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ATC’s six plays for 2025

John Daly-Peoples

Murder on the Orient Express

AUCKLAND THEATRE COMPANY 2025 SEASON

John Daly-Peoples

Auckland Theatre Company have announced their 2025 Season of six plays ranging from Shakespeare’s 400-year-old Romeo and Juliet to Roger Halls latest.

These plays include two world premieres, an Auckland premiere, and a translation of a one of the classics. The productions will be directed by some of the country’s best talent including Shane Bosher, Oliver Driver, Benjamin, Alison Quigan QSM and Katie Wolfe,

The Plays

a mixtape for maladies
by Ahi Karunaharan
4 – 23 Mar
Ahi Karunaharan’s talesweeps from 1950s Sri Lanka to modern-day Aotearoa. Directed by Jane Yonge (Scenes from a Yellow Peril) this is both a love letter to Sri Lanka and a lament, the story plays out over 17 songs – ranging from Dusty Springfield to La Bamba to the hit single from a Tamil rom-com.

A collaboration between Agaram Productions, Auckland Theatre Company and Te Ahurei Toi o Tāmaki Auckland Arts Festival.

Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express
Adapted for the stage by Ken Ludwig
22 Apr – 10 May
The classic that birthed an entire genre comes to the stage with Cameron Rhodes (King Lear, North by Northwest) as the inscrutable Hercule Poirot, supported by Rima Te Wiata, Sophie Henderson, Ryan O’Kane and Mayen Mehta. This play was adapted for the stage by Tony-nominated playwright Ken Ludwig and is directed by Shane Bosher.

Roger Hall’s End of Summer Time
17 Jun – 5 Jul
New Zealand’s most successful playwright Sir Roger Hall brings back one of his most famous characters, Dickie Hart who made his first appearance almost 30 years ago in C’mon Black. This is an affectionate and hilarious skewering of an old grump who realises he still has a lot to learn about the world when he moves to Auckland to be closer to his grandkids. Directed by theatre stalwart Alison Quigan, the play sees Andrew Grainger (Peter Pan, North by Northwest) bringing his big-hearted comedic talent to this solo show that like, all of Hall’s plays, has more than a little bite to it.

William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet
15 Jul – 9 Aug
William Shakespeare’s tale of passion and heartbreak is recast as a fast-paced thriller in this large-scale production of Romeo and Juliet, directed by the co-director of 2023’s runaway hit King Lear, Benjamin Kilby-Henson. Theo Dāvid (Shortland Street) and Phoebe McKellar (One Lane Bridge) make their Auckland Theatre Company debuts as the star-crossed lovers in a Missoni and Pucci-inspired take on 1960s’ Italy, supported by a stellar cast including Bronwyn Bradley, Miriama McDowell and Beatriz Romilly. As potent today as it was when written more than four centuries ago, this tragedy celebrates the triumph of love over hate.

Mary

MARY: The Birth of Frankenstein
by Jess Sayer
19 Aug – 7 Sep
A villa in Switzerland, in the dark winter of 1816. Mary Shelley stands over a bloodied corpse and knows her words are to blame. The script, written by award-winning playwright Jess Sayer in collaboration with Oliver Driver, builds on the bones of history to re-imagine the events of the infamous night that birthed one of the most famous novels of all time: Frankenstein. In Mary: The Birth of Frankenstein, co-created and directed by Oliver Driver (Amadeus), the production transforms from a parlour drama into an unsettling, drug-fueled, lust-drenched Gothic horror as Shelley, played by Olivia Tennet, casts off the men who seek to control her and steps from childhood into life.

Tiri: Te Araroa Woman Far Walking

TIRI: TE ARAROA WOMAN FAR WALKING
by Witi Ihimaera
4 – 23 Nov
The Season closes out with a history-making new adaptation of the epic tale of Tiri Mahana, a 185-year-old matriarch, from her birth at the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi to present day Aotearoa. For the first time, the play will be performed in two parts, English and te reo Māori, with both versions capturing the enduring spirit of Te Ao Māori. With the multi-award-winning team of The Haka Party Incident creator Katie Wolfe (Ngāti Mutunga, Ngāti Tama) and actor Miriama McDowell (Ngāti Hine, Ngāpuhi); Witi Ihimaera’s (Te Whanau a Kai and Ngāti Porou) extraordinary play will shine once again, re-imagined in te reo Māori by Maioha Allen and company.

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Tempo Dance Festival: In Transit, Matter and Slip

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

In Transit

Te Rerenga o Tere | Tempo Dance Festival 2024

Rua, – In Transit & Matter

Q Theatre

October18

Slip , Rebecca Jensen

October 20

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

In Transit

Choreographer, Louise Pōtiki Bryant

Sound / Av, Paddy Free

Lighting, Jo Kilgour

Costumes , Kasia Pol

Slip, Rebecca Jensen

Louise Pōtiki Bryant’s In Transit imagines the links between Maori  myth, ritual and their notion of the ancestors observing the nutuarl  world and its cretasures. Here the shaping of the creation myths, are given narratuives and images which give meaning to the transition in human life  paralleling those of the spirit world.

