Sydney Theatre Company

Theatre Review: Complex or confused? Oil at the Sydney Theatre Company may leave you scratching your head

Set across five distinct time periods, Oil at the Sydney Theatre Company depicts different moments in the modern history of petroleum (crude oil) and its far-reaching impacts. Written by UK playwright Ella Hickson and directed by Paige Rattray, the play follows the journey of May (Brooke Satchwell), a strong-willed woman who longs for a better…

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Theatre Review: Sydney Theatre Company’s The Dictionary of Lost Words at the Sydney Opera House proves that the pen is mightier than the sword

Adapted by Verity Laughton from the novel by Pip Williams, The Dictionary of Lost Words centres around the Scriptorium, where the very first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary is being compiled. It is 1886, and researcher Harry Nicoll (Brett Archer) is working while his four-year-old daughter Esme (Tilda Cobham-Hervey) plays under the table. The…

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Theatre Review: The Importance of Being Earnest is a feast for the eyes and a delight for the ears

The first thing you will notice about The Importance of Being Earnest at the Sydney Theatre Company is the stage. Impressive seems an inadequate description for such an elaborate set design. Created by Charles Davis, the audience is transported to another world, a world of excess, decadence and extremely high ceilings. With incredible attention to…

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A man and a woman sit on the end of a pier. They are looking into each others eyes as they lean in for a kiss.

Theatre Review: Sydney Theatre Company’s stunning adaptation of On the Beach hits close to home

If the end of the world was upon you, how would you respond? Hopeful optimism? Or perhaps defiant acceptance? It’s a question that has found its way into social consciousness a lot over the last few years, and it forms an integral part of Sydney Theatre Company’s On the Beach. Directed by Kip Williams and…

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Poison of Polygamy

Review: Sydney Theatre Company’s The Poison of Polygamy is a journey you’ll want to go on

The Poison of Polygamy at the Sydney Theatre Company will take you on a journey. From China’s Qing dynasty to Victoria’s nineteenth-century goldfields, and the colourful landscape of Melbourne’s Chinatown, the play seamlessly shifts focus. Based on the novel by Wong Shee Ping and adapted for the stage by Anchuli Felicia King, The Poison of…

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Review: Sydney Theatre Company’s A Raisin in the Sun is as urgent as ever, 65 years later.

A Raisin in the Sun was the first play in Broadway to be written by an African American woman, premiering in 1959 and starring Sidney Poitier. Sixty-five years later, it finally makes its Australian mainstage premiere, presented by Sydney Theatre Company. Three generations of Youngers live in a cramped 2-bedroom apartment on Chicago’s gritty south…

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Adelaide Festival Review: The Picture of Dorian Gray paints a convincing picture of a timeless message

The recent renovations to Her Majesty’s Theatre in Adelaide have been in keeping with the charm of the old building, while modernising it to a current standard. More room in comfortable seats, an additional dress circle, better bar facilities; these all add up to a sympathetic improvement of a classic theatre. What better place to…

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Appropriate

Review: Sydney Theatre Company’s Appropriate is a remarkable and intensely significant production

Ever notice how families will remember events from their childhood differently? How a conversation, a situation or a person that seems so clear to you can be viewed from a completely different perspective by your sibling. This concept of selective memory is sometimes heightened after someone dies, our brains often choosing to focus on the…

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Preview: STC’s Appropriate has all the benchmarks of great theatre

With everything that occurred in the year that was 2020, Appropriate, directed by Wesley Enoch seems, well, appropriate. Written by the American playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, the play centres around a dysfunctional American family brought together by the death of their father. As they begin to sort through his belongings they struggle between a desire to…

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Four shows not to miss in Sydney Theatre Company‘s 2019 season

Unveiling its bold, imaginative and entertaining array of productions for the year ahead, the Sydney Theatre Company’s new program of thirteen shows across four venues is prepared to astound audiences from far and wide. Speaking about the season, Artistic Director Kip William’s has said: “In 2018 our season looked at leadership and social responsibility in…

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Caryl Churchill classic Top Girls takes to the stage in The Sydney Opera House

The Sydney Theatre Company is kicking off their 2018 season with the Caryl Churchill classic Top Girls, and will be hitting the stage from 12 February to 24 March. The production is directed by STC Resident Director Imara Savage with an extraordinary all-female ensemble including Helen Thomson, Kate Box, Michelle Lim Davidson, Paula Arundell and…

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Theatre Review: Muriel’s Wedding: The Musical is a neon-coloured explosion through our culture

A question commonly asked in arts circles is where all the new Australian musicals are. Surely, they do exist, but grand-scale, blockbuster song-and-dance shows isn’t something we’re generally known for. Hot Shoe Shuffle – arguably Australia’s first hit musical – premiered only 24 years ago, and since then only Pricilla and Strictly Ballroom have made…

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Theatre Review: STC’s The Father could not be in better hands than those of John Bell (Performances to 21st August)

Dementia is a truly terrifying condition, one that attacks the very sense of self. It affects not only the sufferer but also those closest to them in the most distressing of ways. In Sydney Theatre Company’s production of The Father this distress is both portrayed and felt keenly, even when the play itself deliberately makes…

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Interview: Matthew Backer talks being on Cloud Nine with this most complex play (now playing in Sydney!)

