Thursday, May 31, 2012
The art of light writing, as playwrights like Oscar Wilde demonstrate, is a serious business. Writing a light play about serious business is even more serious. The danger is that "light…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 12:06AMWednesday, May 30, 2012
Part of the problem in responding to the Next Wave Festival 2012 is knowing where to start. After much dithering, I'm going to begin by talking about the festival itself: I'll be posting abo…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 12:07AMMonday, May 28, 2012
A pointer to my latest review on Overland, which looks at Melbourne poet Philip Salom's recent heteronymic collections The Keeper of Fish and Keeping Carter, out from Puncher and Wattman Poe…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 07:11PMWednesday, May 23, 2012
It may sound banal, but the most important thing, both in film and in the theatre, is the human being - the study of human beings. What you want above all, whether you are doing film or thea…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 10:47PMSunday, May 20, 2012
The Next Wave festival - a look at up and coming artists from around Australia, with a significant international component - is now in full swing, illuminating all sorts of hidden corners of…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 08:48PMThursday, May 17, 2012
Because Richard Bean's play The Heretic is about climate change, it attracted the notice of hardline climate change denier Andrew Bolt in the weeks running up to its opening. There was a min…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 09:48PMTuesday, May 15, 2012
Today the Minister for the Arts, Simon Crean, is announcing the long-awaited review of the Australia Council. Early reports indicate that one of its major recommendations is the abolition of…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 12:28AMTuesday, May 8, 2012
I'm going to be very bloggish today, gentle reader, and tell you all about my week. As always, I've had a problem with hats. My misfortunes began when I accidentally finished a novel. I say …
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 07:14PMMonday, April 30, 2012
Below is the text of a talk I gave at the Wheeler Centre last month as part of the series Australian Literature 101. I was asked to discuss Ray Lawler's Summer of the Seventeenth Doll, which…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 05:30PMThursday, April 26, 2012
I may have mentioned that I am now reviewing poetry for Overland Literary Journal's swish new blog. My most recent review, of Ian Hamilton Finlay: Selections, is now online. Finlay's a sig…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 02:11AMMonday, April 23, 2012
From outer-edge indie theatre to main stage is an crucial and delicate transition for any company. One of the best things that has happened in recent years is the opening of both the Malthou…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 03:32AMTuesday, April 17, 2012
The Malthouse/Sydney Theatre Company production of Thomas Bernhard's 1984 play The Histrionic is, apparently, the first professional production of Bernhard's work anywhere in Australia. The …
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 10:59PMFriday, April 6, 2012
For the past couple of weeks, the Melbourne International Comedy Festival has crashed over our fair city like a tidal wave, dragging the crowds and a bunch of increasingly exhausted critics …
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 06:28PMSunday, April 1, 2012
A few years ago, I spent some time with the Seagram Rothkos in the Tate Modern collection. Grouped together in a specially designed gallery, they are extraordinary paintings: their profound …
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 01:40AMFriday, March 23, 2012
Once upon a time, O my best beloved, when the jungle was so primitive that not one animal had an iPhone, Ms Alison did one thing at a time, and that thing was mostly poems. But the gods of b…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 12:00AMSaturday, March 17, 2012
A quick pointer to George Hunka's excellent roundup of the scandal unfolding around Mike Daisey's The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs, in which journalistic and theatrical ideas of truth…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 07:20PMSunday, March 11, 2012
A quick pointer to Jana Perkovic's fascinating critique of The Wild Duck, and the conversation which it's prompting. Warning: long. But stimulating.
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 07:57PMThursday, March 8, 2012
I missed the opening night of The Seed. From other reviews I've read, this was probably a good thing: sometimes it strikes me that press night is probably the worst time to review anything. …
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 08:53PMWednesday, March 7, 2012
Over the past week or so, I have announced in every possible internet way my intention of seeing less theatre and giving some necessary time to my other writing hats. It is somewhat awkward …
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 01:05AMFriday, March 2, 2012
Ms TN is heading up to Sydney tomorrow to participate in Belvoir St's upcoming Sunday Forum on Reviewing Theatre: In Print and Online. My fellow panelists, moderated by The Chaser's Chris Ta…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 07:01PMWednesday, February 29, 2012
Under the curation of new artistic director Jonathan Holloway, the 2012 Perth Festival generated more energy than a windfarm in a tornado. My only real regret - and regret it I do - is that …
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 07:28PMMonday, February 27, 2012
When I emerged from Beautiful Burnout, the National Theatre of Scotland and Frantic Assembly’s examination of the art of boxing, I tweeted enthusiastically (in twitter language, which as y…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 07:13PMSunday, February 26, 2012
From the moment that Philip Glass's insistent, spiralling score erupts in the auditorium, this revival of Lucinda Child's 1979 work Dance is relentless. Each dance in this trilogy begins and…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 05:05AMSaturday, February 25, 2012
On this mercifully cool Perth day, Ms TN found herself in a fragile state. This is entirely the fault of the "festive" part of "arts festival". After last night's show I …
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 04:11AMFriday, February 24, 2012
UK Shakespearean company Propeller is an odd beast. Under the artistic direction of Edward Hall, its mission is to refresh Shakespeare using physical theatre. With this goes an attempt to re…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 12:24AMThursday, February 23, 2012
Mozart's The Magic Flute often seems to me like a quintessence of opera, equal parts nonsense and delight. It's an absurd fairytale, with all that form's arbitariness and illogic. It also in…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 04:07AMTuesday, February 21, 2012
NB: Serious spoiler warnings.
After I left Teatro de los Sentidos's Oráculos last night, I wandered back to my hotel room through the Perth streets feeling as if my skin were luminous, as …
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 11:35PMSunday, February 19, 2012
Regular readers will know that Ms TN has spent the past few years vainly attempting to find a balanced life. Every year I vow to see less theatre; every year my vow crumbles spectacularly, l…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 07:18PMSaturday, February 18, 2012
After an interesting week in Melbourne, about which more soon, Ms TN is off to the Perth Festival tomorrow. It may do me good to be locked in a hotel room for a week, with my scope for procr…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 05:53PMWednesday, February 15, 2012
In today's Age, critic Cameron Woodhead buys into the recent controversy around Shit on Your Play. For once, a sensible, informed piece about theatre blogging in the mainstream press. As he …
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 05:03PMTuesday, February 14, 2012
This really is from the archives. I was looking for something else when I stumbled across this piece, which I have no recollection of writing. It was in a folder that dates from when I was W…
SOURCE: Theatre Notes at 05:51PM 
