Image by Dawn Pugh
Closing out their 2018 season, the Lane Cove Theatre Company brought the world of Dr Seuss to the stage for a fun-filled production appealing to kids and adults alike. The most beloved childhood characters of the Cat in the Hat, Horton, the Grinch, Yertle the Turtle, and all their friends are brought alive for a musical extravaganza.
Image by Clare Hawley
It’s the roaring 20s again and Queenie wants to hold a party to end all parties, one where she can get loose and wild and show off just how she likes. Little Triangle’s latest production is a truly wild party full of debauchery, danger, and, most importantly, dancing.
Image by Clare Hawley
In its Australian premiere, the newest iteration of Stalker: the Musical explores themes of love and fear in a nameless town under the control of an all-powerful Mayor. When a Stranger wanders into the lives of the townspeople, he introduces new ideas that completely change what they’ve always thought to be true.
Image by Christopher Starnawski (Omnes Photography)
The team behind Little Triangle are at it again, bringing forgotten musical theatre gems back to the stage for a new audience. This time, instead of a single show, there are a lot of little bits plucked from their narrative context and woven into A Little Cabaret.
Image by Stephen Reinhardt
After a stellar start and a bumpy descent in her music career, Emjay has become disenchanted with music, her once true joy. Now she teaches singing to all sorts of characters looking to find a way to tell their story in song. One day a special student arrives and re-awakens the love Emjay thought she’d lost.
Image by Dawn Pugh
They look like any other normal family: a father as breadwinner, a mother as caretaker, a deadbeat son, and an overachieving daughter. But this family is working hard to hide their grief and gain control over their mother’s spiralling mental health. Next to Normal is a musical about coming to terms with the past and finding a middle ground everyone can feel steady on.
Carousel sells itself as a misunderstood love story: Julie, a respectable yet unusual girl, falls in love with the rough-around-the-edges Billy, a carousel barker with a seedy background. Things are difficult from the beginning as Billy takes out his anger and paranoia around marriage on Julie, until he eventually hits her. In a money-making scheme gone wrong, Billy unexpectedly dies and is given the chance for a redemption arc that requires a supernatural element.
Image by Rebeccalynne Photography
If recreating the classic Stephen King horror novel as a Broadway musical sounds like a bad idea to you, you’re not alone. Carrie, with music by Michael Gore, lyrics by Dean Pitchford, and book by Lawrence D Cohen, was one of the biggest flops in Broadway history. Closing after 16 previews and 5 performances, it’s a show nobody wanted to touch for nearly 25 years. This version of events focuses a lot less on the supernatural and gruesome elements and instead turns the story into a high school drama about the consequences of bullying. With the prominence of school shootings and religious extremism still in our news cycles, this production seems timely with a touch of something darker.
Little Triangle is a brand new Sydney theatre company dedicated to reprising under-performed musicals at a ticket price point that doesn’t cost their audience a week’s rent. As an effort to expand and diversify the musical theatre scene in Sydney, this is a valiant way to open a company. Their second production, Merrily We Roll Along, just closed their season at the Depot Theatre to wide praise and keen look-outs for their next show!
Image by Keshav Unhelkar
PARADE is a show that fits at the intersection of a few pertinent global discussions: racial and religious persecution, misogyny and violence against women, and a lighter resurgence of American historical musicals. Perhaps the consistent feeling that the political climate of the United States is sliding further and further into the past is calling people to turn to staged political events with clearer moral codes and reliable heros’ journeys. Whatever the reason, director Hayden Tonazzi’s desire to add purpose and meaning to the society’s choice of major production is a commendable one.
Night Writes 