Dinos at night? I’m in! Australian Museum’s Culture Up Late events are themed and spread throughout the year. Valentine’s Day got a gong but tonight it was Mardi Gras at the Museum.
Lots of extra things to do or just wander around enjoying the displays, the Mammoths: Giants of the Ice Age exhibition is included in the very reasonable entry price. Continue reading CULTURE UP LATE: AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM: MARDI GRAS EDITION
DUNGEONS AND DRAG QUEENS is a live-action drag show combining comedy, fashion, and fantasy tabletop gaming. It offers exciting effects, original music, and a new adventure improvised every night. It’s like if George R.R Martin hosted Drag Race! Continue reading DUNGEONS AND DRAG QUEENS PLAY ON AT PACT
On the face of it, the show currently playing at the Kings Cross Theatre is a domestic drama. Set in one location, a loving couple are united against an invisible enemy. That is until a complication arises. Will they stay together, or will this impediment drive them apart. It’s classic melodrama isn’t it? But not here. ARE WE AWAKE? is a confluence of alternative dialectics about love, disability and identity molded, without rage, into a thing of beauty. Continue reading ARE WE AWAKE? : OF HEALTH AND QUIET BREATHING
ACCORDING TO OTTO by Wayne Tunks is now having its Australian premiere as part of The Depot Theatre’s 2018 Season.
Family life with an extended family, heartwarming and full of love, empathy, pathos, truth, tears and joy. Extremely entertaining, that also delivers with the laughter, a very pleasurable night of entertainment, fast-paced and filled with a hundred delicious comedy one-liners. A fresh new comedy masterpiece. Continue reading ACCORDING TO OTTO by Wayne Tunks at The Depot Theatre Marrickville
Stylish and supernaturally creepy, JADE OF DEATH, is making its public premiere at the Mardi Gras Film Festival on February 23rd. Lucky me, I had a chance to see the series of 6 x 10 minute shows before it opens as a 60 minute offering. And luckier still had the chance to speak with Erin Good (writer / director) and Taylor Litton-Strain (producer) of the show. Continue reading JADE OF DEATH: A STYLISH SUPERNATURAL MYSTERY
Mardi Gras Fair Day is always a loverly day …
Hey cousin echoes behind and 20 heads turn. Chookie!!! calls a woman as she rushes past me. Continue reading LOVE ALL AROUND AT FAIR DAY
Though it be not wooden, the O into which we are welcomed demands much from us. For a scant hour … our attention and our suspension of belief. For here we will behold the vastly fields of France and carried here and there, jumping o’er times, we will witness this Joan of 1000 parts, the equal of warlike Harry. JOAN is tour-de-theatre of great matter. Continue reading JOAN: A MUSE OF FIRE FOR MARDI GRAS
STRANGERS IN BETWEEN… two strangers. Strangers who are pulled into the life of a newcomer to the perilous city, a young man named Shane. Shane is in between boy and man, in between straight and gay and in between genetic family and adoptive family. He is the lost boy, the wide eyed innocent, the guiltless seeker and he will meet these two strangers as he emerges blinking to a new life. This production, playing at the Seymour Centre as part of Mardi Gras, tells a story. A human story, riddled with the laughter and with the fears. The story for us of those who embrace us. Continue reading STRANGERS IN BETWEEN: STRANGERS WELL MET AND STRANGERS NO MORE
Playing during Mardi Gras and within walking distance of the Museum of Love and Protest, THE VIEW UpSTAIRS (Book, Music and Lyrics by Max Vernon) is set in a skilfully created seedy New Orleans drag bar of the 1970’s. Here the characters lead lives in fear of a persecution which new- to- the- 70’s Wes initially finds impossible to understand. But his awakening to the struggles past will waken in him resolutions toward the struggle both now and still to come. Continue reading A FLARE UP AT THE HAYES: THE VIEW UPSTAIRS
The award-winning supernatural thriller series JADE OF DEATH is set to debut at Queer Screen’s 25th anniversary of the Mardi Gras Film Festival on February 23.
Continue reading JADE OF DEATH: PREMIERES AT MGFF18
Grey hair and arthritic knees was a good excuse to take my time and gingerly make my way out of the theatre around the little bits of water which had escaped the set to the stage floor. An excuse to eavesdrop longer on the heated discussion being engaged in by a few audience remainders. They were not happy and the gist was pretty clear. Not faithful to the text, not respectful of text, the text doesn’t need shock tactics and so forth. METAMORPHOSES is guaranteed to divide viewers, unless the fact that it is almost sold out means they have found their audience already. Me for one. Continue reading METAMORPHOSES: MYTHS COHERE AT OLD FITZ
FUCKING MEN is very high on the fun-o-meter but it also registered strongly on the emot-atron. It is a Fairground of shifting dynamics about, but not just for, a certain population of gay males. If it wasn’t, I might be reduced to discussing the lack of a queue at the women’s toilets … we were outnumbered 20 to 1. Or giving an insight into men’s underwear, of which there is a lot, expounding the virtues of the pianist’s jacket or discussing socks. Continue reading NO QUEUE AT THE LADIES LOO AT THE NEW
This was such a fun show. Make it an Act of Will to get yourself over to the Eternity to see it.
