fringe: half hour hamlet

This is our second time seeing Patrick Hercamp perform his half hour version of Shakespeare's Hamlet.

For the purposes of the show Hercamp is not the titular Dane but rather Shakespeare, translating the play into the modern language of the day (our day, not Shakespeare's). The role of Hamlet gets filled in by an audience member (which in this particular show turned out to be me, thanks for that Patrick), and Hercamp then directs much of the explaination/play directly to them (or, for the purposes of this review, "me"). Fortunately this entails sitting in the audience and holding Yorrick (the skull) and not being on stage.

Like last time there are also soundbites for the audience to recite... when anybody dies, when poison is mentioned, when everybody is blissfully happy (remembering of course that this is Hamlet, so that one doesn't come up a lot) and when "your grandfather kisses your sister" (or "ewwwwwww"). A little like last time, the first two of these are basically a noise and a word together, which get progressively more difficult for the audience to manage to remember for some reason as time goes on.

Having the whole half hour essentially directed right at me was something of a unique experience. I love Hercamp's energy at the best of times, and being right in the focus of it was amazing and more than a little dazzling.

The show itself feels somewhat tighter than last year, I'm guessing mostly because he's had a year to really relax into the performance, as well as refine it and lose anything that didn't work in favour of things that did. As I said before Hercamp's energy and performance is really what makes this an amazing show to watch. To keep the level of performance at around 11 for the whole half hour show really shows how skilled he is as a performer and an improviser (whether it was when a random somebody banged on the fence of the beer garden or when I said "whoopsy" about the death of Polonius, Hercamp just picks it up and runs with it).

I do find myself wondering if this is something that could work with other Shakespeare plays or if there's something particular about Hamlet that makes this work as incredibly well as it does.

In any event, it's a show I highly recommend you go and see, whether you're familiar with Hamlet or not.

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festival: intimate space

Intimate Space from Restless Dance Theatre is an odd experience that sits at the intersection between performance art, dance and theatre.

And it takes part against the backdrop of the large, never sleeping machine that is the Hilton Hotel.

Restless is a company who create "inclusive work informed by disability" and means that a large number of the performers have some kind of "difference", the most immediately obvious one for a number of them being Down Syndrome.

The experience beings with a great deal of whimsy. And the only people we interacted with were all members of the company. I'm going to keep some of the details vague, but there are certain things I definitely want to remember.

We were greeted by the concierge, who tied baggage check tags around our wrists after asking which of six categories listed we most identified with. At the time I chose "Fancy Free", but afterwards I went back and checked "Sentimental Fool" to go along with it, because it was more apt.

There were only about a dozen people in the audience group, enough to fill a hotel elevator, but not too many to make it really cramped.

Up to a certain point there's no speaking, we have to read signs and hand signals and people's clothing.

The whole introductory section with Ashton Malcolm, Kym McKenzie and Michael Noble was beautifully done to induct us into the world we're about to visit, and when Noble (that's him in the photo) finally leads us off, a little like a sweet and geeky version of the White Rabbit, leading Alice into Wonderland.

We're led through the hotel, from corridor to hotel room, then into the service corridors and the basement, to the blue lit laundry room, along the corridors following giggling staff, then up to the kitchen and out onto the mezzanine overlooking the bar.

The bar scene was the one that really got to me. We were all given headphones as we come out onto the mezzanine and after a number between a man and a woman we're invited to join the woman looking out over the balcony where performers are dotted amongst real hotel bar patrons. I have no idea if anyone warned the visitors what was about to happen, but they do kind of get absorbed into the narrative just by their mere presence in the room.

Then Jianna Georgiou and Alex Luke start to dance together on the stairs, as two people in love. She has a "difference", he does not. As they dance and flirt this looping, overlapping, repeating words and phrases come through the headphones.

"They don't belong together."

That's not all of it, there's a lot of words, all rolling and coiling over each other... in fact, I'm not even sure now if that's actually one of the lines, but that's the message. And it really got to me, because it's always what people who discriminate or want to have power over others say to lessen other people's power and agency. You can do better. He's too good for you. And I teared up. Because, as I mentioned earlier, I am a sentimental fool.

