Category: Theatre
Review: The Unfriend Is The Escape We Need Right Now
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★★★★☆ Steven Moffat has written some very successful TV shows such as Coupling, the Emmy Award-winning Sherlock, and Dr Who. One of my favourite Dr Who episodes, ‘Blink’, introduced the murderous Weeping Angels, inspired by cemetery statuary. Moffat clearly understands basic human fear because that Dr Who episode is a genuinely creepy, scary affair. Fear, though, can…
Review: Eliza Is A Trippy Thriller Masterpiece
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★★★★½ There is no buzzword more pertinent in today’s society than ‘AI’. While the modern world endlessly debates the topic, Eliza takes us back to where it all began – to raw, human emotion and simple origins that spiralled out of control. Shedding light on a true tale often forgotten…
Review: Pride and Prejudice* (*sort of) Embraces The Giddy Chaos Of Girlhood
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★★★★★ Pride and Prejudice* (*sort of), produced by Neil Gooding Productions and Woodward Productions, tells the beloved story of Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy through the eyes of the family’s hilarious servants. It finds an unrelenting joy in the trivial dramas featured in the original story and embraces the utter…
The Bachelor of Acting Class of 2026 Takes Their Final Bow At Showcase
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There is something special about reaching the end of three years of acting training. By the time a graduating class arrives at its final Showcase, the audience has the opportunity to see not just what they can do, but the remarkable range of work they have explored along the way.…
Review: Death Of A Salesman Buries The Great Myth
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★★★★★ Late in Death of a Salesman, Willy Loman empties soil from a white sack and spreads it into a mound. He wants to plant something because nothing will grow around his boxed-in Brooklyn home. On Dale Ferguson’s stark stage, the pile already resembles a grave. The image gathers everything…
Review: Girls & Boys Delivers A Whiplash You Don’t See Coming
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★★★★☆ Sydney Theatre Company’s Girls & Boys creates an illusion of safety and comfort, then takes it apart, piece by piece. Justine Clarke has the audience spellbound in Dennis Kelly’s one-woman play, now back at Wharf 1 Theatre, lulling us in with amusing anecdotes before revealing something far darker. The opening scene…
Review: The Homecoming Finds Dark Humour In A Family At War
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★★★★★ The Homecoming is a dark comedy by Harold Pinter exploring the complex relationship of a family of men living in North London. This familial relationship is pushed to its limits when one of the sons returns home after years away with his wife, whom the rest of his family have…
Review: Housework Brings Scandal, Ambition & Aussie Wit To The Stage
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★★★★½ I’m a sucker for a political drama. I’ve spent probably too many nights binge-watching the usual suspects: Scandal or Parks and Recreation. Sydney Theatre Company’s Housework has everything you love about your classic political romp: backroom dealings, deception and a good old-fashioned power play, but with a distinctly Australian…
Review: LUKE Is A Provocative New Voice In Australian Theatre
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★★★★★ LUKE by Angus Cameron is an extraordinary queer Australian story premiering at Red Stitch Theatre in Melbourne. Trust me when I say you want to be part of the crowd that can say they saw it first, because I have a feeling this provocative new work is going to become…
Review: The Sunshine Boys Sees Old Friends, Feuds & Great Comedy
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★★★★½ Willie Clark still gets Variety delivered. His nephew brings it around, and the old vaudevillian checks the obituaries. When the bookings stop coming, there is always the satisfaction of outliving the competition. It is a wonderfully sour detail in Neil Simon’s The Sunshine Boys, like the milk he’s forgotten…
Review: Scenes With Girls 2026 Brisbane Festival
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★★★½ Following a sold-out 2024 season, Scenes with Girls returns, this time as part of Queensland Theatre’s 2026 DOOR 3 program in a season for Brisbane Festival. Written by Miriam Battye and presented by Matilda Award-winning independent theatre company Salad Days Collective, Scenes With Girls explores the raw and emotional…
Black Swan Perth Premieres New Work Day (After Day) In The Life Of The Useless
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When life is falling apart, can AI help mend a broken heart? Black Swan State Theatre Company presents the world premiere of Day (After Day) In The Life Of The Useless, a razor sharp and unexpectedly moving new comedy from acclaimed Western Australian playwright and performer Will O’Mahony, playing at…
Review: Koreaboo La Boite Theatre 2026 Brisbane Festival
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★★★★☆ La Boite Theatre presents Koreaboo, an enlightening perspective on adoptee reconnection and coming to grips with one’s identity.Facing the personal struggles that come with early adulthood, Hannah (Michelle Lim Davidson) is eager to reunite with her biological mother, Soon Hee (Heather Jeong), in Korea and learn more about her…
Review: Strong Is The New Pretty 2026 Brisbane Festival
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★★★★☆ I am a theatre guy, not a sports guy. I did, however, grow up in an NRL household (insert eye roll). My memories include Broncos flags hanging out the front of the house and my parents yelling at the TV. I never understood the hype. I am, however, always…
Review: Strategic Love Play Explores Dating & The Art Of Not Knowing
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What happens when two strangers meet after the endless swiping, matching and messaging of modern dating? Strategic Love Play sees playwright Miriam Battye turn the awkwardness of a first date into something much more unpredictable. Presented by Sharehouse Production Company in association with Flight Path Theatre, the production places two…
Review: Death Of A Salesman Asks Whether The Life We Are Chasing Is Actually Worth Having
