David Fick - Page 12

Drugs are bad, yo. And sex? It'll ruin your life. These are just two of the life lessons to be learned in the gauchely naive BEAUTIFUL WRECKAGE, a new pop-rock musical written and performed by Grant Jacobs and Liam McDermott

CANNIBAL COUNTRY, a new physical theatre drama written by Alex McCarthy, made its bow at the Alexander Bar and Cafe's Upstairs Theatre this week. The timing is opportune, with protests at the University of Cape Town, of which McCarthy is a graduate, once again seeing emotions run high in both the mainstream and social media.

The latest entry in the tradition of FRANKENSTEIN parody and satrire is local theatre-maker Callum Tilbury's DOCTOR GODENSTEIN'S MAN, starring Wessel Pretorius and Ameera Conrad in a production directed by Byron Bure at the Galloway Theatre.

A revival of the iconic South African children's television show, BANGALORY TIME, adults are able to bring their children and grandchildren to enjoy fondly BANGALORY'S BACK and create some new fans at the same time.

Theatre criticism, they say, is in crisis. Follow the news feed of any theatre practitioner on any social media platform, and chances are that an impassioned debate will arise on the subject at some point. BroadwayWorld Contributing Editor David Fick takes a look at nature of criticism, its relevance and place in contemporary society and the ability of critics themselves to perceive the theatrical act.

EVERY BEAUTIFUL THING is a bittersweet microcosm of the human experience. It is in grappling with these two sisters' encounter that elusive thoughts rise to the surface about what lies behind the artifice of one's own life. Beautiful pain. Finding one in the other is our only hope.

Some three decades after its first premiere, LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS still delivers on its promise to be an enjoyable romp for its audiences. In this production, there is a great deal of fun to be had in the kind of musical that offers only the slightest commentary on the world around us - 'whatever they offer you, don't feed the plants' - and mostly expects its viewers to kick back, relax and go along for the ride.

The Fugard Theatre's production of CABARET begins with a perfectly realised moment of theatre. Before long, the magic of that moment wears off, and this production of the classic John Kander, Fred Ebb and Joe Masteroff musical begins to flounder in Matthew Wild's directionless staging of the piece.

The Fleur du Cap nominations are out! Here are some thoughts about the nominees in each of the categories.

ORPHEUS IN AFRICA is all set to be a grand, old-fashioned classic musical in the Rodgers and Hammerstein tradition. Kramer has unearthed a fantastic historical footnote and found the reason that this story deserves to be raised into our consciousness more than a century after Orpheus McAdoo's death in 1900.

Billed as Bailey Snyman's dance interpretation of Andre Carl van der Merwe's novel, MOFFIE sets itself a demanding task in adapting and translating the themes of Van der Merwe's harrowing novel. That's enough to hope that MOFFIE is a piece that earns support so that Snyman and his Matchbox Theatre Collective can develop their work and continue to try and make dance that matters.

Fred Abrahamse's staging of OTHELLO fails to capture the accelerating spiral in which the titular character finds himself on the way to his doom; this OTHELLO is a bland, watered down affair that is, at best, a devastatingly competent reading of the play.

The premiere of SAMSA-MASJIEN in the Baxter Theatre's Flipside venue last week was my second experience of the play. I previously saw the piece at the Klein Karoo Nasionale Kunstefees (KKNK) last year, where it was staged in a hangar on the grounds of the South African National Defence Force, a seemingly infinite space that suited the operatic scope of the production a little better than the relatively more intimate (though still fairly sized) alternative theatre venue at the Baxter Theatre. Nonetheless, SAMSA-MASJIEN remains an intense rendering of and meditation on aging, the nature of dementia, family and compassion.

Penelope Youngleson and Philip Rademeyer's Rust Co-Operative is a theatre collective that does not shy away from controversial and provocative subject matter. The company's new play, NAT, written and directed by Youngleson is a brutal, no-holds-barred look at the reality of the lives of children in disadvantaged communities.

It is the last day of 2014 and this final look at 'six of the best' plays to appear on South African stages finishes up BroadwayWorld's review of the past year's theatre.

The penultimate column in our 2014 South African Theatre Retrospectives deals with musical theatre and opera. Today we celebrate 'six of the best' opera and musical theatre productions from around the country - with two honourable mentions for an outstanding cabaret and revue - having already looked at some of the best plays and dance productions of the year.

2014 is almost over, which means that BroadwayWorld South Africa is in the midst of taking a look back at the past year in theatre. This third column of five in this retrospective series on South African theatre in 2014 raises the curtain on six more of the best plays that have been produced on stages around the country.

2014 is almost done and dusted and as part of a series of five columns that reviews the past year of South African theatre, this second 'six of the best' column serves as an overview of the best South African dance and physical theatre of the past year.

As 2014 speeds along to its final curtain, it is once again time to reflect on some of the theatrical highlights on South Africa's stages over the past 12 months. First up, we have six of the best plays seen in theatres around the country this year.

Compilations usually end up being a bit of a curate's egg, but the format of ANTHOLOGY makes for an invigorating night at the theatre - even if only two thirds of the programme of A CHANGE IN THE WEATHER succeeds at delivering a satisfying theatrical experience.