Shows

Improv is one of my favourite things to watch. Often integrated into the action, the audience becomes one giant sponge, absorbing the adrenaline coursing through the cast as they scramble to make up scenes on the spot. It’s thrilling when things go right and equally so when things go wrong. It’s a communal experience for both its makers and those witnessing their creation: a show that can’t be repeated, will never be seen, again.

When you line up some of the best improvisers in Wellington – in this case, Alayne Dick, Jennifer O'Sullivan, Dianne Pulham, Matt Powell, and Wiremu Tuhiwai, with special guest David Correos from Christchurch – you’re pretty much guaranteed a great night.

Interestingly, the players only take one audience suggestion (the theme, Easter), instead of prompts for each scene. While I’ve seen the latter more often, I prefer the Summer Improv format – without interruptions, the action has more momentum than a bear devouring an entire jar of manūka honey that its flatmates were entitled to two-thirds of. Big shoutout to Tuhiwai here, whose portrayal of a bear that can’t get its scat sorted at home or work is one of the highlights of the night.

Animals – both fictional and real – become a recurring theme. We have the Easter Bunny (but of course), not one but two bears, and the Squirrel Squad – Trash Squirrel, Ocean Squirrel, Air Squirrel, and Forest Squirrel, a gang pictured here that I desperately wanted to assemble again. While I did fight the urge to cry out for a Squirrel Squad encore, the players incorporate many a great hark-back, consistently getting the audience in on the joke.

Just a few more gold nuggets include O’Sullivan’s wise-man Mark, Pulham’s gaslighting mother, Correos’ sober driver, Dick’s incompetent manager, and Powell’s irate flatmate. Matt Hutton’s improvised keyboard soundtrack and Sam Irwin’s snappy lighting transitions tie it all up neatly in a bow befitting for a young girl named Gavin.

Summer Improv is on for one more Friday in January, though I hope to see it become a regular fixture on our stages. It’s certainly earned its place!

Ahh, the Circa pantomime. Giving our favourite fairy tales topsy-turvy topical treatment, these riotous rollercoaster rides have been an annual Christmas tradition for families from Wellington and beyond for nearly two decades.

This year’s pantomime sees writer and director Gavin Rutherford retire as the show’s sassy, saucy Dame after 12 years. Stepping into the kitten heels with grace and gusto is Jthan Morgan as Kahurangi Fairy, a fairy godmother embroiled in an eternal spat with the dastardly Fox (Emma Katene) and her sidekick, Thorndon Key (Tabatha Bertei-Killick). Meanwhile, lonely widower Gepetto (Sepelini Mua’au) finds a hunk of wood, boots out its former resident Willami Wētā (Finley Hughes), and carves a puppet son, Pinocchio (Nī Dekkers-Reihana) – much to the dismay of his cat and wannabe influencer Ms. Claws (Natasha McAllister). And all the while, ‘hee-haws’ echo down the streets of Wellywoodington as donkeys multiply without explanation.

It sounds nuts because it is. But oh boy, I reckon Pinocchio is my favourite pantomime yet. While this show is by no means subtle (in fact it’s still as mad as a whale with a hernia), it does feel more restrained in its approach than past pantos. Rather than colourblind the audience with spectacle, it plays more of a long game, allowing Leary and Rutherford’s references and jokes – not to mention the presumably unscripted adlibs (shoutout to Hughes and Mua’au for the brilliant banter) – to really shine.

The cast is a tight unit, with a recurring gag of talking animals unwittingly enjoying pats (McAllister and Katene) a hilarious highlight. I particularly love the general disdain but secret sentimentality Hughes brings to the role of Willami, Dekkers-Reihana’s defined physicality as a puppet, and Morgan’s inspired interactions with the audience – especially the whispers of “don’t tell anyone”.

Tying it all together are the arrangements of inimitable musical director Michael Nicholas Williams, with bangers and bops bound to appeal to millennials like myself.

Get your lovely friends by your side for a happy conclusion and a measure of magic at Circa Theatre this summer.

If potty-mouthed puppets are your peccadillo, then Avenue Q is for you. Billed as Sesame Street for adults, it’s a musical comedy that tackles racism, homosexuality, homelessness, suicide, and internet porn. It feels contemporary as the issues it traverses haven’t gone away and are arguably more prescient now than they were when the show won a Tony Award in 2004.

