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Arts / Theatre plumps for good acting and genre-busting plays

HAMLET’S favourite actors were famed for their expertise in “tragical-comical-historical-pastoral” plays, and if you throw in some music and dance, that pretty well sums up Canberra Theatre Centre’s 2018 “Collected Works” subscription season.

“Master Class” with Amanda Muggleton. Photo by Richard De Chazal

Launched this evening (Monday, October 16) before an enthusiastic crowd of theatrical punters, this is a season that spells out the theatre’s commitment to good acting and genre-busting plays.

First up in February is a tribute to theatrical royalty as Amanda Muggleton reprises her role as diva Maria Callas in Terrence McNally’s celebrated play “Master Class”. Former Canberra director and Olivier award-winner Adam Spreadbury-Maher returns from the King’s Head Theatre in London to direct.

On the tragical-historical front, Bell Shakespeare is to the fore with “Antony and Cleopatra” (billed contentiously as “the most famous couple that ever lived”), directed by Peter Evans and a second play, “Julius Caesar”, directed as a political thriller by Bell’s associate director James Evans in his first main-stage production for the company.

“Sense and Sensibility”. Photo by James Hartley

A pastoral motif abounds in the decor for the SA Theatre Company’s production of Kate Wallis’s Austen adaptation “Sense and Sensibility”, surely a crowd pleaser, while Lee Lewis’s production of “The Bleeding Tree” is a murder ballad set in a very different rural environment – a dirty, dry town in rural Australia.

“The Aspirations of Daise Morrow”. Photo by Tim Standing

Charismatic actor Trevor Jamieson returns to star in a raucous comedy, “The Season”, set on Tasmania’s Dog Island, while Garry Stewart’s Australian Dance Theatre makes a welcome return visit with his exploration of metamorphosis in “The Beginning of Nature”, accompanied live by The Zephyr Quartet, which will also surface in “The Innovations”, a hook up between the Canberra International Music Festival. Brink Productions will stage “The Aspirations of Daise Morrow”, based on a Patrick White story.

Comedy thrives in this season with Sydney Theatre Company’s indigenous Australian counterpart to “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” in Nakkiah Lui’s romantic comedy “Black is the New White”.

Favourites of the Canberra Theatre calendar are on the program, with Bangarra translating Bruce Pascoe’s historically revisionist work “Dark Emu” into dance, Sydney Dance Company bringing Rafael Bonachela’s full-length work “ab [intra]” and Opera Australia reprising John Bell’s English-language production of “Madame Butterfly”.

A first for the centre is a quirky collection of “Indie Works”, programming manager Gill Hugonnet’s personal selection of more outrageous shows, not least the hilarious “Oedipus Schmoedipus”, which gives women and the audience a role to play in death scenes from the great tragedies.

In a genuine coup, the theatre has secured the “rip-roaring, heartbreaking” play, “A Pacifist’s Guide to the War on Cancer” from London’s Complicité company in collaboration with writer Bryony Kimmings.

Karen Vickery in “Switzerland”. Photo by Dominic Northcott

Great news for Canberra is that our very own Pigeonhole Theatre has been engaged for a production of Joanna Murray Smith’s play “Switzerland”, directed by Jordan Best and featuring two of our top actors, Karen Vickery and Lachlan Ruffy.

Virginia Gay in “Calamity Jane”. Photo by John Mcrea

And after this year’s musicals, it’s time to jump on to the Deadwood Stagecoach for Hayes Theatre’s rare revival of “Calamity Jane”, starring Virginia Gay and featuring simply wonderful songs such as “Black Hills of Dakota,” and “Secret Love.”

The season winds up with the Wharf Revue’s brand of “excruciating jokes and acidic satire”.

Subscription bookings for “Collected Works 2018” to canberratheatrecentre.com.au or 6275 2700.

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Helen Musa

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