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.

Year 9 is a tough time for everyone. There’s nothing like feeling like the world is against you and then finding out your town really is. 

Miracle brings you smack bang into the reality of a 14-year-old girl, who thought her biggest worries were figuring out when she could wear a jumper to school, how she could get her crush to notice her, and if her friends really liked her or not. Trying to prove that her family isn’t crazy, that she can take a joke even when fighting back tears as she tries to clear her family name, was a lot more than she bargained for. Miracle desperately fights against the veil of childhood as she is forced to battle with things she’s not quite old enough to fully understand.

There’s nothing that Miracle wants more than to fit in. She would rather cross her heart and hope to die than her dad get a job that draws more attention to her less than picture-perfect family. She tries to craft a plan towards his future employment as far away from her as possible, but doesn’t realise how catastrophic things will become. Meanwhile, the town is plagued by sudden deaths and a thick smoke cloud that tricks the residents into thinking there’s no such thing as clean air…

Miracle is a beautiful, fraught coming-of-age novel based in Australia. Come for the teen angst and the trip down memory lane and stay for the family dynamics and societal displays. The world is instantly relatable and vibrant, yet still captures the mundanity of the everyday. This is a book to savour. It is full of beautiful poetic language that is begging to be read out loud. Take your time to chew over every rich, juicy word that Lane has carefully crafted and enjoy the charm and the messiness of the relatable characters. Take your heart on the journey to the end of Miracle’s childhood.

For a lot of people, democracy is the simple process of voting for politicians who you think will have your best interests at heart and will look after you in the short and long term. Unsurprisingly there’s more to it than that, and for those wishing to learn the nitty-gritty of how it works in New Zealand, we have the latest book from Geoffrey Palmer and Gwen Palmer Steeds titled Democracy in Aotearoa New Zealand: A Survival Guide.

Going back to the beginnings of the first Māori wars and the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, it explains how the English style of democracy first implanted itself in our country and how it grew and adapted to serve two very different cultures.

For me one of the best aspects of the book is the inclusion of interviews that the authors carried out. These include ones with Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, former opposition leader Judith Collins, and ambassador to Ireland in waiting Trevor Mallard. They give us a rare peak into the mindset of the people that have helped to literally shape our lives in New Zealand. Ardern’s interview in particular stood out for me, as it gave me a better idea of how she thinks and her problem-solving process.

Another plus is the easy-to-read format of the book; I understood everything and never felt like anything went over my head.

One problem is the fact that politics is not for everyone and for some the subject will simply be a turnoff, which is shame because I think we should all have an understanding of the way our country is governed. I would still wholly recommend this book to those people, as it gave even a layperson like myself a better understanding of democracy, and how important it is to remain a part of the democratic process. As it says on the back cover, it’s a survival guide to democracy in Aotearoa.

Much like the words challenging and unprecedented are burned into our collective consciousness when we think of the last couple of years, so too is the word mindfulness and the act and art of being mindful when we think of wellness and wellbeing.

But what does being mindful actually involve? In Mind Free, Mark Stephens looks at the limiting patterns, actions, and behaviours that are holding you back and how, through the techniques of mindful meditation and self-hypnosis that he’s developed over the years, you can overcome these.

Stephens talks of mindful meditation, where if you become one with the task you have at hand or your present moment, then even the simple act of preparing a cup of tea can become a mindful experience. I tried this with a similarly mundane activity: shopping at the supermarket, marvelling over avocados, noticing all my fellow shoppers and the sights and sounds around me.

But so many times my mind wandered from the present to the past; my mind a hybrid landscape where everything but the present was competing for thought time – it was hard to stay in the moment. Stephens says it’s about bringing your attention back to the present.

Having a mantra of positive affirmations like ‘I can handle anything’ or ‘I am strong’ or ‘I’ve got this’ is a strategy suggested for overcoming anxiety to consciously change your internal story. When you feel better you start to act differently and feel happier and more content, Stephens says. Meditation mandalas can be found dotted throughout Stephens’ 21 positive states of being, which he has identified as the positive states we all need in our lives – things like appreciation, calm, love, laughter, and optimism.

There are certainly some positive techniques in Mind Free and empowering actions to take using thought regulation and breathing techniques.