While I have singled out a few people by name, everyone involved did an amazing job, and intersecting with the lives of the real hotel staff and seeing, albeit briefly, the workings of the hotel was incredibly interesting.

The only quibbles I have are really minor ones... firstly the baggage check tags never overtly come into play... yes, I realise they're probably more to identify us as belonging to the production in a fun and quirky way, there was only one spot where Noble checks the tags on everyone, but I'm not sure if the tags made a difference. And on occasions it was difficult to know where to stand or when to follow, so the odd bit of extra direction wouldn't go astray.

But they're very minor issues with an otherwise highly interesting piece.

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photo saturday: hell of a week

Things I did this week...

• wrote a job application
• cleaned my house for a rental inspection
• had a meeting with the new employment agency contact
• went to three Fringe shows
• drove up and down the road to Ma's place twice (including today)
• got my hair cut
• went out for drinks with The Nuthouse.

It doesn't sound like all that much, but there was almost literally not enough week for the amount of shit I had to pack in it and I'm all kinds of emotionally shattered. Like I said last week I'd forgotten that the inspection was this week, so I'd intended to write my job application on Sunday, and I had to instead split my focus between the two and leave parts of the house cleaning until later in the week. Which would have been fine had I not had something of an emotional breakdown trying to write the application.

Partly that was due to the fact that those things are never just written in plain English... and I had to write 1500 words in response to things that made no sense. In the end I got to around 900 words, and then took it into work and spoke with La Ninj since she's no longer involved in the process, she gave me some good advice, I reworked some stuff, added other things that made sense, copy and pasted various things from the last time I did one of these things and got it to just shy of 1500 words.

I then put it in on Thursday. There was some additional internal mental drama around filling out the supporting documentation, but I kind of knew that was A Thing. Still doesn't stop it from being drama.

Now I guess it's just mine to lose. I've been doing the job for almost three years, I quite literally wrote the book (well, the process document) on how to do the job. And if it turns out that I don't get it for some reason, I will print out the process document, either hand it to the new person or simply leave it on the desk and walk out. Because fuck that noise.

I'm not 100% sure, but I think my current offsider is also applying for the job. If he isn't and the application document I saw him working on on Friday is for something else completely, then fine, I owe him an apology inside my head at least... but if he is, why the fuck wouldn't you just say something. I also can't really blame him for putting in an application, but at the same time I really want to... and doubly so because he hasn't had the decency to say something about it.

It also turns out that I know all three people who are going to be on the interview panel. I expected to know two of them and for the third to be a stranger, but no, turns out I know all of them. Not completely sure if that helps or not, but let's go with it being an advantage.

Tuesday was a big evening, with two Fringe shows back to back and then I had to drive Ma all the way home. Thankfully she came in on the train though and I met her at the Royal Croquet Club. But I didn't get home until almost midnight.

Wednesday was Haircut Day and also Tink Has A New House Day. Fortunately it isn't that much further away though. I finally made all the correct words about what I actually wanted from my hair colour... I kept not getting it quite right, at least since she'd been away, so while my previous hair did make other people comment, that wasn't really what I was looking for (by contrast, nobody said a damn thing this time, which I kind of prefer).

Thursday was my inspection day... and I think it went well, unlike the last couple of times nobody left me any kind of communication to say that it was all good or not, so I don't really have a clue.

I also had a late Fringe show, which I really should have left for earlier than I did... I had to rush as quickly as possible from where I parked the car to the Garden and then was at the end of a long line of people. It wasn't a major disaster, but I could have been closer to the action if I'd just gotten my crap together earlier. Kind of the story of my life just at the present to be honest.

Friday was actually a really slow day. Mostly because I decided to take it slowly after having been through the wringer for the rest of the week, but fortunately there wasn't anything that stopped that from happening. And then we went out for drinks after work... and I discovered Pimms. Yes, I know, it's been around for a while, but it was sitting there on tap right in front of me, and it just sounded like a good idea.

