Virgins and Cowboys

The 2015 FLIGHT: Festival of New Writing is a new and exciting venture between Theatre Works, Footscray Community Arts Centre and the Masters of Writing for Performance course at the Victorian College of the Arts (VCA). Featuring five new works by VCA graduates, the festival promises to be a chance to show off original and dynamic Australian works. One show featuring in the festival is Morgan Rose’s Virgins and Cowboys. Coming off from an incredibly well-received season with MKA Theatre at Melbourne Theatre Company’s NEON season with Lord Willing and the Creek Don’t Rise, Beat had a chat with Rose about her upcoming show and what inspired her to write it.

Kerith Manderson-Galvin on 186,000

Kerith Manderson-Galvin is one of those performers who is fascinating to watch – as are the plays she has created and written.

Over the last few years, Kerith has been a regular player on the independent stages of Melbourne. Recent works have included Being Dead (Don Quixote) – which she performed in for Midsumma 2015 – and don’t bring Lulu (Union House Theatre, 2014). She was also seen on stage last year in Nicola Gunn’s fantastic production of Green Screen as part of the MTC NEON Festival. And don’t even get me started on all the shows she’s done with MKA Theatre! And speaking of MKA, as part of this year’s Midwinta Festival, Kerith, along with MKA, has run a number of panels and recently had a development season of her new show 186,000.

Stories I Want To Tell You In Person

Originally performed as part of the 2013 season at Malthouse Theatre in Melbourne, Lally Katz’s one woman show Stories I Want to Tell You in Person is now part of the Melbourne International Film Festival. As one of Australia’s most acclaimed playwrights (with her most recent production Timeshare premiering at Malthouse to rave reviews), Katz made her acting debut in Stories I Want to Tell You in Person after writing the show for Belvoir Theatre when they rejected her previous show. Adapted for the screen by director Erin White (ABC TV’s It’s a Date and At Home with Julia), Katz has bought her show to the big screen and it is sure to charm audiences just as she did when it was on stage.

Death and the Maiden

Written in the wake of the Pinochet regime in Chile, Ariel Dorfman’s captivating, psychological thriller Death and the Maiden was performed by the Melbourne Theatre Company in 1993 and, 22 years later, is making its return to the MTC stage in a new production starring Susie Porter, Eugene Gilfedder and Steve Mouzakis and directed by Leticia Càceres (who recently directed MTC’s Birdland). Beat had the opportunity to speak to Mouzakis, who has had an impressive career over the years including theatre (MTC’s The Cherry Orchard for which he won the Green Room award for Best Actor), film (Spike Jonze’s Where the Wild Things Are) and television (Christos Tsiolkas’ The Slap).

The Lonely Wolf (or an incomplete guide for the unadvanced soul)

Melbourne Theatre Company’s NEON season, now in its third year, has once again provided Melbourne audiences with the work of some of the best independent artists this town has to offer. One artist involved in this season is the award-winning director Gary Abrahams of Dirty Pretty Theatre. Inspired by the Herman Hesse’s novel Steppenwolf and the writings of American philosopher and psychoanalyst James Hillman, Abrahams has created The Lonely Wolf (or an incomplete guide for the unadvanced soul), which promises to be an irreverent dance-theatre production that chews up Hesse’s surrealist story and spits out an anarchic work about madness and love.

Birdland

Photo by Gina Milicia

In a world where Kim Kardashian and Kanye West are worshipped and a world where we are obsessed with celebrity breakdowns, Melbourne Theatre Company’s upcoming production of Birdland could not be more well-timed. Written by award-winning British playwright Simon Stephens as an examination of fame, fortune and decadent disregard in a celebrity obsessed world, this Australian premiere introduces us to Paul, a damaged rock star idol whose fame and fortune is at an all time high. Taking on this demanding role is Mark Leonard Winter in what is his MTC debut. When speaking with Winter, he expresses a great passion for this character, no matter how unlikeable he may appear to others.