But sometimes the art of creating a mind that is free by breathing, meditating, living in the now, self-affirming, thinking positively, and stressing less is as complicated as its promised reward.

Men flicker out like photos burned. Folklore fuses with our everydays. Birds no longer sing in cities. Year’s Best Aotearoa New Zealand Science Fiction & Fantasy Volume IV is a beautifully curated collection of our country’s best science fiction and fantasy short stories. These are stories that you can enjoy on their own, picking up whenever you feel like a little literary snack, or it can be a whole meal that you devour in one sitting.

The volume begins strong with I Will Teach You Magic by Andi C. Buchanan. Buchanan’s story tucks you in with a spell of love woven into the ink. It stretches out of the pages, onto your fingers, and flows into your heart. It’s the perfect beginning to the collection like sitting around a campfire, hearing stories retold that have been passed down by generations.

Plague Year by Anuja Mitra skilfully spins an ever-so-relevant social commentary by playing within the familiarity of a classic folklore. Data Migration by Melanie Harding-Shaw is a beautifully crafted tragic glimpse into a reality that just may fall upon us. A stark reminder that regardless of whatever challenges we face, teachers are forever the glue of civilisation, building hope and light within new generations. Interview with Sole Refugee from the A303 Incident by James Rowland is an incredibly gripping short story that you don’t want to end. The only survivor walks on past all the pain, fuelled by the pressure to meet deadlines at work.

Because this is a collection of stories, there isn’t enough space in this review to address each of them. I absolutely recommend this gem of a book. Standouts in the volume were stories that lingered on the precipice of our realities but held enough distance to gain perspective. Voices are taken, time is stolen, and worlds crumble as we watch frozen as witnesses. The volume holds the magic of many voices that all should be heard.

This Requiem concert was designed to provoke thoughts about the purpose of life and the nature of death. Seikilos by John Psathas was very much the former. An energetic and energising piece of music this was definitely in the vein of the living. Percussion, brass, strings, woodwind were all led with great clarity through the chaos by Gemma New who made a welcome return the podium for this performance.

Richard Strauss’ Death and Transfiguration took us to the opposite pole with a commentary on the experience of death and following death – the transfiguration. The strings stood out here although, as usual, it was impossible to call out any one section of the orchestra as doing a better job than another.

The performance of Mozart’s Requiem in D Minor, K.626 by the NZSO, a quartet of singers and arguably the best choir in the country, Voices New Zealand, brought together both themes of the programme and left us in no doubt we had been given an opportunity to contemplate life as well as death.

It is easy to forget singers, unlike instrumentalists, have limited opportunity to warm up their voices before they have to deliver a perfect combination of style, strength, tone, and of course, pitch. The four soloists: soprano Anna Leese, alto Rhonda Browne, tenor Amitai Pati and baritone Robert Tucker, were out of balance with each other to begin with but by the Lacrimosa, their voices were entwined and more evenly matched.

However, Mozart’s Requiem is really all about the chorus. They have the greatest opportunity to shine and this performance was dazzling. Brilliantly clear diction, remarkable changes in tone, delicate, close harmonies that sent shivers up and down the spine, and New’s tightly coiled and powerful energy combined for an outstanding performance. Is it wrong to be uplifted and made to feel alive by a requiem mass? This one carried me home.

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.

I have mixed feelings about David Farrier’s new documentary Mister Organ. On the one hand, it followed a reasonably interesting and twisted true story about a shady individual who I wanted to know more about, while on the other, my interest in the film peaked at about the halfway point as it lacked those defining moments all incredible documentaries are known for.

New Zealand journalist and filmmaker David Farrier (Tickled, Dark Tourist) is drawn into a game of cat and mouse with a mysterious individual who is clamping cars outside an antique store in Ponsonby, Auckland. Delving deeper, Farrier unearths a trail of court cases, inflated claims of royal bloodlines, ruined lives, and at least one stolen boat in this true story of psychological warfare.

One thing that’s for certain is that Farrier has found the ultimate sinister weirdo to ‘star’ in Mister Organ. That man’s name is Michael Organ. During the film, Farrier says, “You pay a soul tax for every minute you spend with him”, and believe me when I say this description is precisely on point. Farrier spent years listening to Organ’s puzzling ramblings while making his documentary and by the end, I felt as if I had done the same. As a director, he utilises long sequences from their one-sided interviews to help the audience fully understand just how whacko this guy is. He also did a great job finding victims and persuading them to share their experiences with Organ, providing a well-rounded view of Organ’s twisted past.

