Uncategorized – Augusta Supple

Tartuffe | Bell Shakespeare

Augusta Supple — Sun, 24 Aug 2014 02:49:29 +0000

Every now and again there is a production which stumbles into the light, into the expectant eyes, minds, hearts of an audience and explodes with such intelligence, rigor and joy that it is irrepressible. The audience squeals and hums with delight, the box office is exhausted and the artists have that warm, nourished glow of knowing that the work will sit as an ultimate touchstone of true delights in their wide reaching careers.

Peter Evans’ production of Justin Fleming’s re-penning of Tartuffe is one such production.

The reviews have been glorious, syrupy effusions – full of praise for the production, the script and performances:
John McCallum The Australian
Polly Simons for Stage Noise
Chris Hook writes for The Daily Telegraph
Jessica Keath for The Guardian
Ben Neutze for Daily Review

There has been in recent years a fairly hefty national discussion about the role of adaptation on the main stages – best read Alison Croggon for the overview, the question of Australia’s theatrical exhaustion as proposed by Dr Julian Meyrick in his platform Paper “The Retreat of Out National Drama” which you can read about here and also what constitutes an “Australian Play” – best read Jane Howard here. – and yet most of these concerns melt into oblivion when there is a production like Tartuffe staring us in the face.

As a long time cheerleader of Australian playwrights, and a long time skeptic of the notion of classics for classic’s sake – Tartuffe answered many industrial injustices I have for a long time squirmed at. My quibbles about the ancient western canon being trotted out by mainstages like a trophy wife of international cultural capital, are fairly basic and point to the sticky and undesirable residue of Australia’s lingering cultural cringe. Such quibbles include:
1. The tendency for classic text to be delivered in a variety of British accents (yes even mainstage productions of classical Greek tragedies have had the royal vocal treatment)
2. The production budget not including a wage for a playwright
3. The complete dismissal of Australian social or political life in reference to the themes and the style of the material
4. A tendency for classical plays to whitewash casting which refuses to accurately reflect the diverse backgrounds of modern Australia on our stages.
5. The programming of classic plays guarantees a cookie-cutter audience development strategies -eg schools – and does not seek to establish new audiences for new writers.

And there are countless arguments about who does this – and how and if we should have cultural KPIs on art -or on audience development. And these discussions will be constant and ongoing.

In the instance of Bell Shakespeare’s production of Justin Fleming’s Tartuffe – we see all these quibbles smashed and reduced to insignificance: the cultural and industrial aspects addressed, cleared the way for what is a production which is uniquely self-aware of nationality, of language and vernacular, of cynical political sensibility – including hearty irreverence and an ability to lean deeply into larrikinism, and of course our exceptional local artists… all aligned under the furrowed gaze of Peter Evans to make what will be remembered as the production to which all aspired to reach the heady heights of what our main stage companies do best.

This is Bell Shakespeare at it’s best – smart, funny, relevant, epic, sexy, saucy, cheeky, brutal fun.

The Composer Is Dead | Sydney Opera House

Augusta Supple — Sun, 10 Aug 2014 14:46:02 +0000

Children’s content is possibly the most important content in the world – films, music, theatre can create a moral, personal, ethical compass for a child beyond their familial and educational realm. The experience can set up a child for life – or cure it of ever wanting to spend time in or near a theatre. It is particularly difficult as society emerges with children and babies being more photographed and publicly “shared” via facebook and other mediums – than ever before in history. The idea of self, entertainment and non-screen based activity for children has changed and will change from the former frames of work. Children have – more than ever – on-demand access to a wide variety of entertainment and so theatre for children is a competitive sport requiring great nibbleness and a suite of skills.

In theatre, the audience is 50% of the equation – and if the audience is not right for the show – or the show not right for the audience – it can be an unfortunate mismatch. In the realm of children – this is even more of a sensitive topic – whereby certain ages will exclaim that something is baby-ish whilst others will be so bored/disengaged they will wiggle in their seats, look at anything but the stage and ask loud questions of their parents about what is for lunch or why are they there. (All questions definitely worth asking). Sometimes well-meaning parents – citing their four year old is a genius will take them along to a 7-year-olds + performance, only to be surprised that the content doesn’t match the child. It happens.

What I think is more interesting to consider is how the content – the story, the language, the imagery, the stage craft – tells the story it is telling to the audience it is telling it to. And that is the essence of understanding reviews.

But enough with this melange of social theory, philosophy and pro-review propaganda… the matter at hand is The Composer is Dead an orchestral mystery by Lemony Snicket. I couldn’t help but race through Walter Benjamin’s Death of the Author whilst watching this new production. I couldn’t help but think of the notion that this might be an introduction to the Opera House for many young people. It might be the first time seeing an orchestra. I thought of the awe and wonder I had beholding that building for the first time. As I watched I tried to imagine and connect to being tiny and new to art – what would I think of this man in the moustache and all those wooden, twirly, shiny curly instruments?

Then I sat back and relaxed…

Written for www.australianstage.com

Large white sails interrupting a beautiful blue Sydney sky, the be-pebbled concrete of the foyer, the grandeur of a tiered wooden concert hall – offering the promise of something grand, befitting the scale of awe and wonder of architecture.

There is a charm in children’s literature which offers an irreverent playfulness – an element of infinite possibility, and an exemplary example is that of Lemony Snicket. It’s hardly surprising his is a pseudonym – or that he has a revolving biography that offers a fresh take on identity. Everything from: “Lemony Snicket was born in a small town where the inhabitants were suspicious and prone to riot. He now lives in the city. During his spare time he gathers evidence and is considered something of an expert by leading authorities” to “Lemony Snicket was born before you were and is likely to die before you as well. A studied expert in rhetorical analysis, Mr. Snicket has spent the last several eras researching the travails of the Baudelaire orphans” and “Lemony Snicket published his first book in 1999 and has not had a good night’s sleep since. Once the recipient of several distinguished awards, he is now an escapee of several indistinguishable prisons. Early in his life, Mr. Snicket learned to reupholster furniture, a skill that turned out to be far more important than anyone imagined.”