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★★★★½ There are some theatre experiences that demand a drink afterwards. Death of a Salesman opened at the Lyric Theatre, QPAC, on a Sunday afternoon, which turned out to be the perfect time to see it. The performance runs for around three hours, giving you just enough time to find somewhere…
Review: GRIMM Is A Dazzling Display Of Pure Pandemonium
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★★★★½ Occupying the sinister space between Disney sunshine and scandalous Sondheim, GRIMM drags us into a dark, desolate forest, where familiar faces lurk in the shadows. The classic, enduring fairytales popularised by the Brothers Grimm are retold, with a terrible twist. It all starts innocently enough: we meet the little…
Review: The Book Of Everything Reminds Us That Life Doesn’t Need To Be Complicated
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★★★★☆ Neil Armfield’s revival of The Book of Everything at Belvoir St Theatre is a joyous, playful delight. It’s a totally refreshing production in a world full of endless digital noise, and a constant push for faster is better. Richard Tulloch’s adaptation of Guus Kuijer’s 2004 Dutch novel premiered on…
Review: Commentary Asks Who Gets The Tell The Story When Everyone Is Watching
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★★★★★ Five windowpanes divide a large blue box. Tall screens shaped like smartphones stand on either side. The stage is empty, but Nick Atkinson’s voice is already filling it, delivering the director’s commentary for his film Low. Matilda Woodroffe’s set establishes the visual grammar of Ash Flanders’ Commentary: windows, mirrors,…
Review: Cleopatra & Antony Brings New Perspectives To An Old Tragedy
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★★★★☆ Melbourne Shakespeare Company returns to fortyfivedownstairs with Cleopatra & Antony, an adaptation of Shakespeare’s historical tragedy by Sonya Suares. Serving as an abridged retelling of the original, Cleopatra & Antony explores the roles the title characters play in both the text and in history. But viewers might find it doesn’t go far enough…
Review: The Gospel According To Paul Has Plenty To Preach About
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★★★½ There’s a very specific problem with reviewing a show about Paul Keating when you were just a kid when the man left office. You understand enough to know why everyone’s laughing, but every now and then a joke sails straight over your head and lands somewhere around 1993. That…
Review: The Jungle and The Sea Is A Sweeping Story Of Family, War & Survival
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★★★★☆ We see theatre to be transported to different worlds, to understand neglected stories, to connect with character and taste the gamut of emotion. It’s a big ask, and it’s rare that a single work can deliver on all fronts. But Belvoir St Theatre and Melbourne Theatre Company’s ambitious new…
Review: Do Not Go Gentle Refuses To Go Quietly
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★★★★☆ What does a crew of early 20th-century explorers to Antarctica have in common with a group of modern-day aged care residents? A boundless hope, an adventurous spirit, regrets, and more. They explore life’s biggest questions in Patricia Cornelius’s beautifully haunting Do Not Go Gentle, presented by Queensland Theatre Company.…
Review: Death Of A Salesman Is A Devastating Reminder Of The Cost Of Success
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★★★★☆ Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman may have premiered in 1949, but Neil Armfield’s devastating production makes it abundantly clear that Willy Loman’s struggle is far from a relic of post-war America. More than seven decades later, we are still chasing the promise of success, measuring ourselves by titles, salaries and…
Review: The Sound Inside Listens To The Stories We Tell Ourselves
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★★★★★ A woman stands beneath an illuminated streetlamp beside an empty park bench on Yale University’s campus. It is the middle of the night and she cannot sleep. Dressed in the yellows and browns of an academic, or possibly Velma from Scooby-Doo, Michelle Nightingale’s Bella Baird is alone but never…
Review: Animal Farm Finds New Bite In Orwell’s Warning
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★★★★☆ On Wednesday night, Bloomshed opened a new season of Animal Farm, based on the novella by George Orwell, at Melbourne Arts Centre’s Fairfax Studio. Presenting at first blush as a bombastic, comedic take on the literary classic, Animal Farm manages to deliver a surprisingly potent message on our current times. Bloomshed is…
Review: Second Coming Is Saving The Planet, One Laugh At A Time
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★★★★☆ La Boite Theatre and Playlab Theatre present Second Coming, a spectacular and humorous take on leaving this world for another. Set in 2065, this world premiere, directed by Ian Lawson, imagines a future where Earth is burning, and humanity’s last hope lies in an ambitious mission to save its…
Review: Reservoir Dogs Meets Shakespeare In Playful Mash Up
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★★★½ The lyrical genius of Shakespeare collides with the razor‑edged storytelling of Quentin Tarantino in The Ghostlight League’s return to William Shakespeare’s Reservoir Dogs. Written by Sydney Shakespeare Company Artistic Director Steven Hopley and directed by The Ghostlight League Artistic Director Rob Lloyd, the production delivers exactly what its title…
Review: A View From The Bridge Is A Must See At New Theatre
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★★★★★ New Theatre’s production of Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge is a powerful exploration of the fallacies of masculinity. Tragic playwright Arthur Miller is best known for the 1949 play Death of a Salesman and the 1953 play The Crucible. A View from the Bridge came out not…
Review: Gunawarra Re-Creation, 2026 Clancestry Festival
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★★★★★ “To see my culture. To hear my language. To see my traditional dance on a mainstage is beyond my wildest dreams and beyond my ancestors’ wildest dreams. Telling this story has been a gift. Weaving creation stories with narratives of today are vital in understanding who I am and…