But the big question I asked myself while watching was: is this a story worth telling? There is no doubt that Michael Organ is probably one of the most dangerously annoying men in New Zealand, but if we made a documentary about every crazy person in the world, we would be here for a while! Farrier mentions in Mister Organ he is “trapped” with Organ because he must make a film about him. With no real climax or major developments after he starts filming, this isn’t really true. Rather, the documentary is more about Farrier and his own strange journey with Organ. Is that worth two hours of your time? Only you can decide…

The combination of a Mahler symphony portraying a 19^th century child’s view of heaven and a contemporary, symphonic tone poem depicting a Californian shoreline made an interesting juxtaposition in this Heavenly programme.

After Tumblebird Contrails I reflected on the way our subconscious shapes our later encounters. Gabriella Smith’s composition quite definitely evoked the natural world she wanted to express. Her orchestration cleverly conveyed birds in the air, creatures in the sea, environmental degradation and distress. My memory of a California coastline slipped comfortably into hers and my knowledge of the damage we are doing to our environment was reflected to me in her music. I once walked the long, relatively undeveloped San Francisco shoreline from the Golden Gate Bridge to the city. Smith took me back, with fresh eyes, to the late summer light, the sandy, gritty, stony beachfront, and a familiar and foreign environment.

Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 in G Major was quite a contrast, from environmental beauty and doom to the heavenly life. In four movements, the symphony follows a classical form and makes the most out of the multi-tonal possibilities of the orchestration. The lower strings were incredibly solid and supportive. I’m always up for a good cor anglais moment and in the third movement Michael Austin delighted me as expected. The performance overall didn’t feel quite as polished as usual – professional musicians are as tired as the rest of us after another unusual year and they have numerous performances scheduled around the motu in the weeks before Christmas.

In the tradition of keeping the best till last, soprano Madeleine Pierard brought her tremendous voice to the stage. Mahler wrote the song Das himmlische Leben a decade earlier than his fourth symphony and it fitted wonderfully into his final movement. Pierard’s voice was absolutely right for the picture of heaven and heavenly life he wanted us to see.

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.

When I picked Better the Blood out of a list of books to review a couple of weeks ago I had no idea it would end up being one of the biggest surprises of my year. Suspenseful, gripping, and exhilarating are just some of the words that come to mind when describing its story. It centres around Senior Detective Sergeant Hana Westerman, a policewoman whose profession sometimes puts her at odds with her Māori ancestry.

Better the Blood’s biggest draw is its rich, deep writing. The characters and the world they live in is beautiful, almost four dimensional at times. Despite living in Auckland all my life, I found the version that Bennett described as something different.

Unsurprisingly, Hana has the deepest character development and it was not long before I began forging a bond with her, and was anxious to see where the story would take her next. What did surprise me though was how I began relating to the story’s main antagonist. While what he was doing was completely abhorrent, I understood why he was doing it, and even saw things from his perspective. Getting into your audience’s head and making them feel for the bad guy, making them understand their motives, to me is the mark of good narrative storytelling – bravo.

While the book starts slowly, it’s not long before the action picks up, and when the other shoe finally drops it’s a race against time to stop a killer who isn’t just as smart as the ones trying to stop him, but who at times is one or two steps ahead of them. Spending time not with just Hana but with the story’s big bad made me so happy and makes a refreshing change from the usual formula of just following the hero’s plotline.

More movie than book, Better the Blood will keep fans of detective dramas engaged until the end. One of the best surprises of the year, and a great one to cap off 2022 with.

Upon settling into Elizabeth Garner’s Lost & Found: A Treasure Trove of Folk Tales, you are transported to an ancient world, but a world not so far away, a world still ours. A world of our forefathers that has been gifted to us, travelling through many generations to finally settle down in our laps. Lost & Found is a celebration of our human history as storytellers, an homage to the oral history that belongs to all of us now bound tightly within a book jacket, immortalised.