The shadow of COVID over Wellington theatre is still a long one and the announcement at the beginning of the performance that the character of real-life former child star Gary Coleman was going to be played by a white guy only added to the comedy.

Wellington Repertory Theatre’s production features an expanded cast of 15 actors and puppeteers, plus an ensemble of five. This allows for some fun choreographed sequences (Melanie Heaphy) that make good use of the extra bodies. The set design (Scott Maxim) of three row houses along the back of the stage offers a variety of spaces for actors and puppets to pop in and out and gives lighting designer Riley Gibson plenty to play with. His backlit drain that gently oozes smoke is a delightful touch.

The cast is a strong one and works seamlessly together, particularly those who operate puppets as a pair. The influence of puppet master Kenny King is in evidence. The puppeteers have clearly learnt his golden rules of keeping their eyes on their puppet and not letting go of them unless they’re dead, which does happen in one hilarious scene.

Vocal performances are mostly strong too. The singers don’t have microphones which occasionally makes it hard to hear them over the backing track, but the balance is generally good. All the singers deserve praise for their enunciation; I could hear every glorious word.

Avenue Q is not for the easily offended or the children in your life, but it’s uproariously funny and this production does an excellent job of bringing it to Wellington.

Having seen Homemade Takeaways performed as a rehearsed reading at Circa Theatre last year, the chance to see a fully fledged production was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up. Much of the cast and crew remain with three of the four main actors reprising their roles. This is a good thing as the quality of performance is top-notch and the actors are demonstrably comfortable within their characters and each other.

Ben Wilson’s comedy-drama set in an unspecified South Island town deservedly won Best New Play at Playmarket’s Playwrights B425 2020 and was shortlisted for the 2021 Adam NZ Playwriting Award. It’s an awkward family Christmas as a Dunedin-based drummer (Dryw McArthur) suddenly uproots his job and city to return to the family home where his recently dumped self-help expert of a sister (Kate Johnstone) is quietly self-destructing. Their young stepmother (Tabatha Pini-Hall), a primary school teacher who is trying to write dark children’s fiction, has recently inherited the house and her 31-year-old, skateboarding, Emma Thompson-obsessed man-child bestie (James Cain) is sleeping on the couch. Overlaying each of their individual traumas is a shared patina of grief for a lost father and husband.

On paper, it seems like a doom-laden mix, but this play is funny with Cain’s character often providing comic relief as the tension builds to a metaphorical and literal storm on Christmas Eve. It’s ultimately uplifting as they somehow manage to make each other feel less alone.

The set (Rosie Gilmore) is unusually fulsome for the BATS stage, with a raised central area that is the kitchen cum living room of a rural house surrounded by fluffy toetoe with a bench outside where the characters retreat to smoke, talk, and attempt skateboard tricks. It’s carefully lit (Bekky Boyce) and the sound design (Maxwell Apse) features appropriately cheesy Christmas music and well-placed sound effects.

All up, this is an excellent show with stellar acting of a great script supported by sharp production values.

After Granny (Elle Wootton) dies, Child (part-puppet, part-Stevie Hancox-Monk) starts to see monsters in the throes of their grief. Specifically, the Griegol, a spooky smoke demon Granny used to tell stories about. Child has a key from Granny, but doesn’t know what it opens. Dad (Paul Waggott) is understandably distrait as he struggles to navigate his own sense of loss and plan a funeral at the same time, so Cat (puppet design by Jon Coddington) pounces in to help, providing clues by sleeping near the locks in the house. Good kitty!  

The Griegol is a play without words that intersperses puppetry and projections, silhouettes and shadows to explore the ever-shifting shape of grief. A black hole of loss and fear, incomprehensible in its magnitude, gives way to acceptance and understanding; dark becomes light as beauty starts to billow from the smoke.

Excuse the excessive alliteration, but innovative, inventive, and integrated really are the best words to describe this production design. Cast members magic up a lot of the action under a camera that transmits a live feed onto a large screen set centre stage (set design by Sylvie McCreanor and Rose Kirkup, technical design by Brad Gledhill). Illustrations (Hannah Smith) and stop-motion animation (Ralph McCubbin Howell) play out in sync with incredible music composed by Tane Upjohn-Beatson and performed live with virtuosity by Tristan Carter, who cuts a deliciously macabre figure thanks to Marcus McShane’s lighting design. Actors flicker in and out of scenes, behind and in front of the screen. They are seamless, speaking 1000 words without uttering one. 