It’s a mystery!

As is the latest local production of a show commissioned by the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra “The Composer is Dead!” Written by Nathaniel Stookey with text by Lemony Snicket, it is billed as a “cutting-edge introduction to the classical music.” What it is though, is an introduction to an orchestra, to the humour and philosophical musings of the very, very clever Lemony Snicket. On this occasion the joy and delight of orchestral music is placed firmly in the baton of Brian Buggy and the Sydney Youth Orchestra – and the joy of interrogation and vaudevillian ham in the agile wit and charm of our host Frank Woodley (comedian /professional show off of “Lano and Woodley” fame who has also starred in Thank God You’re Here, Bewilderbeest, Optimism, Inside)and directed by Craig Ilott (Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Smoke & Mirrors, La Clique Royale). It is less an introduction to classical music and more a witty expose of orchestral identity riffing on classical music from the Western canon.

It is nearly impossible not to want our host to succeed – he’s self-reflective, goofy, awkward and determined – and we love him for his terrible moustache and because he is easily flattered by the woodwind section. In the spirit of Snicket, Woodley is playful, energetic and clever – and it is a big stage, a big orchestra –he swings through the sections always keeping his eye on the prize – us. It’s a big ask for such a big room, and Woodley and Illot serve the story and the context with grand gestures befitting of the backdrop made of swathes of red velvet.

There is a simplicity in the production that is appealing – charming in the grandeur of it all. But there is a disconnect between the concept of an “introduction” and a playful riffing on assumed knowledge. Unfortunately the former is not sufficient to support the later – and the show itself is best pitched to those who have some prior experience of orchestral music who are ready for the references and the knowing nods to composers (and decomposers) to slide slickly into the story.

For any child and parent familiar with the grandeur of classical orchestral music The Composer is Dead is guaranteed to amuse and delight by the mere charm of simple story told well.

Inner Garden | De Quincey Co

Augusta Supple — Sun, 06 Apr 2014 04:18:22 +0000

That familiar twist and turn of the road, pitted with holes and crumbling bitumen – I’d look up more at the arcing trees if the twists and turns and the potholes in the road didn’t keep my eyes wide, and darting about – Callan Park.

Callan Park. Previously a meeting site for the Eora Nation, looking over the harbour, now houses so many people, so much potential so many pursuits. Usually I find myself lost on this greenspace’n’ gravel headed to The NSW Writers Centre, or wandering into sandstone buildings with red wine and stained shoes looking at graduate art from Sydney College of the Arts, previously I had been helping a Canadian punk band find their way to The Laneway Festival. On this occasion, for Inner Garden, I was anticipating the new work by Bodyweather practitioner, aesthetic adventurer and performance maker Tess De Quincey.

Having a fifteen year relationship with an artist’s work really matters. For me at the opening of De Quincey Company’s Inner Garden, I felt like a rush of embodied experience finally settled and made sense – like the tetris game was now under control and I wasn’t just experiencing a stacking up or overloading. I’m not sure if it was this particular work, or if it was me – but I felt for the first time, completely spellbound. Previous experiences of De Quincey’s work I felt removed from the ideas – outside or inconsequential to the happenings around me. Inner Garden a completely new mode of engagement – welcoming adventure, an aesthetic treasure hunt of sorts – in a space which I had previously had cursory experiences in.

Elemental and elevated, a man wrapped in plastic sprays gentle spikes of water from the rooftop of the courtyard. Inside the front door a woman is hung up-side-down, carefully watched by a rigging assistant, a gardenbed smokes with a resting body within, other bodies – feathered or armored in leaves hide and shift. There is: cluttered furniture with deliberate graffiti, paper aeroplanes shuffling along a string whilst the evening Sydney sky is interrupted by the heavy exhalation of a aeroplane, a table full of curios and variations on clay and ink and sand themes, a web of cord holding up a boulder, a corset lit by a shard of light dusted with sand, a self perpetuated drum machnine made of bits of tin and drum and wire hidden under a franjipani tree.

Hidden adventures.

The hidden.

Interestingly the connection to land and place and history is probably what made so much sense to me. Callan Park is a beautiful place which sits above a series of tunnels. Earlier in its history as a sanitorium it was considered that the inmates were not to step on the queens land, and so travelled underground. An interesting architectural history too – The lunatic asylum was designed according to the ‘enlightened’ views of Dr Thomas Kirkbride – the idea that architecture (like all art) can help soothe and restore the mind has a long history. Interesting for me the feeling of being locked into a cloister was not as oppressive as I had assumed – perhaps due to the large stretch of night sky- which switched it’s colours from light blue of the day , through various shades of magenta into a dark blue night.

The shift in the work from solo struggles, acts of defiance, aggression, physical/vocal/emotional exertion – to group vignettes – a push or pull, a chasing interweaving – punctuated with timekeeping by a gong. The regimented obedience, the discipline within the chaos.

Beautiful, difficult, spellbinding Inner Garden is to date one of the most sophisticated, intricate and daring installation performances by De Quincey Company.

