Students in an after-school drama club in Athens rehearse their performance about the refugee crisis, March 2017.
(Kathleen Gallagher)
Despite hardships, youth are rallying to build a new vision for the planet. The rest of us should join them.
Madeleine MacMahon as ‘Sebastianne’ in a live production of The Tempest by Creation Theatre from 2019.
Creation Theatre/ Big Telly Theatre Company
We can’t go to the theatre but some creative theatre groups are bringing it to us, via Zoom.
Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cats.
kojoku/Shutterstock
By combining the tradition facets with modern music Lloyd Webber reinvigorated the form.
Courtesy Lalela uLwandle
Empatheatre’s latest production is more than a play about three characters who live near the sea. It’s a model for collective consultation on how to save the ocean.
Berenice Melis/Unsplash
New grants to aid the arts and culture sector are welcome. But as we look for distraction and meaning in isolation, a bigger correction is needed to how the government values Australian creativity.
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Physical proximity is intrinsic to performance and communicates considerable meaning. Social isolation has implications for artistic connection.
Chris Herzfeld/STCSA
This new production from State Theatre Company South Australia and Belvoir explores the messy and contradictory inner selves of pre-teen girls.
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Heroes and heroines of Classical Greek tragedy used to get all the glory. Today scholars, and theatre and film directors are looking to what the minor players can tell us about the zeitgeist.
You’re great, just don’t get too big for your boots.
Ben Houdijk/Shutterstock
Why shouting diversity just doesn’t cut it if the system is designed to keep people out.
The set design for Lady Tabouli captures all of the details of Lebanese-Australian family life.
Robert Catto/National Theatre of Parramatta
This new play will feel familiar to those of us who grew up in Lebanese Australian families.
Erin Ball performs at Cripping the Arts at Harbourfront Centre in Toronto, in January 2019. She balances with her hands on the arms of an old wheelchair. Behind her, two long pegs extend from her prosthetic legs.
(Michelle Peek Photography for ReVision)
Rustle your program without getting a glare at a relaxed performance — an art form in synch with the growing field of disability arts.
The play is a window into the living room of an Indigenous family. Image by Stephen Henry.
Stephen Henry/Brisbane Festival
A playwright known for Black Comedy tackles sorry business and loss - providing an engaging window into family life.
My Dearworthy Darling: the new production from writer Alison Croggon and theatre company The Rabble.
David Paterson
This new production from Alison Croggon and The Rabble asks us to consider how women’s voices are ignored, and makes us listen across time.
The mobile Soundforms stage brings indoor musical performances outside.
Flanagan Lawrence / Nick Gutteridge
Moving on from tiered seats and post-war black box stages, the design of theatres are changing again in response to new societal concerns.
Zahra Newman in Wake in Fright. A new adaptation of Kenneth Cook’s novel retells the story of a man’s descent into violent masculinity with a female voice, accompanied by visual and aural spectacle.
Pia Johnson
In a new adaptation of the classic Australian novel, the story of masculinity and despair in the outback is told through a female voice.
Celia Pacquola as Jenny Milford in The Torrents. A new production of the forgotten Australian play shows its themes are still relevant today.
Philip Gostelow
A new production revisits a play dropped from the Australian theatrical canon long ago. Set in a regional newsroom, the play’s themes are strikingly relevant today.
Sheridan Harbridge as Tessa in Prima Facie, a new play about a lawyer who becomes a victim of the legal system after she is sexually assaulted.
Brett Boardman
Written by a former lawyer, a new play presents a forceful critique of the Australian legal system’s treatment of sexual assault.
Igor Sas in Water. The play deals with the issues of ‘illegal’ immigration and environmental crisis in three narratives.
Daniel J Grant
In the vein of Arthur Miller, a new play sees family drama and political issues clash in an enclosed space.
Scott Sheridan and Natasha Herbert in Cloudstreet, a new production of the stage adaptation of Tim Winton’s literary epic.
Pia Johnson
A new production of Cloudstreet - the play adapted from Tim Winton’s literary epic - is visually arresting. But despite a diverse cast, Indigenous characters remain spectral and peripheral.
Eliza Winstanley, Carte de visite, circa 1860. TCS 19, Houghton Library, Harvard University.
Houghton Library, Harvard University.
Eliza Winstanley, who died of diabetes and exhaustion in Sydney in 1882, is largely forgotten. But as a leading artist on Australia’s earliest stages she deserves a prominent place in our theatrical histories.