Granted there was only one of the bar staff who really knew what the fuck they were doing when they made it up for me with orange and lemon and lime peel and whatever else he did (and he charged me slightly less than the others too)... whether that had anything to do with me talking about Puppetry of the Penis with someone from work when I went to the bar, I don't know.

It wasn't a late one, but I couldn't be bothered walking home, so I took my slightly tipsy self off to the bus. Of course because of stupid damn Clipsal it took longer than usual to get home.

This morning was what has become the new standard Saturday... I got up, I got ready, I went to the supermarket, I did my shopping and Ma's shopping, I forgot at least one thing that one of us wanted, I came back here and unpacked. We didn't have any shows until 2pm today (Festival, not Fringe), so I hung out here for a while before I packed up the car and headed off to Ma's. Essentially I drove down there, gave her her stuff and we got back in the car and came back here again. There wasn't a lot of time to spare, so we made a quick stop here for tickets and whatnot and then headed into the city for the show.

Then afterwards we came back here to hang out until it was time for the evening shows.

First show we only just got to it in time, which is a habit I don't enjoy, but at least we didn't have to do a lot of useless hanging around. Between that show and the third show of the day we went across to Gluttony for some food. There may have been better choices/options if we'd tried anywhere else, but we had yiros and it was nice enough.

Then we headed over to wait for the last show, saw that, resisted the urge to punch the people in the row behind us who seemed to think that they were part of the show, left, drove Ma home, had a very lovely and chilled (and, yes, quite cute) drunk dude engage me in conversation from the back seat of the taxi he was in when it pulled up next to us at the traffic lights, came back here and called it a night (okay that last bit isn't in the least bit true, I came back here and proceeded to finish this post which I started when we came back here earlier, then I have to do the write-ups for the three shows).

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fringe: puppetry of the penis

I just spent 75 minutes of my evening sitting in a large wooden box, surrounded by women (with the odd incidental husband/boyfriend and a smattering of homosexuals) watching two grown men play with their genitals.

Yep, that's right... I saw Puppetry of the Penis. Or, as they refer to it during the performance... The Dick Show.

I've been wanting to go and see it for a few years, but it was only this year that the guys, Barry Bisco (left) and Rich Binning (right) really caught my attention and I knew the timing was right.

By every definition and metric it is a weird ass show. There's no other Fringe show that I've seen in the last 129 shows (oh yeah, this was also my 130th Fringe show) that was just dick from beginning to end. And no other show where the guys were just playing with the genitals the whole time. Plus straight women do tend to get very... enthusiastic and excitable... when naked men are involved.

There is just something odd about watching guys contort their penises into all manner of shapes and configuration... for example, the Eiffel Tower, the hamburger, the sailboat, the Loch Ness Monster, the snail, the Kanye and the Drumpf (which were essentially the same joke with different props), the baby bird, the ladies and the wristwatch. And you can pretty much imagine what most of those involve.

It's not that I think they're hurting themselves... guys all know just how stretchy and elastic a flaccid penis can be, but there's some definite above and beyond stretching going on.

It was incredibly funny though... some parts more than others if I'm honest, which is only to be expected, but it did have me laughing for the majority of the show.

Of the two guys, I have to say that I had much more of a fondness for Rich... there's just something about his cheeky smile and just the way that he played with the audience... not to mention all of that body (and those great tattoos).

Oh and full kudos to the young guy who was sitting near me in the audience who got up and dropped trou to participate in the hamburger. It was a good looking burger, although I was amused and impressed that he didn't give a shit after the trick was over and just flashed the whole audience his unburgered junk and he got dressed again. Woohoo for bonus penis.

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fringe: shakespeare's waiting room

Mr William Shakespeare is auditioning some his most famous characters in order to determine who is the most dramatic.

Yes, technically if you think about it too hard the premise doesn't make a lick of sense, but as a framework for the show, it works quite well.

Lady Macbeth, Titania, Bottom, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet all turn up for an audition, perform the most tragic and dramatic sequence for the respective stories and then stick around to snipe at the other characters before, during and after their turns.

