MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA THEATER REVIEWS

The problem with GENESIS TO BROADWAY is how interesting its proposition is. You find yourself leaning forward, wanting to know more when a particular anecdote is shared, only for it to be replaced by another brief story - like a medley where your favourite song is cut off that moment too soon....

5 Pound Theatre's production, 2 short Russians, opened this week at the Owl and The Pussycat. Act 1 opens with Maksym Kurochkin's Vodka Fucking and Television. In this play Hero, played effectively by young up and coming actor Jack Beeby has to decide whether vodka (Susannah Frith) fucking (Clare Ca...

The new stage musical KING KONG begins previews tonight for an exclusive season at the Regent Theatre in Melbourne, Australia, with an official opening night of June 13. As BroadwayWorld previously reported, the show is already casting its eye towards Broadway, with a hopeful launch as early as 2014...

Richard Bean's One Man Two Guvnors has to be one of the funniest plays written to date. It is nonstop hilarity from beginning to end. The show opened in 2011 on the West end, transferred to Broadway and has been on an International tour in 2013. With a multitude of musicals opening in Melbourne over...

Legally Blonde opened in Melbourne to a standing ovation that was well deserved for a particularly talented cast . This production is slick. From beginning to end it has everything a musical comedy needs. It's light, camp and fun with a clever score from Laurence O'keefe and Nell Benjamin that combi...

From the opening moments of Bangarra dance theatre's Blak it was obvious there was something magical occurring before us....

Can a production where the performers spend half of their time naked on stage have no climax, no peak? The answer, it turns out is a definitive yes....

On this unseasonably warm night, in this intimate cave of a performance space, the air will soon be ripe with the pungent smell of tomatoes and longing. It turns out the two go well together, unexpectedly, deliciously, when served up in FLESH AND BONE, the latest piece from KAGE Creative Directors a...

The best way to enjoy Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is take someone under 10 with you to see it....

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is an interesting show to define. Part musical, part children's spectacle, it ultimately settles as a big budget pantomime. It is a clever route for Roger Hodgeman to direct this show as its virtually non-existent script does little for both actor and audience. Everything in ...

Cirque du Soleil's latest venture to Australia is with the insect themed OVO, a show celebrating the biodiversity and wonder of the ecosystem and all things that move within in it. The particularly impressive set design by Gringo Cardio opens with a giant inflated OVO (portugese for egg) looming ove...

Four years after first opening in Melbourne, Jersey Boys re-opened last night for a brief return season. The cast is predominately new but the gutsy and moving story of The Four Seasons remains timeless and entertaining as ever....

The eve of the New Year 2013 in Melbourne saw the Australian Premiere of the much-acclaimed drama War Horse. It's no wonder that this play has received such high accolades. This production of War Horse is as unique a drama as Les Misérables is a musical....

Fem Bellling, Andrew Dunne and musical director Warren Wills guide their audience on a journey from the beginning of time through varying musical styles and cultural influences leading to the great white way. The show provides few highlights with wills' arrangements and virtuoso accompaniment being ...

The wafting sounds of Christmas Carols in the foyer pre performance set the tone for what was to be a beautiful performance by a wonderful craftsman. As Charles Dickens, Phil Zachariah takes us on a journey through four staves, three ghosts and protagonist Scrooge. Zachariah embodies and portays eve...

None of the actors on the stage looked comfortable at last nights second instalment of 5pounds of Repertory Theatre, Sally...the musical. Precisely because it was a musical and the cast and director Celeste Cody were exposed to the challenges of the genre. It's understandable as well, because even t...

Opening 5pound theatres repertory season last night was Daniel Lammin's adaptation of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion. Lammin's adaptation is a feature of this performance with the 90 minute one act version managing to tell an often drawn out story in a particularly succinct and stylish way. Coupl...

The bland MIDI tracked 'overture' that opened More Sex Please We're Seniors gave an indication that none of Peter Sullivan's songs were going to be memorable. They were, however, particularly memorable for one reason; being musically and lyrically feeble. The script by Jon-Michael Howson is boring ...

The Laramie project, written by Moises Kaufman and members of the Tectonic Theatre Project, is a play that has been particularly overdone since its opening in Denver in 2000. In part because it deals with real human responses to the tragic beating and subsequent death of Matthew Shephard and in par...

In 1962, the original production of A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum was struggling in its off broadway try out. Audiences were not turning up and so producer Hal Prince hired director Jerome Robbins to come in and offer some advice to the creative team. Robbins biggest influence in th...

Promises promises is a 'musical' of two halves. I say 'musical' loosely as it is more a play with songs that don't particularly enhance the story. On top of this Burt Bacharach's score never reaches any great soaring heights, it is more a commentary of the action taking place. Its highlight is Tur...

Trevor Ashley returns to the Arts Centre in his riorous four hander Fat Swan. The writing is some of the most wickedly funny, sharp, edgy work to be presented on an Australia stage and is performed to perfection by Ashley himself, along with Genevieve Lemon, Brendan Moar and Danielle Barnes....

Sport and theatre collide in this biographical depiction of AFL legend Ron Barassi written by Tee O'Neill and directed by Terence O'Connell. The play is long...too long, with very little conflict to keep you interested. The cast tries hard and is aptly led by Jane Clifton as narrator, Melba, a fanat...

There is a rare kind of production where each element is so in synch, so finely tuned that this particular production eclipses other casts, other interpretations, and goes on to be considered a defining moment in the history of that show, and indeed of musical theatre itself. The current Australian ...

5Pound Theatre's Jason Cavanagh directs his original work Kiss Them All Soundly, an Into The Woods esq look at the darker, grittier side of three re-imagined nursery rhymes. Cavanagh delves into the realm of fantasy versus reality, digging into the sub-conscious of four famous childhood characters, ...