The work appears to dwell on several aspects of Māori myth such as the creation story of Ranginui and Papatūānuku, whose, children exist for a time in  in the dark world until Tāne, separates their parents, bringing the children into light.

There is also reference to the evolution of the  taiaha which Tū, the god of war asks Rūrūtangiākau, the weapon maker of the gods to create a weapon.

The dance opens with a low droning sounds as the sole figure, representing Tū or Rūrūtangiākau who dances through shafts of light with a  branch balanced on his head., He moves from an underworld into light and is joined by five other dancers who perform with long sticks or the evolving taiaha. They dance to a soundscape which [provides a sense of the being under water along with bird sounds.

The dancers seemingly inspired by bird and reptile  movement, move with short sharp steps id birds, strutting, foraging and pecking. These  movements were accompanied by staccato like breath which add to the sense of existing n another dimension.

Some of the dancers entwine cresting manaia shapes suggesting the notion of messenger between the mortal and spirit worlds.

The slender taiaha are used to create a Papatūānuku womb-like shape out of which  a figure emerges.

The work is full of robust dancing, flickering shafts of light along with a mesmerizing soundtrack along with relentless beats. It blends together sound, music, visual and movement describing the transitions between the physical world and the spirit dimensions.

Matter

Matter

Choreographer & Sets, Ross McCormack

Composer, Jason Wright

Lighting, Jo Kilgour

Costumes , Vicki Slow

“Matter” choreographed by Ross McCormack opens with a lone figure seemingly transfixed by one of the five post erected on the stage. He was joined by another figure and from their fitful movements it appears that they are inhabiting a world where they are seeking, discovering or being activated by lines of force or energy, possibly emanating from the poles.

Then they are joined by a group of dancers who move to a cacophony of sound, inching forward, creating a reptilian-like form with a nod to the work of the German choreographer Pina Bausch. Their erratic shuffling moves, driven by an inner tension and massive roars of music is by turns orderly as though responding to laws of Nature or manipulated by an unseen hand.

Two of the dancers appear to respond to other sounds as though out of their control and they engage in movements which area mix of tussle and dance, their movements  hinting at forces which are attracting and repelling g them.

We get the sense that the poles are the xxx of these forces-  electromagnetic, natural rhythms or xx.  Other bodies separate and merge becoming alien creatures and the sounds and music we hear are the sound of  massed bodies  and the arms and legs becomes tentacles.

Throughout the work the dancers seemed to be either seduced or buffeted by the music and sounds, their movements at times urgent and  sharp while at other times graceful and submissive.

In the latter part of the dance the poles /  pou are moved taking on more symbolic meaning- the crucifixion, the triumphal Iwo Jima image  of WWII.

There is a surreal beauty to the dancing which is created with a subtle mix of  sound and lights while at one point the music takes on the rhythms of the Pacific with a hypnotic quality.

Another dramatic sequence involves first two dancers and ultimately all eight moving and dancing as mirror images of each other creating a dramatic frieze. This architectural aspect is also present in many of the other sequences, deriving from the five poles.

Much of the time the dancing could be likened to the movements of atoms and molecules in chemical and physical reactions, conforming to notions of particle physics and string theory.

Slip

Slip, Rebecca Jensen

We don’t often get to see true absurdist dance in the style of the absurdist dramatic works of the 1950s and ’60s. Nothing that suggest the human condition is essentially absurd and devoid of purpose.

Rebecca Jensen’s “The Slip” seemed to offer an absurdist dance which was set in a bizarre or surreal environment. The stage looked like an art installation  – a step ladder, bucket, watering can, a table cluttered with apparatus, a sole cup and a large, directional microphone.

The opening minutes of the work continued the absurdist premise as we watched a couple of stagehands pouring water into containers and splashing it over  the stage. It looked as though it was a work about sea level and climate change. This idea was reaffirmed throughout  the production with images and the sounds of water.

After that opening  sequence Rebecca Jensen appeared, dressed in a medieval gown, the first of her iterations. She sat, meditatively  on the stage, performing simple gestures which were  in marked contrast to her hectic movement in the latter part of the work.

“Slip” is a filled with precise  and deliberate movements, mixed with moments of humour and provocation. It is an experimental work where the  flaws and interventions that show up over the course of the performance add to its idiosyncratic quality.

It’s a work which can be interpreted as having  surreal narratives, the themes of which will occur to the individual viewer as they come to grips with  the many vignettes.