Dates: 6 – 8 February 2014
Location: Callan Park
Tickets :Full $35 / Concession $30 (plus $2 booking fee)
Concept & Direction: Tess de Quincey
Performers: Victoria Hunt, Linda Luke, Ellen Rijs, Kirsten Packham, Lian Loke & Garth Knight, Weizen Ho, Latai Taumoepeau, Yoka Jones and Dale Thorburn
Installation & Costumes: Tom Rivard & Katja Handt
Sound: Jim Denley, Kraig Grady and Robbie Avenaim
Lighting: Sian James-Holland
Bookings: https://innergarden.eventbrite.com.au

(A short note to apologize for the lateness of this post – a tumultous couple of months full of distraction and duty has lead me a way from celebrating this work – and my memory seems too soft to offer any grand sharp incisions into De Quincey’s practice – but I wanted to note an record this, regardless)

Playwriting Festival 2014 | NSW Writers Centre

Augusta Supple — Fri, 28 Mar 2014 22:20:49 +0000

To me there is nothing more exciting than the convergence of a range of different minds and hearts and voices coming together to collide, clash, reinforce, reveal, support or offer a completely new perspective, a personal perspective. When this convergence is around of and for playwrights, their plight and their inspiration, their resilience, adaptability and experience – well – it’s the perfect way to spend a Saturday.

Today is that Saturday when the grounds of the NSW Writers Centre will host a rabble of playwrights (what is the collective noun for playwrights?) to talk about inspiration, process, producing and all manner of logistical and industrial issues.

In 2012 Australian Theatre’s sweetheart, Kate Mulvany lead us in our first NSW Writers Centre Playwriting Festival with a keynote from the Industry’s Gandalf, John McCallum. This year one of my favourite playwrights, people and personally one of my all time favourite colloborators Vanessa Bates is at the helm. She’s invited the effervescent and brutally quirky Lally Katz to open the festival.

I’ll be there listening and cheering on and provoking and doing all the things I love to do, with the people I love to do it with: playwrights.

To add to the conversation, Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre has developed a brand new residency for performance makers to develop their work in a supportive environment. I’ll be spruiking the residency program and encouraging playwrights to pitch. I’ll also be live tweeting through out the day… so that’s @augustasupple

I’ll be chairing a conversation about the collaborative process with several artists who I admire deeply and endlessly: Hilary Bell, Caleb Lewis and Jane Phegan in the Patrick White Room.

3.30 – 4.15 – The Collaborative Process
Ways of working together.
When does collaboration help the process?
Is it worth committing to a co-writer or a group?
Can you have an ongoing relationship with a director?

More information: http://www.nswwc.org.au/whats-on/festivals-2/playwriting-festival-2014/
Full program: http://www.nswwc.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/PWF-Program-Website.pdf
Tickets: http://www.nswwc.org.au/products-page/play-writing/playwriting-festival-2014/

Fight Night | Sydney Theatre Company and The Border Project and Ontroerend Goed

Augusta Supple — Sun, 23 Mar 2014 07:21:30 +0000

I have no doubt: the personal is political. But who are these “persons” making things of their own politics, and politics of their own person? If we are to examine closely: the politics of me, you, us – would any of us be able to guess how any of our personal politics could steer 90 minutes of entertainment?

The blurb goes a little bit along the lines of:

“Five contenders. Five rounds. You choose. Employing high octane performance and innovative hand-held voting technology, Fight Night is a playful and immersive night of theatre. While your vote may reflect the personalities on stage, the process will be just as revealing about yourself. How fast do you judge or condemn people? Based on what? In a society where beauty prevails and even the world of politics is not safe from the cult of celebrity, director Alexander Devriendt has created a clever political game, treading a fine line between democracy and the tyranny of majority.”

We meet our host. Introduces the devices in our hands, hanging on thick black lanyards around our necks. Introduces the technical crew. Introduces the premise. Introduces five hooded representatives. All caucasian. Tidy. Approachable. Generic. Each with their own appeal, or ability to repulse: visually, vocally, or through attitudes, perspectives or oratory style.

We are about to go through a series of questions about how we want to be represented and by whom – they answer questions, they are asked to speak to us knowing only a statistical figure about the group in the room.
(On opening night at the Sydney Theatre Company Wharf 2 space, we are: aged between 25-44, earning less than $35,000 a year, many of us are single, many are non-religious, many are a little bit racist, many are offended by specific words.)

It’s an interesting exercise on statistics and data collection – especially in this setting, a part of me would prefer to return to another venue or another night to compare reactions…. is the opening night crowd at the STC really that single? Are we really that wealthy? Are we really that mistrusting of the group? Are we really only mildly loyal to the actions of a representative we are loyal to?

I’m not really interested in spoiling the unfolding of our particular night of pushing buttons (and some of us had our political buttons pushed) – because the premise is really what is on show, not the writing or the performances. What is most important about this show is about the individual’s behaviour in response to the group assumption about the group’s behaviour. Is there a main theme? Perhaps. The most simplistic of readings shows how democracy (in at least an Australian context) is flawed.

Yes. I think we knew that.

The more interesting aspect of the show is the personal revelation of where one’s personal attitudinal, moral and ethical values are placed, especially when anonymous voting allows you to reveal where you fit in the spectrum of the room.

The active participation within the system of “Big Brother style” voting off – is, of course, voluntary. At no time are we forced to press a button. But we do. We engage with the format of the show. We are a part of the show’s structure. If we were not to participate there is no repercussion. Except perhaps the show being short or stuck or without significance. In Australia, with compulsory voting, we are well attuned to voting because we have to. A compulsion. Compulsory.

Hypothetical situations are posed. Questions of the audience flip between the general and the specific. For example,
“Which word to you find more offensive? Nigger, Faggot, Cunt, Retard, or none of those words.”
“Are you a little bit Racist, Sexist, Violent or none of these flaws?”
“Are you Religious, Spiritual or Neither?”