The location of this show was both a positive and negative I have to say... it's at Live on 5 at Adelaide Oval, and the stage has been set up looking out over the oval itself. As settings go, not too damn shabby.

However on nights like tonight when it's quite hot, it's not the most pleasant venue, and although there was some amazing reverberation and echo happening partly from the amplification but mostly from the general acoustics of the place, there were points when the actors strayed a little too far from the microphones and were slightly hard to hear (Juliet especially). The planes coming in at various points didn't especially help that either.

The other complaint I have to mention is that this was advertised in the guide as a 90 minute show, but I think it went for just under an hour... so when the play was "over" (I think we may have been waiting for the usual return of the actors to tell us to tell our friends about the show and leave them a review, etc... which didn't happen) nobody left until one of the stage hands came out to tell us it was definitely over.

Costuming is simple but effective, everybody just wears black, modern clothing that still manages to suit their character (especially Lady Macbeth... but then she was always going to be my favourite).

Likewise, the set itself is just the titular waiting room, with a little space on one side for the characters to perform for Mr William.

I can't find anything about the cast of the play, so I'm just going to have to refer to them by their characters...

Unsurprisingly Lady Macbeth was my favourite... she was such a bitch, but in the best possible way. However both Titania and Bottom were excellent also... especially Bottom playing the rather dense fool.

The gold star has to go to the waiting room receptionist though... not just for her amazing facial expressions throughout each and every audition, but also when she gets a chance to really cut loose, she's amazing.

In fact everyone did a great job with the Shakespeare parts of the show, even Romeo and Juliet manage to go from ditzy teens to starcrossed lovers without a hitch.

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fringe: fauna

People pretending to be animals... animals pretending to be people... Fauna lies somewhere in the space between.

This is circus that is inspired by nature, the fauna of the title, and isn't necessarily always pretty... but it is wonderfully controlled and powerful.

A couple of years ago we were lucky enough to see Cadence, and three of the performers from that, Rhiannon Cave-Walker, Daniel Cave-Walker (formerly Daniel Liddiard) and musician Geordie Little, have returned with Fauna. Along side them are Enni-maria Lymi, Matt Pasquet and Imogen Huzel.

Little provides the live music to go along with the performance, and starts the show off with his guitar, which is quite beautiful.

It's kind of hard to describe the show to be honest... there's no specific story, but there are character traits and specific animal behaviours. Lymi seems to be the awkward predator, somewhat feared but easily surprised. The Cave-Walkers are clearly a mated pair. Huzel is some kind of a bird and poor Pasquet is clearly below everyone in the pecking order.

My favourite sequences were easily anything involving Lymi... she's mainly a trapeze artist, but it's not pretty posing trapeze (which I dislike), it's strong, powerful trapeze, that she makes funny while at the same time showing an incredibly level of both strength and control.

It was also impressive to see her act as the base for a trick involving all three women.

And following up close behind as a favourite was the sequence with Messrs Cave-Walker and Pasquet squaring off as rival males. I'm not going to lie, I know they were supposed to be fighting, but it was a little bit sexy.

But it's really not like there was a bad sequence throughout.

I also had a soft spot for the collective walk they do at the beginning and end of the show... it's not big, it's not flashy, but it is wonderfully coordinated and beautiful to watch.

That's kind of the point of Fauna I think... it's not big, over the top, dramatic tricks for the most part, but everything that they do, they do with an immense amount of power, strength and control which is even better as far as I'm concerned.

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fringe: night creature

I can honestly say that it's been a while since a Fringe show has moved me to tears like Night Creature did. And I don't even really know why.

I will freely admit that based off what I'd originally read about the show (and going off the feel of the poster), I was expecting a completely different kind of show from Lion House Theatre.

What I got was a show that was warm, funny, sweet, beautiful and completely surprising.

It's essentially a one woman show, with Casey Jay Andrews capturing my attention right from the start, but she's helped out by the lovely Tom Coliandris on guitar.

