Our selection of the best new music across a range of genres from the week ending 3 May 2024. On his first solo record in six years, Kamasi Washington turns his attention to dance – a natural progression of the Los Angeles born artist’s ongoing study of music as a means of connection. His 2015…
Two actors, some props, lighting… sounds rudimentary – but the result in The Woman in Black is astounding. This storied play remains the second-longest running production in London’s West End, racking up over 13,000 performances between 1989 and 2023. (The longest-running is The Mousetrap.) Now this localised version of the London production is touring the…
A searing look at female homelessness in Australia over the age of 55, Way, written and performed by Sally McKenzie, is as powerful theatre as it is shocking reality. In short, it is distressing but important to watch what unfolds. McKenzie – an MTC stalwart in the early 1980s who moved back to Melbourne from Brisbane as…
The bawdy meets the bizarre in the Australian premiere of the tragicomic musical The Grinning Man, which is based on the 1869 Victor Hugo novel The Man Who Laughs. He is, of course, best known for Les Misérables and The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. With music by Tim Phillips and Marc Teitler, lyrics by that pair, Carl Grose…
American Primitive is the thirteenth studio album by veterans Old 97’s. The record is arriving just months before the 30th anniversary of their debut album, Hitchhike to Rhome. The band, consisting of vocalist/guitarist Rhett Miller, bassist Murry Hammond, guitarist Ken Bethea, and drummer Philip Peeples, describes the album as a “de-evolution,” featuring big, loud, brutal,…
Fremont is the fourth feature from Iranian born filmmaker Babak Jalali. This low-budget, low-key indie drama follows Donya (played by newcomer Anaita Wali Zada), an Afghan refugee who has relocated to the town of Fremont in California. She used to work as a translator for the US military in Afghanistan before the withdrawal of troops….
Australian author Liam Pieper has released a couple of fascinating and diverse works of fiction – The Toy Maker about a Holocaust survivor and their family, and Sweetness and Light set around an ashram in India. But he also has a career as a ghost writer a career he wrote about in the Guardian earlier…
Fifteen-year-olds Arvy (Jess Sofarnos) and Thea (Megan Mitchell) are besties. They met in a science class and have been inseparable ever since. At their weekly sleepovers, they share intimate secrets, swap stories and say they love each other. You’re Being Dramatic juxtaposes one such rainy overnighter with a meeting at a pub they have many years later. By…
Whether or not you are a Harry Potter fan, it would be hard to be unimpressed or unamused by this delightfully ditzy offering. In short, Potted Potter condenses all seven Harry Potter books and a game of Quidditch into 70 hilarious minutes. Taking us on the wild ride are the talented and engaging Scott Hoatson and Brendan…
Our selection of the best new music across a range of genres from the week ending 26 April 2024. Grammy Award-winning vocalist, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Judith Hill reclaims her strength on a deeply emotive new album, Letters From A Black Widow (out now via Regime Music Group). ‘Black Widow’ finds Hill confronting the malign label…