As someone who prefers “fair but indecisive” leadership when polled I stayed with the same candidate right to the end of the show. Which is remarkable as I was decisive about this action.

It is an interesting portrait of the political and attitudinal landscape, however as a piece of theatre or art, it lacks conflict, tension or dramatic action. The game changing moments aren’t surprising enough to raise the stakes and at a certain point of the structure – the final point to be made – the stakes aren’t raised sufficiently for us to do anything but to meekly and compliantly either sit in our seats, or quietly dwell in the foyer.

What if this show created an occasion of upheaval? Would the political structure be broken? Could theatre, specifically, could *this* particular piece of theatre change the world, not just represent the flaws of the system that we are already familiar with? Why are we watching it? Are any of us moved to action? Are any of us hope to change the course of the show: to really push the actors through their paces?

No. We are a dull and basic audience to this production, just as we are a dull and basic demographic voting for the latest rehearsed actor to perform the role of politician.

Our politicial system is ineffectual.

Theatre as an artform/agent of change is ineffectual.

We, as an audience, as a population – a majority with ideas, money, influence and community – are ineffectual.

We end as we begin, shrugging and complicit in how things are directed. We are responsible for our actions, their actions, and we despise the machine we feed, and feel powerless to create an alternative structure. And we all eventually walk downstairs.

I look out to the water of Sydney Harbour.
I drink wine.
I listen and engage as those around me remark on the gimmicks of the production.
I engage with the conversation.
I politely smile. (Meanwhile I feel empty, powerless and depressed.)
I don’t say I felt bored. I don’t admit to feeling restless.
I offer alternative dramatic solutions to the flat structure of the performance – not to anyone who could consider them as options.
I walk away.

I am as ineffectual in my theatrical engagement, as much as I am in my political viewpoint. Theatre as a system, mimics the system of politics. And I’m left high and dry.

Perhaps that’s the point.

CREATED BY: The Border Project and Ontroerend Goed
CAST: Sophie Cleary, Valentijn Dhaenens, David Heinrich, Angelo Tijssens, Roman Vaculik, Charlotte Vandermeersch
DIRECTOR: Alexander Devriendt
WHERE: Sydney Theatre Company, Wharf 2 Theatre, Hickson Road, The Rocks
WHEN: Thursday, 20 March 2014 – Sunday, 13 April 2014
TICKETS: $35 – $65 (+ booking fee). Box Office: 02 9250 1777
MORE INFO: http://www.sydneytheatre.com.au/whats-on/productions/2014/fight-night.aspx

A confession… and a want… and a plea…

Augusta Supple — Tue, 18 Mar 2014 12:17:57 +0000

Forgive me, for I’ve been absent. It’s been a month or so since my last blog post – and anyone who has a blog knows that when it all starts backing up it feels horrible: a black, sticky stench of a feeling, weighing and nagging like an unsatisfied heart.

January was the usual carousel of festive delights, jostling and competing for my attention like a throng of over-sugared five-year-olds ready for birthday cake. Sydney Festival is a wonderful time of year, when I feel like I have permission to be the pale-skinned indoor-dwelling person that I am, in a country that is really best suited to the bikini-ed tent pitch-ers. Sydney Festival is the time I see the conservatism and the radicalism of my peers, colleagues and our critics as they bounce between spiegeltents and pop-up stages, venues with a view and venues on the move. It sets the tone of the year of art consumption. It also signals my personally appointed “man-date” month whereby I take my male friends and colleagues to a show (and sometimes dinner) to thank them for being such interesting people. This year was no different.

I saw a bit in January, and wrote very little: I was also quite sick, and holding tight the reigns of my day-job and juggling the usual post-New Year expectations with practicalities, extravagances and well-worn habits, revising and reviewing Board papers and reading new plays… I was a little busy – absent from here, but present elsewhere. So by way of an indication (and perhaps to brag a little) here are the shows/events/films I attended in January:

Cranked Up | Circus Oz
The Hobbit Part II
Empire | Speigeltent
Amanda Palmer | Speigeltent
On the Shore of the Wide World | Griffin Independent
Christian Boltanski’s Chance | Carriageworks
Oedipus Schmedopus | Belvoir
La Voix Humane | Carriageworks
Sarah Blasko & Appelonia Heavenly Sounds | St Stephen’s Church
Project 28 by Roman Ondak | Parramatta Town Hall
Wittenberg | The Old Fitzroy Hotel
The Piper | Carriageworks
Dido & Aeneas | Lyric Theatre
His Music Burns | Carriageworks
Forklift | Carriageworks
The Magic Flute | Opera Australia at SOH
Short, Sweet & Cabaret | New Theatre
Short, Sweet & Cabaret (WildCards) | New Theatre
Ockham’s Razor | Seymour Centre
The Shadow King | Carriageworks

As you can see it was a fairly diverse time of art consumption, peppered with grand conversations with my dear Jane Howard, James Waites, Diana Simmonds, John McCallum – or even a poor unsuspecting artist or friend I’d trap or coax into surrendering a few hours to my interrogation: what did you think? Did you care? Did you feel? What do you remember? What matters about this? etc etc. (Yes, I’m exhausting) I had intended to write about it all… but didn’t. Scraps of responses remain unfinished… and gave way as my laundry, or a new show invite, insistent romantic overtures or other domestic obligations ebbed over me, stared at me.