The set decoration is simple but effective, particularly the use of a single type of props to represent both characters and the landscape.

The story is the reinterpretation of a Greek myth about the Scylla set in a Yorkshire fishing village and the combination of the beautiful writing and Andrews' amazing performance turn it into a modern fairy tale.

I feel like to say any more would spoil the experience, but I cannot recommend seeing this show highly enough, it is a perfect little gem that was washed up at my feet.

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fringe: razi - mesmerise

If the word adorkable was ever going to apply to a Fringe performer, then Razi (Adelaide magician Ryan Osbourn) would be it.

And that does work for his stage presence... even if he does seem nervous or flub a line or two, it's easy to forgive.

I will say that some of his magic tricks I've seen other performers do better... I'm not sure if it was our closeness to the stage or Osbourne's nerves, but there were a few moments where the audience could see the inner workings.

That's not to deny that he knows his stuff, and he can definitely handle a deck of cards, even when I knew roughly what he was doing, I still didn't actually see him doing it.

The mentalism section was interesting, especially because there were a large number of kids in the audience which I haven't run into at previous magic shows (they've mostly been a little more adult orientated). And of course whenever Razi asked for volunteers, they all wanted to be involved. It added some unexpected comedy a couple of times, especially Max and his choice of number.

Actually the number trick was the most interesting... and it's another one of those "I know there's a trick to this part, but I have no idea how he got from step 1 to step 102 without anybody seeing it.

The first two thirds of the show is magic and mentalism, then the last third is contact juggling. I will say that the latter is definitely where Razi shines displaying amazing dexterity and control as he manipulated a number of objects, finished with the crystal spheres as seen in his poster.

As a long time fan of Labyrinth, that part definitely had my attention. I'm not exactly sure what I think about the mask he wore during it. I'm guessing it was to stop people focusing on his face rather than the trick, but it's a bit weird looking...

I'm not sure if it wouldn't have been better to spread the juggling out between the other parts of the show, because it's a lot to take in all at once.

Otherwise it was a good show... not the best magic act I've ever seen, but quite an entertaining one.

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photo saturday: things

There's thoroughly too much shit going on right at the moment, and all of it is a little more difficult than it really needs to be.

And none of it's helped by the fact that my brain is a little too frozen up due to the fact that there are far too many things I should be doing or thinking about and my brain just seizes up.

Work was fairly quiet at the beginning of the week, but the rest of it was fairly busy. One of the additional things I had to do along the way was make all the arrangements to move to a different temp agency, most of which involved doing the stupid ass tests that I've done about a million times now. What annoys me most about those tests is they usually have a very specific way of making you do things, and any other version or divergence from that makes you fail it. Very irrirating.

But I'm all signed up to the new agency and I "start" on Monday. Tomorrow I have to write my job application for the job, which will be all kinds of fun. But I have given myself a reward to have only after I finish writing it. That gives me the rest of the week to refine it before I have to submit it on Friday.

Oh fuck, I've just realised that the inspection that I thought was the following week is actually next Thursday. So now I need to both write the job application AND do all the cleaning I need to do before Thursday while being out at the Fringe on Tuesday and going to see Tink for my haircut on Wednesday.

Fuck my life right now... fuck it right in it's face.

If worse comes to worse I'm just going to take Wednesday off... but I should be able to do everything, it's just a matter of making sure that I actually get off my ass and do all of the things. Or alternatively that I manage to clean the apartment tomorrow and then don't mess it up at all between then and Thursday.

Fuck, fuck, fuckitty fuck. But at least I checked, otherwise I would have been screwed. Although really what the fuck is the baseline of what I need to do to pass the inspection, clean the kitchen, clean the bathroom, sweep and mop the floor and I should be done. Everything else is mostly done.

Sorry... got distracted by my own brain for a minute there.

Otherwise the week was spent going to Fringe things, with the exception of Monday and Friday.

I did intend to do some tidying last night, but a late conversation turned into a late gentleman caller who arrived at about 10:30 and didn't leave until around 2:30am.