American Emmy Award winning comedy writer David Javerbaum’s comedy is an anarchic, wild flight of fancy. Much loved Sydney theatre performer Mitchell Butel plays the part of God. This God has grown weary of the Ten Commandments, He has come to correct mankind’s dire misconceptions about his teachings and delivers a radical re-write. Continue reading AN ACT OF GOD @ THE ETERNITY PLAYHOUSE
REVOLUTION, PROTEST AND PERSONAL STORIES: Mardi Gras’ Queer Thinking Program announced.
Leading thinkers and thought provocateurs will converge on Carriageworks on Saturday 24 and Sunday 25 February, for two exhilarating days of ideas, discussion and debate for Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras’ Queer Thinking program. Continue reading REVOLUTION, PROTEST AND PERSONAL STORIES: QUEER THINKING PROGRAM
SATURDAY CHURCH is a trans story yes. But much much more. It is transporting, transcendent and transformative, with themes of belonging and being that reach well beyond the coming out. The film is essentially a drama, but the interspersed songs and dancing, a bit like LA LA LAND, come smoothly together to inform, touch and influence hearts and minds. Continue reading SATURDAY CHURCH: MGFF 2018
AL BERTO is a film of its place. About one of Portugal’s most celebrated modern poets, it is set in Sines on the Portuguese coast. But it is of a different time. It is 1975 when 27 year old Al Berto returns to his small fishing village, a place where change comes slowly. The painter/poet is beautiful, passionate and free spirited but his kind of creative living is way too fast … even for a population newly freed from an authoritarian regime. AL BERTO explores freedom, political and personal, in a sensual, deliciously detailed film playing as part of Queer Screen’s Mardi Gras Film Festival. Continue reading AL BERTO: MGFF 2018
Of all the films I have watched towards Queer Screen’s Mardi Gras Film Festival, IN BETWEEN (also called BAR BAHAR) has been my favourite. I loved spending time with Layla, Salma and Nour, Israeli-Palestinian women who share an apartment in Tel Aviv. Deceptively intimate, the storytelling sweeps the viewer into a world of explosive thematic content. Continue reading IN BETWEEN: MGFF 2018
If one of the joys of being human is taking delight in enjoying other humans then A WOMB OF THEIR OWN brings the both humanity and the joy. Directed by Cyn Lubow, who is also a participant, the film gives voice to masculine identifying people who have chosen to become pregnant. Continue reading A WOMB OF THEIR OWN: MGFF 2018
Like a ludicrously expensive engagement ring, the real worth of THE RING THING is in its rarity. This film is a collage of opinion and drama about Gay and Lesbian marriage and from our perspective, when we see it as part of Queer Screen’s Mardi Gras Film Festival, it is best watched with an eye to the future. It’s been over two years since same sex marriage became available to Americans. This film takes that experience and meanders off with it thereby allowing us that rare opportunity to sit in the dark and consider what happens next. Continue reading THE RING THING: MGFF 2018
“My father tells me stories. Not … always … the … truth.” says Su Goldfish of her father Manfred in the fascinating documentary THE LAST GOLDFISH. Continue reading THE LAST GOLDFISH: MGFF 2018
Light piano music leads us from hands slowly massaging dough, through a cityscape, into a Torten Laden, Café Krendenz on a busy street in Berlin. THE CAKEMAKER, playing as part of Queer Screen’s Mardi Gras Film Festival, is a profound and impactful film which has been crafted with loving hands. Continue reading THE CAKEMAKER: MGFF 2018
Danny is a little shit. He’s an arrogant layabout who expects the world to come to him. He’s finished college after all… why people aren’t breaking their neck to offer him writing work. It’s a mystery to him but not to us. Danny is the antihero of his own story in a terrifically droll comedy DATING MY MOTHER which will play as part of Queer Screen’s Mardi Gras Film Festival 2018. Continue reading DATING MY MOTHER: MGFF 2018
Queer Screen’s 25th Mardi Gras Film Festival is 15 February – 1 March 2018 and the full program has just been announced.
To help you decide from the huge array of films on offer look out for a series of reviews from The Sydney Arts Guide.