The focus of the work comes from the title, ”Slip”. There is a constant slippage between what we see and what we hear, between what is natural and what is fabricated between the  role of the performer and the place of the technician.

While Jensen is the dancer/actor in “Slip” she is aided by Aviva Endean who acts as sound technician, participant and  guide,  controlling a table full of noise producing devices both physical and electronic.

When Jensen first appears, she dives into her backpack extracting various items such as a key, a bag of chips a bottle of water and a newspaper. But when she handles these items, it is not their natural sound we hear, it is Endean – shaking her own newspaper and pouring her own bottle of water, the sounds picked up and enhanced by the large microphone. When Jensen eats a chip, the crunch we hear is from Endean’s microphone enhancing the sound of her biting on a stick of celery.

This dislocation and enhancement occurs throughout the work in different forms. When Jensen walks around the stage we hear the sounds of Endean’s feet crunching on shells. At other times when Jensen walks, we hear the sounds of her body creaking as though she is robotic.

Jensen explores a range of movements from small gestures though fluid and dramatic balletic moves to the volatile actions which see her almost out of control.

The soundscape produced by Endean is similar to the enigmatic sounds created by the experimental group From Scratch and like that group she uses unlikely items to create the sounds.

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The Apprentice: Trump’s early days of learning the art of corruption

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Jeremy Strong (Roy Cohn) and Sebastian Stan (Donald Trump)

THE APPRENTICE

Directed by: Ali Abbasi

Duration: 120min

In cinemas from October 10th

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Some of the more interesting aspects of the Donald Trump biopic, “The Apprentice” are around its funding and distribution. Unlike most US films it was largely financed by Irish and Danish organisations and none of the major distributors would touch the film, fearing the wrath of the ex-president. To fund the distribution of the film in the US the producers initially had to launch a Kickstarter fund before it was eventually picked up.

The film is directed by  the award-winning Iranian-Danish filmmaker Ali Abbasi and looks at the life of Donald Trump in the 1970’s and 1980’s as he made his first moves into the New York real estate business.

It’s in two parts with the first set in the seventies when Trump is just starting out, working for his father as not much more than a rent collector as he embarks on his own career. The second part is set in the eighties when he is wielding more power and influence.

Along with Trump, the main protagonist is the influential attorney Roy Cohn  who gained prominence for  successfully prosecuting the American spies, Julius and Ethel  Rosenberg leading to their execution in the early 1950’s.

He  manipulated the legal system on behalf of powerful, conservative figures but lived as a closeted gay man, publicly denying his AIDS till the day he died.

Trump becomes the apprentice to Cohn as he assists him in his efforts to circumvent New York City planning restrictions to build Trump Tower and helps Trump amass wealth and power through deception, intimidation and media manipulation.

Cohn’s advice to Trump consisted  of three simple rules.

Rule 1. Attack. Attack. Attack. Rule 2. Admit nothing. Deny everything. Rule 3. Claim victory and never admit defeat.

We see how these become the foundations of Trump’s later ways of dealing with individuals, organisations and the media, as President and in his present-day speeches and interviews.

Abbasi depicts Trump as something of a loner, often in the presence of other people but with no close friends. Even his family relationships are fraught notably  with his “loser” brother Freddie who is only an international pilot and later a drug user who Trump won’t put up at his place.

The film does not completely vilify Trump and there are some sympathetic touches but it does show that he is a flawed character both from his upbringing as well as  his relationship with Cohn and these experiences do nothing to make him more sympathetic towards other people.

Sebastain Stan cleverly displays many of the characteristics of the later Trump and we see how he is progressively imbues Cohn’s cynical view of people and the world – there to be taken advantage of.

Jeremy Strong as Roy Cohn presents an almost totally amoral character who apart from his three rules of getting ahead also reveals a disdain for weakness in others and a savagery in getting his own way.

Maria Bakalova (Ivana Trump) and Sebastian Stan (Donald Trump)

Trump’s relationship with his first wife Ivana (Maria Bakalova) and his father Fred (Martin Donovan) are loosely sketched in but they could well have been fleshed out a bit more to add depth to the psychological study of Trump but they do suggest aspects of his personal relationships and the need to dominate .

Screenwriter Gabriel Sherman has skilfully crafted Trumps ascent with his actual recorded dialogue, written words  as well as some  well devised dialogue.

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Resetting the Coordinates of Performance art in NZ

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Resetting the Coordinates

An anthology of performance art in Aotearoa New Zealand

Edited by Christopher Braddock, Ioana Gordon-Smith, Layne Waerea and Victoria Wynne-Jones

Massey University Press

Published September 2024

RRP $65.00

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

In 2014 The Walters Prize  included a work by Kalisolaite ‘Uhila where the artist inhabited the Auckland Art Gallery precinct for several months, living as a homeless person – eating sleeping and communicating with visitors, staff and other destitute  people. The work  was intended to draw attention to the plight of the homeless.

