Sexual Misconduct of the Middle Classes | Melbourne Theatre Company with Belvoir

Image by Jaimi Joy

[NOTE: This review contains a major spoiler in the second to last paragraph. Audience members who wish to be surprised are advised not to read it.]

When the #MeToo movement went viral in 2017 it began exposing the complicity of the entertainment industry in maintaining and covering up predatory power dynamics between older male gatekeepers and younger women new to the industry who saw their exploitation as a necessary stepping stone in their burgeoning careers. But that power dynamic was not new nor was it limited to Hollywood. Hannah Moscovitch’s 2020 script illustrates the same patterns alive and well in academia and the writing industry.

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Wherever She Wanders | Griffin Theatre Company

Image by Brett Boardman

The last time Kendall Feaver’s work appeared on Griffin’s stage was the dense and jagged examination of mental illness The Almighty Sometimes. In this new work, Feaver takes on an equally thorny topic of sexual assault on university campuses, as well as the implications for feminism, racism, and the power imbalances that uphold these sacred institutions of knowledge.

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1984! The Musical! | New Theatre

George Orwell’s dystopian political satire has had a resurgence of popularity since the 2016 US Presidential Election, the revelation of Facebook’s interest in spreading misinformation, and the generalised fascist-y turn global politics has taken recently. This new adaptation looks specifically to the funny side of surveillance and turns the 1949 novel into a comedy and a musical.

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