Which made getting up this morning something of a chore.

But today was much like last week, in which the plan was for me to go shopping and then do my own thing for a while, then go and pick Ma up early in the afternoon. Which basically meant that I spent a couple of hours tidying the apartment up (thank fuck). Then I headed off to pick Ma up.

I went down around 1.30 just in case we wanted to do anything or go anywhere once we got back here to my place. We didn't end up doing a damn thing tho... because neither of us could either make a decision or really be bothered.

Then it was time to head off to dinner, and then two essentially back-to-back Fringe shows.

We were going to have dinner at the Seven Stars Hotel which we tried out last Fringe, but it turned out they were fully booked, so after a brief bout of indecision we ended up at Bocelli on Hutt Street. And I'll say that they don't skimp on their portion sizes.

What we should have done was move the car between shows, but we didn't, which meant first quite a long walk from Flinders Street to the Botanical Gardens, but after the show was over an even longer walk back to where we parked. Note to self, don't do that next time.

That was followed by driving Ma all the way home, then driving myself all the way back to my place, getting back just before midnight.

And now here we are.

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fringe: blanc de blanc

Blanc de Blanc is, in equal parts, a chic 1920's Parisian hotel staffed by the insane and a debauched cabaret of flesh and champagne.

Suffice to say, I loved it.

It's not for the faint-hearted though. It's definitely a "grown-up cabaret", more so than any of the somewhat similar shows I've seen before. And I think for some it may be a little more than they bargained for, even with the R18+ rating.

There's a lot of nudity, mostly female, but occasionally male... and the cast can and will molest the audience and every opportunity.

The show itself is a two hour mixture of circus, dance, comedy and some spectacular aerial work.

Monsieur Romeo is the maitre d' and ringmaster of this crazy little crew, and he's a commanding presence on stage... even more so when he changes costume in the second half.

All of the cast are amazing at what they do, but I have to give special mention to Spencer Novich who was just exceptional. It's hard to be the clown, but Novich makes it looks effortless, and his slender frame belies the amazing control he seems to have over every single muscle in his body. And without spoiling anything, his sound effect sequence is so completely flawless.

Likewise Masha Terentieva does spectacular things with a hotel luggage cart that need to be seen to be believed, but for me it was the personality she oozed from every pore throughout the whole show that I loved. To me she was channelling a somewhat insane and obscene version of Jean Harlow... if Harlow ever worked with hula hoops and flashed her breasts to the audience.

I've seen people do aerial work from water before... I've seen Soap, I've seen The Boy in The Bath (twice), but I've never seen it done so beautifully and sensually as real-life partners Hampus Jansson and Milena Straczynski. I mean it doesn't hurt that Jansson is so incredibly beautiful it's just ridiculous, but their routine was just spectacular to watch, especially when she was lifting him out of the water and supporting his whole body weight.

The asskicking ladies of Blanc de Blanc continue in two very different ways with Emma Maye Gibson and J'aimime.

Gibson, to quote the program, is an obscene beauty queen, surreal showgirl and sex clown. Yep, that's two words I bet you never thought you'd see right next to each other like that. But she manages to make the sexy stuff just the right level of funny and the funny stuff the right kind of sexy without it all falling down around her... ears. Oh, and if you see her doing her "I will survive" number, I have two pieces of advice, firstly, SING IT LOUD, secondly, take the maraca if it's offered.

On the flip side, J'aimime did a couple of amazing sequences first with a jacket and a hat, then with a really, really big balloon. I've seen the jacket routine before, but there was something about the way she did it that was so incredibly believable... but the balloon... well I've never seen anything like that in my life.

Last but not least, Shun Sugimoto is one hell of a dancer... he somehow manages to combine breakdance with contortion and make it equal parts breathtaking and horrifying. Plus he and Jansson make quiet sexy cats all dressed up in black lycra.

This is one of those shows where everybody does a little bit of everything (up to and including full frontal male nudity, thank you Spencer), and it's definitely more than the sum of it's parts, which is saying something, because those are some very talented, naughty and crazy parts.

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