However, going to the gallery to find the ”art” and the artist necessitated searching the art gallery, the nearby park and streets until I found him wedged into an overhang on the gallery’s roof.

This search seemed more like a game of hide and seek rather than being immersed in a social /political experience /experiment. At the time It seemed to only involve me and the artist, reflecting on an encounter.

That encounter is what can loosely be called an example of  post-object art or performance art which has been evolving in New Zealand since the 1970’s.

With that encounter and many others one can see that performance  art requires an audience as well as documentation as many of the events are transient.

Now an  anthology/reader of performance art in New Zealand, ”Resetting the Coordinates” has been published,providing an in-depth survey of the artists and artworks in the  performance area which have happened over the past fifty years.

At the core of performance art  is the audience and the performer/artist,  the works having a theatrical element to them in which artist often draw attention to time, space, and body,

The  goal of these actions is to generate a reaction with themes which are commonly linked to life experiences of the artist themselves along with social and political criticism.

Darcell Apelu:, New Zealand Axemens Association: Womens subcommittee president
2 August 2014, documentation of performance.
Courtesy Artspace, Auckland. Photo by Peter Jennings

The book records a number of the activities which occurred as described in the introduction by editor Christiopher Braddock,

“If, on 2 April 1971, you had journeyed out across the unsealed metal roads to the west coast of the Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland region of the North Island of Aotearoa New Zealand, venturing as far as the remote Karekare Beach, to the north of Whatipu Beach and the great Manukau Harbour and south of Piha Beach, you would have come across the mystifying scene of ten people arduously sweeping the beach with long-handled yard brooms. “

Organised by Phil Dadson and colleagues this was the first in a series of purposeless works of which Dadson said : ‘This was work for the sake of the work, no particular purpose, no rewards’ across a ‘pointless-to-sweep stretch of beach’ in ‘communion with the elements and the place’.

These activities often existed outside the confines of the mainstream contemporary art scene  and were often undocumented. Many of the names included in the anthology will be recognisable because of their wide-ranging practice, others however have had lower profiles.

Central figures have been Phil Dadson, Jim Allen, Annea Lockwood, Peter Roche & Linda Buis, Andrew Drummond, Daniel Malone, Shannon Te Ao and Lonnie Hutchinson. There have also been numerous other practitioners who are included in the book.

Christopher Braddock, one of the editors says “Mainstream art history tends to prioritise static forms of art that are more commodifiable and saleable such as painting and sculpture. Anthologies often prioritise these artforms, such as Michael Dunn’s “New Zealand Painting: A Concise History| published in 2004. Furthermore, large-scale anthologies can cement these institutional prejudices, such as Hamish Keith’s The Big Picture: The History of New Zealand Art from 1642 (2007) which largely ignores performance art.”

The book underlines the fact that performance art is a distinctive part of recent art history, with its activities presenting  social and political  approaches which  emphasises the  connections between artist, audience and art critic /  historian.

These events often combined elements of anarchy,  humour, spirituality, repetition, the unplanned and unexpected.

There are a several chapters which examine the  history and development of performance art, some which look at the aspects of woman’s art practice, the development of Māori and Pacific based works, queer performance art and performance art in post -quake Christchurch.

There are numerous photographs and records of the activities which only give a limited appreciation of the performances such as Annae Lockwood piano burning while the multiple images of Andrew Drummond’s projects give some sense of the scale of his work.

CardboardConfessional_
Audrey Baldwin, Oscar Bannan, Bridget Harris, NeilMacLeod, Annemieke Montagne, Pat Parkin, Jennifer. Katherine Shield
2016, documentation of performance for the Centre of Contemporary Art Toi Moroki programme,Ōtautahi Christchurch.
Courtesy Centre of Contemporary Art Toi Moroki. Photo by Janneth Gi

Among the other projects included are the documentation project of the Christchurch “Cardboard Confessional” (2016) developed by Audrey Baldwin et al, Louise Potiki Bryant’s dance work “Te Taki o te Ua / The Sound of Rain” (2001), Jeremy Leatinu’u’s Queen Victoria (2013) where the artist contemplated statues of the queen,  Juliet Batten’s Women’s Project of 1985 at Te Henga Beach and Bruce Barber’s “Mt Eden Crater Performance  (1973) which was a collaboration with Solar Plexus as part of the drumming event initiated by Phil Dadson..

It is a fascinating book with lots of performances which have been rarely written about, seemingly lost to history but which tell us much about the social, political and spiritual examinations and soundings which artists have made.

