Sydney Theatre Thread

[SYD]

STC opened the season with two plays that presumably were intended to bookend Sydney World Pride.

Hubris & Humiliation was light, fluffy and funny but not likely to win a Helpmann award.

Last night we saw Edward Albee’s The Goat, or who is Sylvia? which was hysterical, if not leaving some patrons clutching their pearls. Claudia Karvan was excellent in her first live gig in 25 yrs.

 

[Lynda2475]

Went to Wicked last night at the Lyric which is doing a short run to celebrate its 20th Anniversary on Broadway.

Both leads were fantastic. Courtney Monsma had impeccable comedic timing as Galinda/Glinda and Sheriden Adams had great power and hit every Elphie note perfectly.

It was so refreshing to have a Wizard in Todd McKenny that is animated and actually dances on stage.

Only weak link was Robyn Nevin as Madam Morrible, she was a bit quiet, spoke some lines that are meant to be sung, just needed to project more in her delivery but then had very big shoes to fill as Maggie Kirkpatrick was terrific in the earlier Australian productions.

Great to have the flying monkeys fly right over the audience in the stalls as they did in the original Australia production in Melbourne, this was never possible at the Capitol because of the ceiling being heritage listed they could never have the rigging come out so far.

Standing ovations all round and the two in our party who were Wicked virgins both loved it and said they were flawed at how good it was, neither really knew what to expect.

The 25th Annual Putnum County Spelling Bee is also playing at The Nancy Hayes and worth a look if you havent seen it before - light hearted with a few catchy tunes.

Also hearing good things about the STC's production of The Importance of Being Ernest at the Roslyn Packer Theatre.

 

[Katie]

Catching up on some fun theatre experiences:

Easter in Melbourne

Good Friday night - spur of the moment decision to see Joel Creasey's standup show, bought the tickets in the line to get in. Great fun, appropriately shocked responses from Teen at some jokes. She's 18 in October, so this year, I'm loosening up a bit and realising we can't just open the floodgates to some experiences when she's 18.

Easter Sat night - Groundhog Day - lots of fun, clever ways of restarting the day. Will probably want to see this again sometime, as Mr Katie was peddling pedaling around Belgium. Loved the snow outside the theatre afterwards. Great GF Chinese food at Robo Mao before the show. Helped calm us after being yelled at and physically intimidated by a man at the tram stop outside the Hilton on our way out. The Teen did not like some of our grittier experiences in Melbourne this trip.

Wicked - first time for the Teen, who knows the soundtrack but not the storyline! She LOVED it. Now she understands what some of the songs are about! Going to see it again in Brisbane in Sept.

QT
Gaslight - excellent performance. Gosh I used to think Toby Schmitz was SO hot about 20 or 30 years ago. Thrilling show.
37 - Lots of sportsball. I enjoyed it more than Mr Katie.
Medea - chilling and excellent perspective on the Medea and Jason story. Wonderful stage setting. Those young boys! The actors were great. Mr Katie went on a different night to me, as Medea is in the grade 12 drama curriculum, so he went the same night as the Teen and her class.

Weekend Quickie
The Teen and I flew down to Sydney on Sat to see &Juliet at the Lyric. I was touching base with some theatre friends who had a two show day, but they saw &Juliet at the matinee. If we'd had the same seats and went to the same performance, we would have sat next to each other!
We were in row BB; the stage felt high when we arrived, but I don't think we missed anything from that angle. You definitely need to enjoy recent pop music for this one. Amy Lehpamer had strong Hannah Waddingham/Rebecca Welton vibes, though I felt I so close I could see a colour contrast between her wig line and face. Excellent performance as Anne Hathaway. Keala Settle has replaced Casey Donovan as Nurse; she was brilliant. Blake Appelqvist gave me big Nicholas Hoult vibes. Jacob Razario was May (brilliant) and I think we had Jordan Koulos as Francois. Strong cast. I kept looking for Riley Gill and Coby Njoroge every time they were on stage. Lorinda May Merrypor doesn't seem that she only graduated in 2016.
Glad we made the effort to come down to Sydney for this one. Brisbane really is suffering from only having the Lyric theatre at QPAC for these perfomances. :/

Beauty and the Beast - the Teen went with two grandmas in Brisbane a few weeks ago. The Grandmas know the story, but their children were all upper high school/uni age when the first Disney movie came out ca. 1990. So the show was a surprise for them. Apparently my MIL thought Hugh Jackman would make a great Gaston ...
All three enjoyed the production, Mr Katie and I didn't really want to see it.