And then it was February. February was full. And now seems very distant:

Party for Marty | Factory Theatre
Grimskunk | Frankies Pizza by the Slice
Proof | Ensemble Theatre
Inner Garden | DeQuincey Company
Nahrain | Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre
The Long Way Home | Sydney Theatre Company
Dawn Upshaw, Elgar & Greig | Australian Chamber Orchestra
Once in Royal Davids City | Belvoir
Groundswell Launch | Sydney Opera House
Thank You for Being A Friend | Seymour Centre
Jump For Jordan | Griffin Theatre
Platform Paper Launch | Currency House
(a childrens musical I co-authored was produced in Canada)
Eugene Onegin | Opera Australia

In February my desire to write was huge: I was fired up and ready to write… that is I was ready right up until the 11th February. My world stopped with the death of my close friend. I realised I’d never hear him soothe me with the sentence “…and that’s why I call you my Joan of Art….” My days and nights in March really became dedicated to the logistics of boxing his books and papers and arranging a memorial – something I’ve never had to do before. I wrote a post on this blog explaining what happened – a kind of placeholder which has met with praise and condemnation in equal measure. The night of the day he died, I went to the opening of Once in Royal David’s City at Belvoir without him. I thought I should write something – but I couldn’t. Silent. Barely finding time to do a desperate load of laundry, check my voicemail or brush my hair. And other hugely difficult circumstances took my breath away, in a way I don’t care to detail except to say, these three months have been one of the most difficult periods of my life – and has involved lawyers, a death, several contracts, much negotiating, quiet cocooning and has meant I’ve had to examine closely the particular rhythms of my ever-beating romantic heart.

March arrived like a lion, contained the usual demands – Board meetings, laundry, theatre, galleries:

Neko Case | Sydney Opera House
The Collectors Exhibition | King Street Gallery
Women in Theatre Launch | Australia Council for the Arts
The Winters Tale | Bell Shakespeare at SOH
International Women’s Day Celebration
James Waites’ Memorial | Sydney Theatre Company
Ganesh Versus the Third Reich | Carriageworks
Noises Off | Sydney Theatre Company
Stop Kiss | ATYP
Interplay | Sydney Dance Company
Elision | Carriageworks
Meet & Eat | Curious Works
Fight Night | Sydney Theatre Company
NIDA Independent Launch | NIDA
NSW Writers Centre Playwrights Festival 2014 | NSW Writer’s Centre

… And suddenly, here on the 18th – nearing the end of the month – a realisation – another month has passed without me feeling like I have made much of a meaningful impact on the arts… what is my contribution? What am I doing? And why? What for? Who for?

And tonight I had a kind of crisis, a kind of awakening. I was sitting in a show – new music – Elision at Carriageworks to be precise – and I felt this almighty urge to stand up, walk out, unbuckle my shoes and walk on the grass. I didn’t want to sit and listen to the desperate squawking of a clearly talented oboist navigating the terrifying terrain of that sheet music.Usually I can find something to like. The lighting? The atmosphere? The soundscape? The design? A charming performer. I didn’t want to listen to the mumble and moans of a trombonist struggling for air and defying melodic ease.

I felt shut out of art.
Despondent.
Alone.

Tonight I left at interval. Was taken home by my best friend. I thanked her for helping me exercise my free-will. After she left, I reached up into my bookcase and pulled out “A Raffish Experiment: The selected Writings of Rex Cramphorn” Edited by my university lecturer Dr Ian Maxwell. Slid it into my satchel and headed to the pub for beer and tacos. I read. I was reassured. I was reminded. By Rex.

Rex wrote things in 1968 that sting me now. Sharp and impatient readings of dull text choices. Deconstructions of glib designs. Interrogations and confessions of an Industry sick, impoverished and limping along in the shadow of an aged and irrelevant inherited theatre practice from Europe or America.

I doubt it was the beer – might have been the taco – but I feel much relieved.

And thought I’d write a few things to break the drought or the silence or bridge the gap – whatever this hiatus has been – to say:

Make good art. Remember art is to help us transcend our to-do list… our daily obligations (Not push us to run towards them, and away from art) Art is to strengthen and embolden, inspire, invigorate, ready, confront, fortify the human soul for all life’s tragedies and confusions.
Have strong and difficult and beautiful conversations. Proliferate ideas. Offer alternatives always.
Drink tea with someone who understands you – especially how you like your tea.
Don’t waste time pretending you care, or you understand or you’re happy if you’re not.
Call people on their poor behaviour. Forgive people for their poor behaviour.
Fight ignorance, fight oppression. Fight apathy. Fight negligence.
Love profusely, unabashedly, unashamedly, wildly, uniquely, urgently.
Make choices that in all shades of your mood, all phases of the moon, all levels of interrogation – stands up plainly and states clearly “I know what I’m choosing, I can live with the consequences.”

And so…

I’ll get back to thinking about art… I’ll get back to talking about art, life love, tacos…

And now I’m back to writing.

Vale James Waites: Lover of and fighter for the underdog, the glamour puss and all the quirky ratbags

Augusta Supple — Wed, 12 Feb 2014 07:34:11 +0000

James Waites 06.03.1955 – 12.02.2014

Today was a difficult day. The usual morning practicalities and logistics changed with a text message from my mentor and friend, and a voicemail message from a concerned stranger.

James Waites has passed away.

In the early hours of this morning, James went down to Coogee beach for his last swim.

James Waites was a lover.

Many knew his life through a string of reviews and articles about theatre. He was the first to be openly out as a gay writer for a mainstream newspaper.

Jimmy with Madame Lash

Friend and confidant of Patrick White, contemporary of William Yang, friend to countless artists including Jim Sharman: James was ever-present at the start of so many luminaries careers, cheering on the underdog, the undiscovered the left of centre and the unusual.

The luminaries

He loved theatre – for the opportunity it gave to express and engage ideas and feelings. He loved artists and brave statements. And embraced them all with a huge amount of enthusiasm and love.