The writers include  Natasha Conland, Gregory Burke, Ioana Gordon-Smith, Khye Hitchcock, Audrey Baldwin, Bruce E Phillips and Heather Galbraith

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Wall to Wall Māfana

Red White and Brass: The Play

Stage adaptation by Leki Jackson-Bourne

Directors, Anapela Polata’ivao, Vela Manusaute

Musical Director, Joanna Mika Toloa

Production Design, Sean Coyle

Costume Design, Chrissy Vaega

Sound Design, Matt Eller

Choreography, Mario Faumui

With Haannz Fa’avae-Jackson, Mikey Falesiu, John-Paul ‘JP’ Foliaki, Onetoto Ikavuka, Saala Ilaua, Diamond Langi, Lauren Jackson, ‘Aisea Latu, Jason Manumu’a, Rocky Manusaute, Michaela Te Awa Bird, Kasi Valu

Original screenplay by Halaifonua Finau and Damon Fepulea’i

Co-produced by Piki Films and Miss Conception Films

A World Premiere

ASB Waterfront Theatre

Until 7 July

Reviewed by Malcolm Calder

Last weekend I had a cold and spent most of it confined to quarters.  You know – a bit of this, a bit of that and an overly-heavy dosage of highly-predictable news, current affairs and media gossip monochromatically detailing financial woes, political faux pas, a couple of murders, the inevitable obsession with car crashes and countless opinion from a whole heap of ‘experts’ confidently predicting an imminent emigration across the ditch. I was miserable.

Then I went to the Auckland Theatre Company’s world premiere of a new stage production of Red, White and Brass: The Play!  And I wondered what I was being miserable about.

The basic plot is well publicised and closely follows the original screenplay of the same name by Halaifonua Finau and Damon Fepulea’I about sporting underdogs who over-achieve just as Eddie the Eagle and those Jamaican bobsledders did at the Olympics.  Hollywood loves a good sports story especially where the underdog comes out on top and this story has a unique local flavour.

But this stage production is more subtly nuanced, goes well beyond sport and is weighted more towards capturing hearts and minds in ways that both embrace and express the social psyche that is Tongan Māfana.

It is a thing that generates joy and, without being in the slightest bit didactic about all things Tongan,

it assumes a knowledge of many things in a long, long list.  These range from the place of religion to the place of rugby; from gently acknowledging the contrapuntal role of the matriarch in a purportedly patriarchal society; from an acknowledgement that achievement rests ultimately on aspiration; from generational clash to resolution and to an understanding that even addresses the subsets within the contemporary urban Tongan diaspora in Aotearoa.

As Leki Jackson-Bourne has noted… this production is loud, proud and unapologetically Tongan. It is a statement about community, heritage and sense of self.  But it is more than that.  It also says something very important about our increasingly multicultural society and as such provides a further plank in the evolution of New Zealand theatre history.  It does so with unashamed pride and joy, and celebrates both.

JP Foliaki reprises the movie role of Maka, arguably with more light and shade than the movie allowed, and his relationship with his ‘bit less Tongan’ cousin Veni (Saale Ilaua) is well handled.  Overall the cast is strong and well-balanced and their choral work mesmerizingly memorable.

Sean Coyle’s busy set morphs well in multiple directions, the costumes are a hoot and the dialogue a completely understandable mix of Lea Faka-Tonga and English. The finale is a triumph- but no spoiler alert from me other than to say the band grows on one.

Congratulations to Auckland Theatre Company and mālō Leki – the last vestiges of my cold vanished on the spot!

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Swan Lake: A Warm Glow Inside

Image Stephen A’Court

Swan Lake

Royal New Zealand Ballet in association with AVIS

Choreography: Russell Kerr ONZM QSM after Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov
Staging: Turid Revfeim

Set & Costume Design: Kristian Fredrikson

Lighting: Jon Buswell

Music: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Auckland Philharmonia, Conductor Hamish McKeich

Kiri Te Kanawa Theatre, Aotea Centre, Auckland until 12 May

Review by Malcolm Calder

Swan Lake is a classic. And rightly so.


This production, originally choreographed by the legendary late Russell Kerr, lives on and will continue to remain something of a benchmark for the company.


Swan Lake is a work of staggering beauty and power. The magic of the swans, the sumptuous costuming and the elaborately subtle set changes continue to captivate.


Mesmeric and somehow timeless, it truly suspends disbelief, draws on both imagination and
emotion and eventually ushers its audience homeward shrouded in an inner warmth and secure in the knowledge that tradition is something to be both valued and prized.


The work itself is as familiar as old boots, is far removed from the concept of a ‘hackneyed standby’ as occasionally perceived by some, and showcases the traditions, skills and techniques that are such an essential part of the artform.
Drawing on sets and costumes nearly 30 years old, this RNZB Swan Lake remains lush, vibrant and very, very satisfying. Assiduous attention to detail has resulted in a restoration job to be applauded,

giving Wardrobe a more than gentle workout and Staging with a restoration that is far from counterfeit.


