Lip Service is a new Australian play that premiered in a separate production in London earlier this year with the title: Madame Rubenstein. That production featured the indomitable Miriam Margolyes, as Rubinstein and Frances Barber, as Elizabeth Arden. At the Ensemble we have Amanda Muggelton playing Madame Rubinstein, and it is a performance that I…
Johnny Saxby (Josh O’Connor, from TV series Peaky Blinders) is a sullen, morose young man working on his family farm in Francis Lee’s God’s Own Country. Since his father Martin (Ian Hart) suffered a debilitating stroke, he has had more responsibility loaded on his shoulders. It’s a hard and often lonely life for Johnny. He…
Eliza Henry-Jones is a new writer to me. Everything about Ache is beautiful, from the cover, with those piercing eyes, to the prose, which tumbles from the page and into readers’ hearts. Here’s the blurb: A year ago, a devastating bushfire ripped Annie’s world apart – killing her grandmother, traumatising her young daughter and leaving…
Without doubt Kinky Boots is the best new musical in years. It has everything: a great story line, wonderful characters, and toe-tapping music that moves the plot along. It’s such a joyful and refreshing spectacle to watch. I loved every damn minute of the two hours of music, dance, and drama. On top of all…
Accurate diagnosis and appropriate treatment for mental illness should be a given, but as history shows, often that’s not the case. In Asylum, two involuntarily institutionalised patients are put through the wringer by an overly officious (read: downright brutish) doctor. One is a young man, Ben (Steven Oktaras), who believes he is dead. Most of all, he…
The well-being of a brilliant seven year-old is on the line in the feel-good weepy Gifted. Frank Adler (Chris Evans) is a single man raising his spirited young niece Mary (Mckenna Grace) in a coastal town in Florida. Though Mary is a child prodigy, Frank’s intends that she lead a normal life. His aim is thwarted…
A compelling doomsday scenario underpins the dystopian drama, The Way Out. Mankind is hanging by a thread after a civil war 15 years earlier. The air is polluted. Facemasks are mandatory for survival outdoors. Unless sanctioned, travel is banned outside one’s “zone”. All clothing is synthetic. Food is of a low quality and in short supply, while much…
Small Town Killers is a jet-black comedy, which pushes the boundaries of taste and fails the political correctness test. But if you’re in the right frame of mind, it’s fun. Ib (Nicolas Bro) and Edward (Ulrich Thomsen) think about sex all the time. But their wives – Gritt (Mia Lyhne) and Ingrid (Lene Maria Christensen) – are…
Well meaning, but heavy handed, All Saints tells the true story of a church at the edge of extinction. After trading in his corporate career to become a preacher, Michael Spurlock (John Corbett) finds his first assignment is a quaint country church with only a dozen members. The job comes with a catch: he has to close the…
A violent buddy action-comedy with a fierce soundtrack, The Hitman’s Bodyguard plays on its irreverence. Nearly everybody notoriously lethal hit man Darius Kincaid (Samuel L. Jackson) has ever met wants him dead. But that will only happen if Michael Bryce (Ryan Reynolds) – the bodyguard recruited to protect him – doesn’t shoot him first … out of sheer…