The Griegol is meticulous and specific in its approach while still hitting a universal message home. It’s a big subject, grief, and it can be overwhelming. But while The Griegol is poignant, even powerful, it’s accessible for all ages and languages. I feel seen, and safe to feel my feelings – even if that means crying three times!

Thank you, Trick of the Light, for such a beautiful, evocative, and meaningful work.

A downstairs space at Te Auaha that I didn’t even know was there has become the intimate venue for Long Cloud Youth Theatre’s latest self-devised work. With its 16-year history of providing a development hothouse for the next generation of writing and performing talent, the company has created a raw and authentic piece based on each performer’s real-world experience of a rite of passage in their own lives, centred around the Head Boy’s end-of-school party.

The white-box space fronted by glass is cleverly employed as a traverse stage with some of the action happening behind the glass or in the next room above the opposite side of the stage. Excellent use is made of light and shadow by set and lighting designers Grace Newton and Hollie Cohen. Initially covered by a fabric screen, the action behind the glass is humorously revealed to not always be what it seems later in the performance. As the party ebbs and flows, we smoothly transition between what’s going on inside and outside the house.

Starting with an angst-ridden discussion about cannabis giving you orange wee, this is an often-funny rollercoaster ride of teenage dramas about breakups and makeups, breakdowns, grief, toxic masculinity, self-consciousness, first dates, inebriation, crushes, and relationships old and new. It’s the exquisite pain of growing up to which we can all relate in some way, presented mostly literally and sometimes more figuratively with movement and dance (choreographed by Nadiyah Akbar).

The stage floor is interestingly covered in patches of carpet and other soft textures with loose white sheets laid on top. I fear that these sheets will be tripping hazards but the cast all having bare feet seems to mitigate the risk and, by the end of the performance, the carnage of tangled cotton neatly reflects the emotional chaos we have witnessed on stage.

Long Cloud Youth Theatre always comes up with something uniquely their own and Rites of Passage is no exception.

Penny Ashton is back in style at Circa Two with her trademark fridge magnets for a riotous, boisterous, and side-splittingly funny take on all things Dickens.

With a minimal set of a wooden trunk, barrel, and chair, the stage very much belongs to Ashton as she takes us through the life of poor waif Olive in Victorian England. Her mother’s dying advice is for Olive not to be at the mercy of men and their need for “fleshy carnival rides”, which Olive takes to heart as she makes her way in the world. In fact, misogyny – both Victorian and modern – is a strong theme throughout the performance and adds an extra layer of spice and freshness to Ashton’s witty narrative.

Ashton’s energy is unparalleled and for nigh on 90 minutes she flits between multiple larger-than-life characters with whom Olive’s colourful life is peppered. There’s Mrs Sourtart, keeper of the government-funded orphanage where Olive spends her youth; Edward “fill me with your love spores” Goodsort, Olive’s long-time besotted friend and eventual husband; Betsy Sozzle, the one-eyed tavernkeeper of the Cock and Swallow; Tiny Tommy Tidbit, the crippled orphan who turns out to be impossibly related to one of the other characters, and many more.

Littered with quotes, tropes, and the titles of just about every novel Dickens wrote, this is a satirical homage to the literary great that seeks out and exploits the best moments of his biting humour and sense of social justice. Ashton’s songs add an extra layer of fun and props to Michael Bell and his band who recorded the music specially – the quality is noticeable.

Technician Tom Smith’s straightforward lighting prettily colours the action and provides spotlighted pools for Ashton to work in. His precise timing of sound effects with Ashton’s stage movement is brilliant and makes for hilarious fight scenes. A nod of sage approval must also go to Elizabeth Whiting for Ashton’s effervescent and multipurpose dress.

Don’t miss this extraordinarily entertaining dose of Dickens.