Other commitments prevented this reviewer from attending Opening Night in Auckland, and I was delighted to be able to see the second night cast with the alternate principals and some shuffles in the corp.


Under maestro Hamish McKeich, the Auckland Philharmonia brought the much-loved and thoroughly familiar Tchaikovsky score to life establishing and maintaining the atmospheric and at times mesmeric tone that marries brilliantly well with Turid Revfeim’s staging. Special mention too to the work of harpist Ingrid Bauer.


I found Joshue Guillemot-Rodgerson to be rivettingly imperious as Prince Siegfried in Act 1 – outstanding control and very much a Prince among his subjects. Then I delighted further as he smoothly grew into the smitten and then the confused, before finally leaving us with a feeling of hope for the future. It was a remarkably well-conveyed journey of maturation and growth perhaps drawing from his own journey from the one I first saw in Romeo and Juliet a couple of years back.


However, I found Ana Gallardo Lobaina initially a little aloof, daunting and even ice-like at times as Odette. Her technique was flawlessly detailed and her control immaculate but her connection with
Siegfried only really flowered for me after she had slid seamlessly into her alter ego of Odile. However I soon stopped fretting as the two came breathtakingly together in their two pas de deux in Act 3.


Dane Head was delightfully cheeky as the athletic Jester and Zacharie Dun gave us a sleek and
demonically insidious Rothbart we all love to hate.
But Swan Lake is about swans after all. At a lake. And swans, being swans, are something of pack
animals. In turn it follows that they move in unison, think in unison and breathe in unison. And these swans did so with only the slightest of occasional nerves from newcomers, conjuring images
that personify Swan Lake.
My only disappointment was that, despite their three multi-cultural scenes and significant overall contribution, for some reason the boys did no final bow at the performance I attended. What a pity – I would have applauded them too.


This Swan Lake is a rather mammoth production and RNZB is to be congratulated. It has an enormous energy, is fabulously presented and attracted an audience representing pretty much every age-group. It presents few intellectual challenges, only aesthetic ones and has many, many talking points.


As more than one writer has suggested, this alone may be responsible for drawing more children into dance than any other. That this work will tour regionally will no doubt assist this process.

RNZB Touring to:

Napier, Municipal Theatre, May 17-18
Christchurch, Isaac Theatre Royal, May 23-26
Dunedin, Regent Theatre, May 30
Invercargill, Civic Theatre, June 2

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Gravity & Grace : a refreshing and inventive NZ play

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Auckland Arts Festival

Gravity & Grace by Eleanor Bishop and Karin McCracken.

Q Theatre

Until March 24

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Gravity  & Grace is adapted from Kraus’ account of the unsuccessful film she made in the 1990’s – Gravity & Grace. That film follows Grace as she finds a connection to a cult predicting doomsday and the arrival of a spaceship, and Gravity, who leaves New Zealand to try her luck as an artist in New York City.

Kraus is probably most well known for her book and TV series “I Love Dick” but Eleanor Bishop and Karin McCracken have mined he obscure Gravity & Grace to make a play which addresses ideas about the flawed or failed artist as well as reflecting on the creative process generally.

The play set in the US and New Zealand where much of the filming was shot because she had obtained NZ Arts Council funding. We follow her inexperienced attempts as a director and her unsuccessful efforts to get interest from the film festivals and agents. Along with this we delve into her personal and professional relationships which blight the films development.

Her own attempts at creating art works are paralleled in her homage  to three other flawed creatives: the French writer and philosopher Simone Weil and her book La pesanteur et la grâce (Gravity and Grace), the American artist Paul Thek whose star burnt out after an initial burst of success and  the German Red Army activist Ulrike Meinhof.

Its as if she is saying these great artists also made mistakes, just like  me.

The two writers of the play also are the stars of the work with Eleanor Bishop’s faultless direction and  Karin McCracken giving an incisive portrayal of  Chris Kraus.

McCracken is on stage the whole time and holds the play together with her range of emotions as well as some witty dialogue . She is  also cleverly presented with many sequences featuring her filmed. Often her projected head loomed over her as she sat at her desk or she was shown from strange angles suggesting the characters many dimensions.

The cast play a variety of roles including Andy Warhol (Sam Snedden); Ulrike Meinhof (Ni Dekkers-Reihana); Simone Weil (Rongopai Tickwell) and Paul Thek (Simon Leary). Sneddon also plays Sylvère Lotringer, Kraus’s husband as well as Gavin her S&M phone lover.

Much of the success of the play comes from the innovative staging created by designer Meg Rollandi, the visuals of Owen McCarthy, and Rachel Neser, the soundscape designed  by Emi 恵美 Pogoni and lighting by Rob Larsen.

