59 stories by "Jason Whyte"
When the geography teacher at a boys private school is off sick, it falls to Miss Fletcher (Hayley Sproull) the music teacher to fill in. As she's not so suited to the subject matter, Miss F…
The Fringe Hub has a new, informative feature this year:Â laminated signs marked to indicate that a performance contains certain types of scenes, such as those showing drug use, or strobe …
From shows earning a walk out to those spent on the edge of one’s seat, quality varies in Fringe productions. Approaching this double-header night, I vacillated between excitement and …
In the cabaret performance Glamping with Bobby and the Pins, I can't remember when I've been more entertained by such a silly show, one that − at its best − shimmers as a c…
The great appeal of a fringe festival is that there's always something to surprise, maybe even delight. With their one-person show The Bookbinder, NZ company A Trick of the Light present …
If you thought cabaret was about show tunes, Melissa Langton’s gunning for your misconceptions in this return season of her latest creation A Singer Must Die:Â a show packed with dra…
What happens when three performers turn up to a show each thinking they are its star? That's the setup for The Three of Us and poses the immediate problem of how to list the cast witho…
A conventional history of modern Irish dance credits the 1994 Eurovision interval performance of Riverdance in Dublin for launching a phenomenon. It shot principal dancer and choreogra…
When tickets weren't available for the show I was planning to see, I took a punt on former rapper Doc Brown in Of Mic and Men on the strength of his 2014 MICF gala spot. For a show promis…
Porcelain Punch’s The Travelling Medicine Show aims to recreate the times when cure-alls were spruiked from wagons with acts of physical prowess serving as testimonials to the value…
I don't believe we've met. I'm Viscount Reginald Bassingthwaite, a professional art dealer.  A Dinner to Die For is an immersive murder mystery with a three-course meal at The Retreat…
For some years I've enjoyed Shappi Khorsandi's short spots on tv shows such as Just For Laughs and the MICF Comedy Gala, but I've never seen her live. Much of her appeal is her bouncy delive…
Bane Trilogy encompasses three stories of loner Bruce Bane (Joe Bone) and his somewhat film noir-like adventures in the shiftier parts of an American metropolis. The part of the trilogy you'…
In the late 1980s, I saw the Canadian musical comedy act Corky and the Juicepigs on tv. Although now I can only remember their surf-vibe song "Psychopathic Killer in the Summertime", nostalg…
Alice got off to an uncertain start to her time in Wonderland, and The Australian Shakespeare Company's outdoor musical production of Alice In Wonderland at Rippon Lea Estate had similar ini…
There are some news stories I remember years after the event. Like some 2004 Â reports from Palm Island, off the Queensland coast, when a man died in police custody and when the subsequent…
Moreland Theatre Company has partnered with Winston Macadamia Smith of Winston's Academy for Nurtured Creativity (WANC) to present A Short Course in Short Theatre: six short plays in a range…
At Last, The Etta James Story features singer Vika Bull and eight-piece The Essential R & B Band giving renditions of songs from James's 57-year output. Despite her long career, this is …
From 2014, new company Metanoia Theatre will produce a range of artforms at the Mechanics Institute in Brunswick, including an experimental and digital theatre hub. In advance of their progr…
Gilbert and Sullivan's operetta The Pirates of Penzance was first performed in New York on 31 December 1879. It proceeded to have a highly successful run that would fix the style of the piec…
The Melbourne Fringe hosts the premiere of This is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, the new show from Gillian Cosgriff. The title comes from the parental lament that immaturity and thoug…
One of the best aspects of a Fringe festival is the chance to partake of performance styles you don't normally get to experience. Radio Variety Hour is a recreation of a 1950s radio show wit…
In 1957, the Soviet space program launched Laika the dog into orbit around Earth to collect data as a precursor to sending people into space. Sadly, the mission didn't end well for Laika. A …
Love in the Key of Britpop is a solo work written and performed by Emily Andersen. Coming from the 2012 Edinburgh Fringe, it came along at exactly the right time for me in my Melbourne Fring…
I was pretty excited by the prospect of Michael Burke in Cubehead, a show promising to blend the stories of the human Michael and an extraterrestrial with a Rubik’s Cube for a cranium.…