Having a first read of a Patrick White unpublished manuscript

As his website states:
“James Waites loves are dogs and actors: “Both species are cute to pat, excel in performing wonderful tricks, and lick you all over for humble rewards like liver treats and pieces of cheese ” he observes.”

James Waites was a fighter.

He once told me that being a critic was “really a mix of parish priest and dentist” – and you had to be the bravest to stand up and applaud when everyone else was too scared to. He called a spade a spade – and got fired for it on more than one occasion. He would refuse to clap, exclaim something was “utter crap” if it lacked heart or empathy. He walked his talk. He was brave… early on nick-naming Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton “Glitter and Fluffy.”

He fought not only battles of the intellect and popular opinion, but physical battles. He had suffered great physical pain, living with a range of illnesses and chronic pain and recently diagnosed with Parkinsons Disease which would keep him up at night in fear and frailty. However, his battles were often put aside for others and he often pushed through to present at opening nights.

James Waites loved the underdog.

Look, he loved all dogs. But especially the underdog. His compassion knew no bounds, taking care of lost and stray pups from multiple walks of life… sometimes offering them shelter, food, what little money he had, comfort, perspective. And often this was not to his benefit. He was the first to “find” Paul Capsis and told me how as soon as he met him – he knew he’d be a star. He spotted Steve Peacocke in 2010 deeming him the next Hollywood hero (and yes that has also come to pass) – he had a genuine midas touch of finding talent and promoting it in his wry and cheeky way.

James Waites kept company with Australia’s best and brightest.

On the table in his dining room was a folder of photos for me to scour through. Photos and postcards of him at dinner, on couches, in foyers with Australia’s best and brightest… Everyone knew James. James knew and loved everyone. Even if there were a few overly colourful stories or cheeky secrets of misbehaviour amongst his peers, friends and colleagues, James loved them all. And loved them especially for their flaws.

James Waites was a romantic.

He’d love love stories. He loved romance. Cuddles from handsome men. Sweet words. He didn’t understand why so much sex in Australian theatre seemed so mechanical and forced and unromantic.

I loved James Waites.

He was more than a critic to me.

He was more than a mentor. More than a friend.

James was also my family. I am the keeper of his history, and I’ll be arranging his memorial in the next few days.

He likened us to Grotowskian wolves howling to each other in the darkness. At 2am or 6am or 1pm whenever – I’d stop to answer his call. He’d stop to answer mine. We spoke, texted or wrote to each other daily in the last 2 years of his life.

We were collaborators. I read all his reviews and edited made suggestions – for the Australian Book Review, his essay for Belvoir’s 25th Anniversary Book. His Currency House Platform paper: Whatever Happened to the STC Actor’s Company. He’d read me, give me notes… tell me when I was on track… or too soft. He introduced me to everyone.

People he loved, artists he admired. The arts was his life. His community meant everything to him.

Though he couldn’t write often due to his energy levels and the side effects of medication and his Parkinsons… but a facebook post attracting comment and likes from his community would inspire him for days.

Thank you to all those who have called and messaged, texted and contacted me. It’s a sad day for us as we have lost a gentleman, a lover, a parish priest, a dentist, a thinker and one of the worlds most generous humans.

Whilst I begin with the paper and preparations – tying up loose ends and getting things in order – I am reminded through the flood of love, well wishes, offers to assist, offerings of condolences and deed-doing… what a truly remarkable community James gathered around him – full of loving generous, adventurous, compassionate souls. How proud he is, was and would be of how we have come together in this sad moment.

And I will miss him.

Forever. More than anyone will know, and more than I can fathom right now.

As I left Maggie Blinco’s house today, she reminded me of a story that summed James up. Last Christmas she was walking with him and they passed a drunk man on the street who was lying in full Summer sun. James, with little strength and coordination picked up the man, moved him into the shade. The man fell back asleep not knowing that a stranger had helped him.

I thank James for all he has done, to make sure I was sheltered. I already miss his shelter and the comfort of knowing he’s there.

Details of a memorial service will be announced on Friday 21st February 2014 at http://jameswaites.com/ . The memorial will be open to all who loved him, all he loved and those who respected and revered this irreverent, energetic, larrikin statesman of Arts and Culture.

The Shadow King | Malthouse Theatre & Sydney Festival

Augusta Supple — Sun, 26 Jan 2014 02:20:58 +0000

I really can’t think of anything I’d rather not do, besides sit in the dark for many many many hours whilst listening to yet another Shakespearean play get a good “going over” by a company primarily focused on the design in order to create a heavy “universality” statement about the human condition. Thank goodness The Shadow King IS NOT THAT!

Instead what we are greeted with is one of the most culturally significant translations and adaptations of our time.

With ownership and permission laying firmly in the hands of the cast’s elders, Shakespeares story is transformed and translated from Northern Australia to metropolitan centres (previously included in the Melbourne Festival – I had the honour at the Sydney Festival.) With the protocols and processes in place – in regards to cultural practice, representation, use of object – I am in awe and endlessly impressed by the rigor and consideration of message, of story of consultation within the development phase and rehearsal process of this production.

Sometimes I feel particularly overwhelmed by the cultural imperialism we experience on an everyday basis – the subliminal and the celebrated berrate in equal measure. I know that there is a push for globalised everything – but I fear the momentum of cultural imperialism will crush any unique, diverse and alternative presentations of ideas, religions and representation. And I feel overwhelmed. I’m not living in Northern Australia. I do not identify as an Indigenous Australian. I have not had my language, my land, my cultural practices taken from me. My response to such a threat is to fight the obvious aggressive fight. And yet look at this production!