Garner’s storytelling ability truly elevates Lost & Found to the highest standard. You can hear the words echoing in your head as if they were spoken aloud, the whispers in your ear as if they were beside you. Garner’s voice is steady and matter of fact, recounting things as they are, have been, and always will be. The folk tales come to life again, speaking their truths and their histories as if they had never silenced in the first place.

Each story in Lost & Found is extremely accessible, as all folktales should be. The tales themselves are a perfect balance of tried-and-true narratives such as Little Stupid and The Whits of the Whetstone and lesser known stories. Each chronicle is imbued with the magic of folklore, each tale tinges our own world with enchantment, each story blurs the definition between reality and make-believe, but each one speaks a truth and passes on our collective generational knowledge.

Full of lessons of old, Lost & Found is the kind of book you read in front of a campfire out loud with family and friends; the kind of book that recalls your early memories from childhood when a parent or grandparent would tell you tales of how the world came to be or life lessons. These are the tales that we all share, the stories that bind humanity, the histories that make sense of the world, the narratives that make us innately and uniquely human.

The title Tauhou is te reo Māori for “stranger”, and it sets us up for content that is surprising in its reach and contrasts. Nuttall is painstaking in her insistence on the essential fictional nature of this collection of stories – it doesn’t represent any real iwi or culture – but purposely pushes together two sides of her whakapapa.

She envisions a shared past between two Indigenous cultures and in doing so exposes the effects of colonisation. That this is done with examples, situations, and language that evoke and disturb while remaining eminently readable is a tribute to the writer.

Set on reimagined versions of Vancouver Island and Aotearoa, the action evolves through various characters and their situations. Hinau lives in a concrete block and has a job in a tribal propaganda office, which she shares with her cousin Salal. Their closeness is a recurring theme. But so is concrete, contrasting as it does sharply with images of nature, rendered longingly by a writer who laments its abuse.

“The beat of a tattoo needle is like the steady pounding of a drum.” Such a sentence, the first in the story Moko, promises to satisfy any reader’s curiosity about the art of tattoo, plus the feelings and motivation of someone who’s receiving one. It’s predictably graphic and absolutely fascinating. If you don’t intend ever getting a tattoo, reading this chapter is the next best thing!

Family members and experiences have particular significance. I related to the father Pa in Stones – recognising the taciturnity that disguises the caring of many fathers. “When he returns for the day, I know to be quiet and reserved”, remarks our sensitive writer daughter.

As well as the use of te reo, several of the stories include words in SENĆOŦEN, the language of the W̱SÁNEĆ people, one part of the author’s whakapapa. “I use these words to bring myself closer to my tipuna and to spread the fire of our language further.”

Tauhou represents a recognition, acknowledgement, and sometimes salutary reminder of pasts and how we might
reconcile them.

Wellington-based author Sharron Came serves up a slice of true rural New Zealand in her captivating debut novel Peninsula. Every sentence is layered with small details that reveal more about the families and characters at the heart of the book and make the characters almost appear in front of the reader.

At first glance it appears to be an homage to a way of life in Northland that’s stayed the same for many decades, affected only by the changing seasons. Stoic Jim and Di Carlton have been running their farm forever and will be there until they die. But then the stories of new characters are interwoven – there’s their former daughter-in-law Kiri who moved back to Northland for family and seems trapped there, and her tree-loving school friend Ritchie who’s moved to Brisbane to run an ecology consultancy and has returned to connect with friends. Jim and Di’s daughter Rachel Carlton has been working as a lawyer in Europe and returns to the small community of Hereford instinctively, even though she feels the ties binding her may “slowly choke the life out of her”.

Small changes start to creep in like the new subdivisions encroaching on the edges of the village and farm bringing urban life, complete with electric vehicles, closer to their rural idyll. Then as you get further into the book the sheen starts to come off the perfect rural lifestyle, as we’re introduced to characters struggling with marriage breakdowns, meth addiction, and children who have disappeared or died.

The plot and the pace meander, so roll with it and enjoy the slow unfurling of the characters one by one.

I haven’t read a book that captures the people, conversations, and lives of rural New Zealanders as well as this. It transported me right back to the interactions and experiences I had when I lived in rural Canterbury. Peninsula is a beautifully written book rich in detail and full of complex, multidimensional characters that will stay with you.

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.