and unrelenting satire, send-up and biting critique of your average white Australian male in such a subtle way you have to laugh at yourself, if you're one of those.
This he did with great charm in three segments. Initially, we see your average male fluoro-vest worker getting ready for the day in silence with a soundtrack describing the behaviour and sexual practice of some species in the wilderness. This voiceover was performed by none other than McDonald himself in a voice and cadence of exacting verisimilitude to David Attenborough. It was priceless.
The soundtrack got suitably cacophonous and confused while our worker was interviewing arrivals at a detention centre. This was followed by a damning appraisal of the state of the arts in Australia due to its male dominance and Euro-centricity. Not hate, but exasperation. Accompanying the action was a fetching light show simply reflected off large plastic sheets hanging off a clothesline (Lexie Condon - lighting operator).
A curious and thoughtful piece of Fringe. One wonder’s what the original work was like?
David Grybowski
2.5 stars
When: 15 to 24 February
Where: Bakehouse Theatre
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
Glam - Global Arts Management Social Change. Live from Tandanya - Tandanya Theatre. 18 Feb 2018
Ingrid Garner has brought her show to the Adelaide Fringe many times before and somehow I have always missed it in the rush. I am so very pleased to see it this year.
Garner brings to the theatre her grandmother's autobiography concerning her experience as a young American girl in Hitler's Germany (as the title suggests, d'oh!). Eleanor, eleven years old and a daughter of parents of German decent, was living an idyllic childhood in a nice house with an apple tree in the US when her father - with appalling judgment and timing - decided to migrate to Berlin for a two-year engineering contract. On the way there, mid-Atlantic, Germany attacks Poland. It's September 1, 1939. The captain changes the colours on the ship's funnel from German to French and then Norwegian to get it safely to Hamburg. In another foolish maneuver, Ingrid's grandfather converted all their US currency to Reichsmarks, thus ensuring they cannot leave. Oma didn't even have an American passport.
That's just the beginning of the story in this endlessly fascinating, heart-rending and superbly performed narrative. Eleanor's father thoughtlessly put the family in peril by hanging an American flag in the window among a sea of swastikas, and got dobbed in to the Gestapo for predicting Germany's defeat in the war. This last action also cost him his job, which presumably was contributing to the war effort in his role as an engineer.
But the Nazis were almost as dangerous as grandfather. Ingrid performs Eleanor's reactions to the Nazi salute, Hitler Youth, discrimination at school (it's a wonder they weren't interned, like the Japanese in Australia), and rationing, followed by bombing, widespread destruction, starving, and Russian occupation. Incredibly, they were unable to leave Germany until 1946.
There are many, many amazing stories of survival. With the surrender of Germany in April, 1945, Eleanor found hope in the renewal of spring time.
Ingrid is a warm and empathetic performer who moves about the stage with grace and elegance and creates a world with two chairs and a wooden trunk. Her growing up from a comfortable adolescent to a young and traumatised teenager is palpable. This is not just a story about living under the Nazis, which was utterly captivating; it is also a story of a family growing together in exceptional circumstances. Slides of the times were a welcome addition of context.
For a person like myself, interested in World War II, this show is a must see. For the rest of you, it's a must see. Bravo!
Note: Ingrid Garner is also appearing in Eleanor's Story: Home Is The Stranger. This sequel to An American Girl In Hitler's Germany recounts her grandmother's experience during her family's assimilation back into American society after the war.
David Grybowski
5 stars
When: 17 Feb to 17 Mar
Where: Live From Tandanya - Tandanya Theatre
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
Adelaide Fringe. Noel Lothian Hall. Joanne Hartstone Presents. 17 Feb 2018
Vince breathes a sigh of relief when an audience member admits he is not up with Greek mythology.
He’ll not be nit-picking this alternative version of Virgil, then. This is to be a loose re-telling of the love story of Orpheus and Eurydice.
And thus does a quiet Fringe gem get started in the award-winning Joanne Hartstone’s snug little theatre space in the Botanic Gardens.
Hartstone, one of the most beloved of our actors, has turned entrepreneur with a full program of eight events in the Noel Lothian Hall.
This one comes from the Flanagan Collective and Gobbledigook of the UK. It is a two-hander, one of whom has just hopped on board for the Adelaide season. That’s Vince Fusco. Like Joanne he is a beloved Adelaide talent.
He is the narrator, reading from a well-worn palimpsest notebook.
Our Orpheus is an Englishman called Dave. His lyre is a guitar.
He’s a big fellow, an actor called Phil Grainger. He shucks off his great big boots and performs in thick winter socks, kicking up his toes from time to time as the mood moves him. He sings sweetly in a voice light and lyrical; not what one expects from such a big man. He sings Springsteen and gentle ditties of love and loss. Now and then he asks the audience to join in.
Fusco reads the narration, smooth, eloquent and unhurried. His voice is kind on the ear.
The audience sits on either side of the performers.
Soon they are swept into that comfortable realm of being told a story, a variation on an old, old, classic story of love and loss and transformation.
This critic was over-walked and jangled arriving at the theatre. She left entirely soothed and at one with the world.
Hence, the judgement is that this whimsical piece of classical storytelling is a little winner.
Samela Harris
4 stars
When: 17 Feb to 4 Mar
Where: Noel Lothian Hall, Botanic Gardens
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
Adela
ide Fringe. The GC. 17 Feb 2018
Max Riebel is a rare bird indeed. He is a classically trained countertenor who is equally at home singing Judy Garland as he is with Henry Purcell and JS Bach!
The Great Pretender is his current show playing out of The German Club for a limited three night season, and its name is styled after the popular song of the same name popularised by The Platters in 1955. But there’s more to the title of the show – it is also about Riebel being chameleon like and holding the countertenor up to any mirror. A singer for all seasons if you will.
Riebel is at home signing from almost any genre. The hour-long performance includes a mix of songs from the baroque era through to contemporary, as well as several baroque pieces played by classical guitarist Ziggy Johnston, who is just superb.
The show has a decidedly melancholy feel to it: the song selection certainly displays Riebel’s vocal agility and musicality, but they are mostly sad and reflective songs, which in turn renders Riebel’s patter somewhat down-beat apart from some off-beat self-deprecating quips that have the audience giggling with delight.
However, the moderately sized audience are there because they knew what they are in for, and they get it – a stunning display of the art of the countertenor, but turned inside out for a totally different experience. Riebel knows how to communicate a song as well, and his operatic singing and acting experience shines through. He inhabits each song.
His performance of Over the Rainbow (of Judy Garland fame) is truly spectacular. Again, without the benefit of program notes, one cannot attribute the arrangement, but suffice to say the melody line and meter is altered in such a way that Riebel’s counter tenor voice imbues the song with such unusual qualities that it is elevated to quite a different level. This song alone is worth the price of admission!
What Power Art Thou (aka the Cold song) from Purcell’s semi-opera King Arthur is also a highlight. Riebel takes a moderate pace and is able to extract resonant tones from the nadir of his register. It is dramatic, imperious and a truly fitting way to end the concert.
Riebel is no pretender, no interloper – he is the real deal.
Recommended.
Kym Clayton
4 stars
When: 17 to 18 Feb
Where: The GC
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au