Look! See how the example has been set – to reclaim language. To assert aesthetic. To tell story with and of community. To be conscious of each other, of the message, of the politics and the social structures! What an incredible example of true artistic leadership.

I’m in awe. And grateful.

How can I do anything but sit back and watch, listen to the example set before us – of how to reclaim culture in a real way. An honest way.

Please see this show if you can.

Written for www.australianstage.com.au

Like that of a smashed hourglass, the stage is covered in a large stretch of red earth, scored with lines of land and water. Time and place has been reconfigured: no longer the early years of the 1600s in England, instead a very current portrait of a community in Northern Australia. It is here, in this rust and metal reality that the story of King Lear has been translated and transposed.

The result of a conversation between director Michael Kantor and Tom E Lewis, The Shadow King is an adaptation and translation of William Shakespeare’s King Lear which draws into sharp focus notions of family, power, influence and loyalty within the indigenous community. Honouring cultural protocols, objects, songs and representation of cultural identity have been authorised by the Elders of the cast and crew.

The Shadow King tells the story of King Lear who, in a flight of foolish fancy, decides he is sick of living under white man rule decides to retire to live an easy life and divides up his kingdom based upon the of this daughters (Rarriwuy Hick – Cordelia, Jada Alberts – Goneril and Natasha Wanganeen – Regan). His youngest daughter Cordelia resists entering into competition via a verbal gush of platitudes offered by her sisters. Traveling from house to house with his mob, Lear is soon unwelcome and displaced. In his place we see the hungry ambition of Edmund (Jimi Bani) surface – who orchestrates the framing of his brother murder, seduces and then rapes both Goneril and Regan. The world is rendered unjust and brutal – and the tragedy compounds when Gloucester (Frances Djulibing) is blinded and Lear and Cordelia are locked away in a dirty prison cell.

This is not Shakespeare’s King Lear, nor does it have to be. Nor is the intent to transfer Shakespearean English into the mouths of Indigenous Australians. This is a “white man dreaming” which has been commandeered through aesthetic, tradition and languages into a new story. A story where in the “kingdom” is transposed into a harsh reality – carports stuffed with clutter, a weatherboard house in the outback. A story wherein the courtiers are a mob of musicians. A story wherein the images of exile and gaol are far harsher – due to geography and a social resonance we can’t escape nor deny.

Here we have the Northern Australian experience – The blinding lights (Paul Jackson) from a truck. A blend of English, Kriol and Yolngu Matha (Translated by the cast – Jada Alberts, Jimi Bani, Frances Djulibing, Rarriwuy Hick, Damion Hunter, Kamahi Djordon King, Tom E Lewis, Djakapurra Munyarryun, Natasha Wanganeen). Film images (Natasha Gadd, Rhys Graham, Murray Lui) of houses and land and light. Music which forms and informs the story as soundtrack, as anthems (Music Consultant – Iain Grandage, Musical Arrangements and Direction John Rodgers, Band – Selwyn Burns, Bart Willoughby, Djakapurra Munyarryun) – an experience which for many metropolitan –based Australians is as strange and unfamiliar as Shakespeare’s England. The experience is at once irreverent, welcoming, brutal and confronting.

This is as much a production which serves to remind us about our connection to land and place and community, as it is about the tragic flaw within humans to satisfy their greed and vanity. The Shadow King is an incredible testament to a vision which seeks to break open and subvert cultural and theatrical assumptions through scale, through premise, thorough the integrity of community consultation.

Truly this is a landmark production which not only offers a fresh, local linguistic perspective on a well worn and transplanted classic – but paves the way for a new dialogue about authorship and storytelling.

Ockham’s Razor | Sydney Festival & Seymour Centre

Augusta Supple — Sat, 25 Jan 2014 13:03:54 +0000

There is something very satisfying or attractive about the notion of simplicity. Ockham’s Razor is a theory which privileges simplicity with the notion that “among competing hypotheses, the hypothesis with the fewest assumptions should be selected.” The thinking goes on to suggest that simplicity is natural. (I’ll cite Wikipedia here)

“Prior to the 20th century, it was a commonly held belief that nature itself was simple and that simpler hypotheses about nature were thus more likely to be true. This notion was deeply rooted in the aesthetic value simplicity holds for human thought and the justifications presented for it often drew from theology. Thomas Aquinas made this argument in the 13th century, writing, “If a thing can be done adequately by means of one, it is superfluous to do it by means of several; for we observe that nature does not employ two instruments [if] one suffices.””

Modesty, efficiency, clarity.

All worthwhile pursuits in thinking. And worth pursuing in art. The history of art is complex enough… without adding more tangles and flourishes to it. The simple problem for the aerial artist (also the one that defines the craft) is gravity. A simple but heavy solution, no?
A fan of Peter Brook’s The Empty Space and Grotowski’s Towards a Poor Theatre – how could I not love the philosophy behind this innovative company.

And surprisingly refreshing is the modest and ordinary everyday costumes – not designed in glitter to show off gleaming abdominal muscles… but simple clothes. Simple stories. Actions and reactions. Simple exchanges and shifts in weight.

Written for www.australianstage.com.au

Suspended on a grid of metal pipe, sits three people. Two women and a man. Somehow caught adrift in mid-air the three stare into the dark of the audience. At any moment they might speak, or sing – to us, to each other. Instead an intricate balance of interweaving, playful exchanges, urgent competition and bitter rivalry erupts. This is Arc – the first in a triple bill by Ockham’s Razor.
Directed by Ruth Naylor-Smith with music composition by Derek Nisbet, this is not merely a series of tricks and flourishes, but a very tender piece of visual storytelling centred around the uncertainty and tenuousness of a love triangle.