Produced by Dastardly Productions and Knot Theatre, Bill Bill Bill is a riotous, rollicking ride of absolute joyfulness. Three solo clowning performances are threaded together by moments of simple storytelling and physical comedy. Each new piece introduces a new character with a unique costume, and each delights in its own way. The show is almost entirely non-verbal, which only makes the emotional depth even more impressive.

Jeremy Hunt’s performance Papa is set in a train station as a young lad attempts to entertain himself. Hunt makes clever use of scale, reaching up to take his imaginary father’s hand, and embodies childishness perfectly. His audience interaction is excellent, prompting me to bowl him a cricket ball (which promptly breaks a window). I adore the simplicity of his set, a railway line produced from two stretches of hazard tape.

Treble in Paradise follows a self-obsessed conductor (Felix Crossley-Pritchard) who dies, goes to heaven, and learns to appreciate his orchestra. My personal favourite, Crossley-Pritchard manages to portray genuine remorse and remarkable character development in such a short piece. His sound design is impeccable, and the conductor’s miffed facial expressions at God’s mysterious ways are subtle enough to be hysterical.

The final solo is Georgia Kellett’s Piccup. It starts as a tale about Peek, a flightless bird reaching for the skies, but seems to abandon this narrative to instead focus on Peek trying to pick up a bar of soap to bathe. I’m a little disappointed not to see the costume pictured in the programme, which would have strengthened the piece enormously. Kellett shines during the interludes between solos, but Piccup feels held back by a weaker premise and distracting scenography.

Bill Bill Bill is a silly, endearing exploration into our world and beyond. All three performers demonstrate an absolute mastery of clowning and Kellett’s lighting design is crisp and evocative. The show’s Fringe awards are well earned, and it deserved a fuller house than it had.

Red Leap Theatre’s performative rendering of Janet Frame’s seminal novel Owls Do Cry is more of a commentary than a clear-cut adaptation. It tries to read between the lines of the evocative prose and lock onto its complexities and the things that are left unsaid. Did it work as a piece of multi-disciplinary theatre? It depends on who you ask, but I know that I left with complicated feelings.

Director Malia Johnston is a powerhouse in the arts world. Many will be familiar with her through her work on the World of WearableArt® Awards and her multimedia approach to performance. Going into a show with Johnston’s name attached guarantees a spectacle and a remarkable line-up of collaborators – from the performers through to the lighting (Rachel Marlow), sound (Eden Mulholland), and AV (Owen McCarthy). Owls Do Cry did not spare on any of those components but it may have muddied the premise. There was always something happening, whether it was broad physical theatre from the inimitable Ross McCormack, a magical display of light, or a gut-busting vocal solo by Hannah Lynch. It felt like your brain didn’t always get a chance to process the meaning.

Despite the sensory overload, the work exhibited a clever arrangement of dance, theatre, song, and design. Every element felt heartfelt, and each performer brought their own powerful presence. Margaret-Mary Hollins gave a delightfully understated performance as the troubled mother, and she was the one that I left thinking the most about. It was haunting, the way she seemed to float on the cusp of the action, there but not really there, acting as a silent witness. Then there were the handful of intimate duets performed by Hollins and McCormack, which transcended the physicality and inspired a deep, emotional response.

Owls Do Cry is a great example of what live theatre can be but for some it may sit in a mysterious realm of abstraction. While it might not be for everyone, Red Leap Theatre can be applauded for their bold interpretation of a New Zealand treasure.

Sitting in the stalls of The Stage, being serenaded by a pair of cheerful musicians (Joe Raea and Eddie Kerr), I can’t help but wonder what we’re in for. A unicorn had just welcomed us into BATS. A pink one, in a fluffy bikini.

The costumes, designed by Salome Grace, are nothing short of extraordinary. Five unicorns, played by Ryan Cundy, Kate Anderson, Brendan West, Katie Boyle, and Grace herself, take the stage, each a brighter colour than the last. The gang is threatened by God’s great flood, but only two can join Noah (Tom Kereama) on the Ark. Once I’ve wrapped my head around the premise, I can start to appreciate the sitcom style. The commentary on Wellington flatting is on the nose but still relevant and grounded by Victoria Martin.

Unfortunately, act one ends before the unicorn plot fully concludes. The musicians return and transition us to the second story, a Law and Order parody involving salami-related murders, but I’m left wondering whether the two narratives are independent or not. The songs are good fun with some excellent punchlines, but Raea seems to lack confidence. He has a fantastic voice that would benefit from higher energy.

