Helen Garner’s semi-autobiographical 2008 novel about the hell of offering a spare room to a good friend with stage four cancer resonated strongly. It collected a series of gongs, including Victorian and Queensland Premiers’ Literary Awards and the Barbara Jefferis Award. And now, following five years of work, composer Dr Jane Hammond and librettist Theresa…
Unquestionably dark and haunting, Benjamin Britten’s The Turn of the Screw paints a devastating picture of distress and, possibly, madness. It concerns a governess appointed to look after two orphaned children on the strict condition that she never contact their guardian, an uncle too busy to take care of them. Apprehensive about taking on the…
It has been tucked away for the best part of 50 years, but thankfully Victorian Opera has revived a quintessentially Australian musical about bushranger Ned Kelly. With book and lyrics by Reg Livermore AO, the story in the company’s new production is compelling. It moves from the northern districts of Victoria and the formation of…
A beaut way for the young to be introduced to opera in the company of loved ones. That is the key to the success of The Magic Pudding: The Opera, an operatic adaptation of Norman Lindsay’s 1918 children’s classic. The story concerns thievery of a cantankerous magic pudding named Albert. He is a walking, talking…
Victorian Opera continues to delight, this time with an hilarious, uplifting and thoroughly entertaining production of Gilbert and Sullivan’s slapstick favourite. I am in awe of the vocal calisthenics of soprano Nina Korbe. What an extraordinary talent she is. Hers is a golden voice worth travelling from far afield to hear. In fact, she is…
A couple of fraught relationships and bygone days are at the heart of Stephen Sondheim’s pointed Tony Award-winning musical, Follies. Each year, between the world wars, Dimitri Weismann (Grant Piro) used to stage Follies, which featured beautiful chorus girls, in a Broadway theatre. It is now 1971. The theatre is in disrepair and facing demolition…
The cutthroat razor is sharpened and ready for the kill in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. Forty-five years on, the musical thriller set in 19th century England retains its bite. It is a tale of murder, vengeance, cannibalism and entrepreneurial spirit. Benjamin Barker has been framed and is exiled to a penal…
Eucalyptus, the fully realised new opera, made its premiere at Brisbane Festival in a co-production by Opera Australia, Victorian Opera, Perth Festival and Opera Queensland. Based on Murray Bail’s fantastical, haunting 1998 novel of the same name and winner of the Miles Franklin Award, Eucalyptus was first performed in a concert version earlier this year…
Can one truly escape one’s past? Can true love win out? These are questions posed in Giacomo Puccini’s La Rondine (The Swallow). The three-act lyric opera set in Paris and on the French Riviera concerns the fate of a mistress. She – Magda – and her provider, the wealthy Rambaldo, are hosting a cocktail party…
Exactly what is the best of all possible worlds? You may well ask that question before, during and after watching the delicious Broadway operetta Candide. The focus is on the hapless titular character (Lyndon Watts), who is schooled by the ever-optimistic Doctor Pangloss (Eddie Perfect). Perfect, who doubles as the philosopher Voltaire, narrates the musical mayhem that ensues…