The second piece Memento Mori is inspired by Holbein’s “The Dance of Death.” Here, a thrilling seduction by Death, romances a woman in red swinging on a trapeze frame. This piece in particular seems a little outside the focus on aerial theatre – the premise simple, the action clear and so without too much of a conflict or struggle – this appears to be more of a short portrait than a story – but Ockham’s Razor being as it is, simplicity is sometimes best.

Third in the triple bill is Every Action… a playful story filled with problems, surprises, solutions and small satisfactions. Four people find a rope and then find fun in climbing, competing, swinging and pulling each other in and out of various rope formations. A more playful piece, Every Action… is a joyful exploration of gravity and our dependence on each other for equilibrium.

Taking their name from a medieval Ockham’s Razor is a principal which states that when given a choice between two theories, the simplest should always be selected. It is also a critically acclaimed aerial theatre company “specialising in creating arresting, entertaining and unconventional theatre on new pieces of aerial equipment.” Two of the artistic directors (Alex Harvey and Charlotte Mooney) perform alongside guests Grania Pickard and Steve Ryan across the suite of three short works.

The total effect of the triple bill is more of that of a sample of situations or ideas – not quite a curated or considered over-arching visual theme or aesthetic – though the philosophy of the company delivers consistent messages of connectedness, fragility, strength and adaptability. This is not a show whereby actions are completed with the expectations of applause, more that each action fluidly moves from one moment to another to convey story or shifts in emotion. The overall effect is mesmerizing and entertaining.

The delight comes from the focus of the performers on each other and the diversity of situations and equipment in the works, and challenges the well worn path of circuses – that of spectacle for it’s own sake. Relationships between performers is intense, intergral and carries with it a message of trust, vulnerability and interconnectedness. Such a message is made strikingly powerful when the stakes are raised – and without a net – nor harnesses on the bodies of the performers.

Forklift | KAGE & Sydney Festival

Augusta Supple — Sat, 25 Jan 2014 11:28:56 +0000

Sometimes when I’m responding to a work – or if I’m reviewing, I trawl through responses by others to see how they articulated their experience. I always learn something from writers and from writing. In this instance at the Saturday show I was sitting next to my blog-sister Jane Howard who wrote a review for the Guardian (AUS) which you can read HERE. I must say I think Jane’s background in dance keeps her critical pencil well sharpened.

Interestingly – the review I raised both my eyebrows at was by Martin Portus for Stage Whispers. Which you can read HERE. Interesting he should engage with this show from a gendered point of view. Going back to my review, long after the fact, I realised the stark difference my review doesn’t mention or indicate the gender of performers at all.

I didn’t purposely not mention they are female performers.

I wonder in the world of acrobatics, dance, circus if being a woman performer IS to be noted. I wonder if it was poor form of me not to mention they are women? I do wonder if it mattered. To the story. Or to the physicality of the piece – or to the dramaturgy of the show. I suspect it doesn’t. After all I don’t say “Look at the excellent job that female actor playing the part of a parent” in my reviews and responses… I don’t note the tone or pitch of someone’s voice with gendered consideration. Should I?

Interesting what we notice, what we privilege, what we consider worth noticing and recording, isn’t it?

Written for www.australianstage.com.au

A glowing vending machine holds the Snow White promise of sugary, oily treats. Towers of industrial racking hold cubes of brown cardboard boxes. Lines in different colours arc across the floor. The bare ribcage of Carriageworks is exposed through the sliding door – a loading dock with the usual glare of a fluorescent light. Someone in hardhat and high-vis vest appears. Strides across the space with more intent and focus than could be expected. An esky. A sandwich. A forklift.

Before long the hard-hatted person climbs into the drivers seat disappears into the loading dock, returning with a slumped beige body in the metal arms of the forklift. A strange fleshy addition to what is otherwise a fairly sparse and spare warehouse setting.

The forklift circles the space lifts the body high up into the top shelf of the racking and then disappears. Another body appears and is similarly deposited onto the top shelf. Exquisite curves and vacant stares – barely human, barely moving. The forklift is all.

Floating somewhere between dance theatre and acrobatics – there is something genre-bending about Forklift. Kate Denborough has assembled a series of vignettes centralised around a piece of equipment which flexes and fluxes – which both enthrals and bores. For some expecting a dance piece – the situation and music – an underscoring of droning electronic hiccups – will seem too much like a physical demonstration of strength and Olympic agility. For those expecting circus the fluidity and poetic of three bodies, in solo, duet and triumvirate will appear to flex and quiver in a contemporary dance realm.

What is beautiful in the work is the visual platform of the forklift entangled with angular flesh. However once the shift occurs from the captor to the initiated – the three performers (Henna Kaikula, Amy Macpherson and Nicci Wilks) enter into a supported showcase of circus trickery and impossibly elegant feats of gravitational defiance. And it’s at this point that any narrative or consciousness of the setting, equipment is lost. Is this the point?

Are we to see the ordinary now abandoned for the sublime or the imagination? The body that dominates the hard and mechanised? Or is it that the body is now that shows itself to be as hard and technical as the equipment?

We see the lifts and twists of the machine become more impressive. We see the lifts and twists of the body become more impressive. Perhaps we are seeing the body de-humanised, transformed into instrument and tool? Perhaps we are seeing the anthropomorphisation of the forklift?

Unfortunately though an intriguing premise filled with many novel and breath-holding beguilement, the central narrative dissolves into an industrialised circus trick, which loses any narrative weight or conceptual intrigue.

Melbourne
Venue: Arts Centre Melbourne – Theatres Forecourt
Dates: Wednesday 12 February – Sunday 16 February, 6.30 & 9pm
Booking: www.kage.com.au/book-tickets