The work is overwritten at times and could do with a trim and there are a few sequences such as the cast working on what was possibly a Paul Thek mural which doesn’t seem to add much to the work.

But it is one of the most refreshing and inventive recent New Zealand works with  fine writing, and suburb stage craft.

To subscribe or follow New Zealand Arts Review site – www.nzartsreview.org.

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Derek Jarman’s Delphinium Days coming in June

John Daly-Peoples

Derek Jarman, The Garden

Derek Jarman: Delphinium Days
Gus Fisher Gallery, 15 June-14 September 2024
City Gallery Wellington, 19 October 2024- 2 February 2025

John Daly-Peoples

This June, Auckland’s Gus Fisher Gallery opens Derek Jarman: Delphinium Days, New Zealand’s first exhibition of this highly significant figure influential artists and gay rights activists of his generation. Entry is free. 

He was the first public figure in the UK to make his HIV positive status known, the exhibition marks 30 years since his untimely death to an AIDS related illness at the age of 52. 

The exhibition curated by Lisa Beauchamp, ( Gus Fisher Gallery), Aaron Lister (City Gallery , and Michael Lett will feature seen paintings, films, photographs and archival material by and about the artist, which will offer an in-depth and affecting view of this celebrated cultural figure whose impact remains profound today. 

Beauchamp says “The exhibition will also cement Jarman’s familial connection to Aotearoa through his father Lancelot,” she says. 

Jarman’s father Lancelot Elworthy Jarman was born in Canterbury in 1907 after Jarman’s grandparents immigrated from Britain in 1888. 

“To bring this part of his life to the fore in Derek Jarman: Delphinium Days will add so much to our understanding and connection to him as one of the most enduringly relevant and impactful artists of modern times,” adds Beauchamp.

Jarman was a prolific creative best known for his avant-garde films, who pushed boundaries to move skilfully between painting, film, writing, set design, performance and gardening. 

Jarman was an early campaigner for the rights of the LGBTQIA+ community and people with AIDs, after being diagnosed as HIV positive himself in 1986.

Co-curator Michael Lett says: “Derek Jarman was one of my first encounters with a fully formed, human gay man. As a teenager reading “Modern Nature” quietly in my room, I found a complex man, who had friends, had sex, got angry, liked to garden and was open about being HIV positive.” 

Jarman’s films are widely known, including Caravaggio (1986) and The Garden (1990) starring his longtime collaborator and muse Tilda Swinton; cult-favourite Jubilee (1978) and his last ever feature film Blue (1993). In Auckland, Gus Fisher Gallery will partner with The Capitol Cinemas to present a selection of Jarman’s most well-loved feature films by the artist.

Jarman helped set the cultural zeitgeist for the time, with his art speaking to and for the dispossessed and alienated, as well as his writing, including Modern Nature (1991) and At your own risk (1992). Many will also be familiar with his music videos for iconic bands like Pet Shop Boys, The Smiths, and Sex Pistols. 

Major painted works from Jarman’s late ‘Evil Queen’ series will be included in the exhibition, as well as a selection of his famous tar paintings and landscapes that connect to his garden at Dungeness. A selection of Jarman’s rarely seen Super 8 films will also be featured.  

The artist himself will feature in a range of tender images by Jarman’s close friend and photographer Howard Sooley.

A dynamic public programme of events will be delivered in Auckland and Wellington to help the exhibition resonate with broad audiences, informed by kōrero with Aotearoa’s LGBTQIA+ communities. 

“By using the exhibition as a catalyst to reduce the stigma associated with HIV and AIDS, we plan to offer meaningful engagement opportunities for rainbow audiences and allies,” says Beauchamp. 

She says Jarman became a beacon of hope for those isolated from society. 

“His artworks and social commentary are a powerful mechanism against a rising tide of hatred and homophobia. Whether through painting, film, gardening or writing, his creativity knew no bounds and continues to influence generations of artists globally.”

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In the name of the Son: a harrowing tale of injustice

Reviewed by Malcolm Calder

Auckland Arts Festival

In the Name of the Son– the Gerry Conlon Story

By Richard O’Rawe & Martin Lynch

Rangatira, Q Theatre

Until 17 March

Green Shoot Productions, Belfast

Director Tony Devlin

Featuring Shaun Blaney

Stage Manager Sinead Owens

There’s something about a standing ovation. Especially when it’s totally impromptu and anything less would either seem churlish and suggest one had possibly been asleep for the last 80 minutes or so.

But that’s what Shane Blaney received at the end of In the Name of the Son at Q theatre on Thursday night.  And rightly so.