My admiration of the show’s design is only magnified with the appearance of Boyle as the Loch Ness Monster in the second act. Somewhere between costume and set piece, the two-person ‘puppet’ towers above her friends and delights the whole house with her shenanigans.

Fab Beasts is almost brilliant. The actors themselves are excellent and I can’t compliment the costumes (and whatever Ness is) enough. However, the storyline feels like an afterthought, hastily pulled together to accommodate unicorns and the Loch Ness Monster. The scenography is a mixed bag. Some moments are clean and effective, especially the fire alarm gag, but the blackouts are painfully abrupt. With a little polish and a rejig of the script, this could be a truly fabulous beast of a show.

An old Arthur Kipps (Martin Tidy) has hired The Actor (Tim Macdonald) to help tidy up his five-hour manuscript, a story about an experience he had while visiting the small market town of Crythin Gifford some years ago. Kipps intends to read the manuscript to a small audience of friends and family, but The Actor has other ideas, employing a sound engineer and a host of special effects to bring the story to life.

The play switches between the actors in rehearsal and a dramatisation of the story, where Tidy as the real Arthur Kipps plays a host of different characters and Macdonald as The Actor plays a young Arthur Kipps. It sounds more confusing than it is! We are transported to Eel Marsh House, the ill-forsaken residence of the recently departed Mrs Alice Drablow. Kipps is Alice’s solicitor and must get her affairs in order, but is haunted by a spectre of a woman in black with a wasted face, whom the townspeople refuse to speak of.

Tidy and Macdonald rise to the challenge of a two-hour two-hander where neither actor is ever offstage. They are both marvellous. I hang off every word Macdonald says while Tidy shines as the reclusive Keckwick, with stellar accent work throughout. Another highlight of this Stagecraft production is Riley Gibson’s lighting design, an evocative interplay of smoke and shadow, darkness and vividity.

With an intriguing lack of music, Tanya Piejus’ sound design utilises silence and recorded sound to good effect, although opening night hiccups mean one important cue is unfortunately late. This is during the door scene in the first half, which I find jarring due to Macdonald’s sudden dramatic turn. There’s an expert build up of fear and thrill in the rest of his performance, and indeed, the production itself. Oftentimes, The Woman in Black is exhilaratingly scary. What fun it is to watch half a show between your fingers!

Welcome to the Hataitai Bowling Club and Dave and Bryan’s Improvaganza! They’ve just spent six weeks attending community “impro” classes (drop the V to be really cool) and will now solve your problems using their newfound passion and skills. As they claim, “There’s no issue you can’t ‘word at a time’ your way out of!”

Dylan Hutton (playing Bryan) and Austin Harrison (Dave) are veterans of the Wellington improvisation circuit and have created a cute premise and charmingly deliver a simple concept for an hour-long show that delighted its opening night audience. Dave and Bryan are indeed a bit pudgy in their colour-coordinated polo shirts and jeans, but the performers certainly aren’t mediocre as they bounce around their homely set and interact warmly with the crowd.

They’re ably assisted on keyboard by the oddly hirsute, 14-year-old Gabe (Matt Hutton) who needs to go home at 9pm and Scotty (Scott Maxim) who, with his trusty fire extinguisher Old Veronica, provides inspired lighting choices to elevate the action. His spotlighted diversions from the main scenes created some of the biggest laughs of the night.

Improv shows need a hook to distinguish them and in this case Harrison and Hutton turn audience members’ domestic and workplace annoyances into (somewhat dubious) life lessons by reinterpreting them through classic improv games and offering post-scene analysis to the problem’s owner. They achieve their aim of reframing issues such as a snoring girlfriend with varying degrees of success but always with a lot of laughter. They even manage to incorporate a couple of topical references, including the current stoush over funding for Shakespeare Globe Centre New Zealand’s University of Otago Sheila Winn Shakespeare Festival, and end with a sweet song about their friendship.

While improv is a common feature of Wellington theatre, Harrison and Hutton have created a show that is fresh and engaging with their own energy and problem-solving spin. And I now know why my cat has furballs (something to do with licking the carpet, apparently).