My initial thoughts were that we were going to get yet another a diatribe about political injustice during the Troubles.  But I needn’t have worried.  This was merely a context for a story about Gerry Conlon’s personal journey and traces his successive leaps following a 15-year mis-sentence through to international recognition and a descent that plumbs the depths of the human spirit.  Ultimately however, it demonstrates the triumph of that spirit over extreme adversity which makes for a very good story indeed.

It seems so long ago now – the IRA Guildford Pub bombings Four and the political upheaval that eventually resulted in their being freed after 15 years in prison.  But I remember it well.  What I was unaware of however was Gerry Conlon’s journey. 

In the Name of the Son achieves this by introducing us to many, many characters and Blaney swiftly skips from one to the other with impeccable timing, sparkling wit and he wrings remarkable depth from each in this one-man show.     There are so many I lost count but they are colourful and they are memorable.  Blaney even manages to slip in a memorable one-liner from Jack Nicholson and a goodly chunk of Springsteen’s ‘Born to Run’ while in toilet at the Oscars.

The play even manages a subtle side-swipe at Daniel Day Lewis and other cinematic A-listers (the film was the titled ‘In the name of the Father’, a dramatization of the political side).

In the Name of the Son by Gerry’s lifelong friend Richard O’Rawe and Martyn Lynch tells it as it was.   And Blaney delivers it switching seamlessly between the different genders, ages and accents of those who played a role in Conlon’s fascinating story.  That is what makes this otherwise harrowing tale of injustice worth nothing less than the standing ovation he received at opening night.

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Reviews, News and Commentary

Beyond Words: a lament, a reflection and a celebration

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Oum with conductor Fawzi Haimor and the NZSO Image Jono Tucker

Auckland Arts Festival

Beyond Words

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra

Auckland Town Hall

March 10

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

The “Beyond Words” concert which had its third performance following its premiere in Christchurch and a performance in Wellington was a collaboration to promote unity and peace through music and to honour the lives lost in Ōtautahi Christchurch on 15 March 2019.

Conducted by Fawzi Haimor the concert featured the Moroccan vocalist OUM  El Ghait Benessahraoui and Cypriot/Greek oud player Kyriakos Tapakis.

Vocalist Abdelilah Rharrabti, saz player Liam Oliver, vocalist and daf player Esmail Fathi, oud player Kyriakos Tapakis, vocalist Oum and composer John Psathas [From Wellington concert] image Jono Tucker

The concert also featured  works by the American Valerie Coleman, Reza Vali, Arvo Pärt and the world premiere of a new work by the New Zealand composer John Psathas.

Psathas’ “Ahlan wa Sahlan”, composed in collaboration with OUM and Tapakis, uses the Arabic welcome to let people know they are in a place where they belong. The work fused together musical styles from Eastern and Western music traditions.

The work features energetic and dramatic sounds with subtle changes of texture and moods, providing a background for the two soloists OUM  El Ghait Benessahraoui and Kyriakos Tapakis.

The composer as previously demonstrated his ability to compose celebratory anthems having written works for the ceremonies at 2004 Athens Olympics and with this work there is sense of the music being both a lament, a reflection and a celebration. With waves of shifting percussive and evocative sounds

OUM was resplendent in her shimmering gown and elaborate head covering  Her voice with its roots in Morocco  and in the tradition of Egyptian singers of the 1930’s like Umm Kulthum drifted and soared above the orchestra’s tapestry of eastern sounds along with answering voice of Tapakis’s oud.

Her singing and movements at times suggested she was in a trance-like state while at other times she exuded an emotional intensity  and in her singing  “Hijra” she sounded like a French chaunteuse. Later there were passages where her voice was close to over-elaborate crooning.

Tapakis provided a riveting performance where he played together with Xylophone and timpani in a filmic sounding section filled with percussive sounds

The other major work in the programme was Arvo Pärt‘s Silouan’s Song which is  fine example of the composer’s low-key minimalism with simple repetition and contemplation sequences of notes.

This was a reflective piece which connected contemporary music with Medieval plainchant and Eastern mystical  music and the various sections were stressed by the meditative silences between them giving the work a ritualistic feel.

In the first part of the programme there were five shorter works including a traditional work sung by Hasbi Rabbi and Molle Mamad Jan which had an achingly unsettling melodic line as well as a beguiling performance by OUM.

There was also  contemplative, work by the Iranian Reza Vali which was filled with despondency and funeral sounds hinting at a vision of paradise.

Kyriakos Tapakis performed his own work “Mantilatos” which was filled with extraordinary sounds and rhythms. While the NZSO accompanied  him, emphasising much of the work it would have been more interesting if he had been able to play as a soloist.

A major disappointment with the programme was the lack of English translations for the various vocal segments. Presumably the lyrics were relevant to the spirit of the event and even though the concert was one that was “beyond words”  with the music conveying emotional and spiritual dimensions it was pity the audience was not able to  appreciate the greater depth which would have come from a knowledge of the word.

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