Scandalously funny, thought-provoking and heartbreaking, Cloud Nine is an enduring theatrical masterpiece. However, after seeing it last week we had some questions… and who better to answer them then someone close to the heart of it all? Cue Matthew Backer, who takes on the dual roles of Joshua and Gerry in the production, and who has managed to dish…

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Theatre Review: STC’s Cloud Nine does much to draw you in to this most powerful play (Performances to August 12th)

In a bleak midwinter comes forth STC’s Cloud Nine– surprising, hilarious, shocking and magnificent. The staging bespokes a Kip Williams production in its minimal design, allowing focus to solely rest upon its carefully selected cast. A layer of dirt covers the ground, upon it a glass box to which the actors retire occasionally to be…

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Interview: Geraldine Hakewill talks about her upcoming role as Lady Macbeth and how Shakespeare’s work continues to translate in 2017

It’s one of Shakepeare‘s most famous tragedies and the Melbourne Theatre Company (MTC) is bringing Macbeth to audiences with a modern day touch. Starring none other than Aussie actor Jai Courtney in the title role and Geraldine Hakewill as Lady Macbeth, this is sure to be an outstanding season of Australian theatre. Macbeth opens next week and the cast…

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Theatre Review: Chimerica delivers on high visual and performance quality (at Roslyn Packer Theatre until April 1st)

Beginning in 1989, Chimerica brings us Joe Schofield, an American Photojournalist stationed in Beijing. Sitting in his hotel room during the Tiananmen protests, he manages to snap the all-famous photograph of Tank Man – a young student standing defiantly in the way of a line of tanks. Fast forward to 2012 and Joe, now back…

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STC’s Chimerica is an extraordinary piece of storytelling (Now playing at Roslyn Packer Theatre until 1st April)

In its opening moments Chimerica greets us with the back of its full cast, each in the vise of the iconic image “Tank Man”. Together they move, whipping their shopping bags in defiance. It is the precursor to the essence of this play: the enigma that is the Tank Man and his shopping bags. It is…

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Theatre Review: Away is an enduring look at life, conflict & the family Christmas holiday (Sydney Opera House until 25th March)

Michael Gow’s Away is one of Australia’s most popular plays and this latest production makes it easy to see why. The current Sydney Theatre Company and Malthouse Theatre Production sees the play return to its second home at the Sydney Opera House (the show played here one year after it debuted at the Stables Theatre…

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Matthew Backer on political thriller Chimerica, Kip Williams rehearsal rooms and the “Tank Man”

Inspired by one of the 20th century’s most powerful images, the photograph “Tank Man”, Chimerica tackles two decades of complex US-China relations alongside the personal stories that exist beyond the margins of history. We caught up with Matthew Backer during rehearsals to talk about this geopolitical thriller and what to expect from this latest production by Sydney…

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Broadway rehearsals underway for Sydney Theatre Company’s production of Chekhov’s first play

Starring Richard Roxburgh and Cate Blanchett, Andrew Upton‘s The Present is based on Anton Chekhov‘s first play, untitled and only discovered sixteen years after his death. After an acclaimed season in Sydney, the STC production will begin previews at Broadway’s Barrymore Theatre later this month. With Upton’s adaptation set post-Perestroika in the mid-1990s, friends gather…

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Theatre Review: Sydney Theatre Company’s Speed The Plow is a somewhat calm and controlled satirical stab at the American movie business

Speed The Plow is a somewhat calm and controlled satirical stab at the American movie business, at relationships and convenience, and at wanting to be a good person and yet always having to succumb in the end at the hands of money, money, money. As Bobby says in defeat: “I wanted to be good, but I became…

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Review: A Flea In Her Ear is an absolute masterpiece of comedic wonderment – Sydney Theatre Company, Sydney (until 17th November)

There is a reoccurring joke in A Flea In Her Ear that plays out as such- one character will start “I saw this play…”, to which the other will interrupt to say “I’m sorry”. The initial character then waves away the sympathy, explaining, “it was short”. Having seen STC’s latest production of this play, my final…

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Review: STC’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is grisly and all kinds of messed up (at Sydney Opera House until 22nd October)

The most recent production of A Midsummer Nights Dream I had seen was The Australian Ballet’s interpretation last year, “The Dream”. The ballet was full of whimsical fairies and enchanted forests, the dancing light and airy as it retold Shakespeare’s fanciful story of love and folly. Here again in the Sydney Theatre Company’s latest adaption…

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Matt Backer (Puck) on STC’s dark new interpretation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Sydney Theatre Company’s dark new interpretation of the beloved Shakespeare A Midsummer Night’s Dream opened at the Sydney Opera House this week. An interpretation that is anything but a fairytale. We caught up with Matt Backer during tech week to chat about this thrilling new production and about his character Puck, or who I shall henceforth refer…

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Sydney Theatre Company announces programme for 2017 season

With fifteen shows spread across four venues, Sydney Theatre Company’s 2017 season aims to “challenge, stir, and entertain” audiences, with a diverse and exciting lineup, including a musical version of Aussie classic Muriel’s Wedding. Speaking of the program, STC’s Interim Artistic Director Kip Williams said: “We are excited to present a diverse season in 2017,…

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Josh McConville on getting into the head of a donkey and the darker side of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Next month Sydney Theatre Company will be taking on Shakespeare’s whimsical tale of fairies and magic, A Midsummer Night’s Dream. But it seems not all will be flittering wings and glittering sparkles in this latest adaption by the company’s interim artistic director Kip Williams. We caught up with STC favourite Josh McConville during rehearsals to discuss this…

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Review: Fracture – Old Fitz Theatre, Sydney (Performances until August 12)

I find Mario Kart so ruthless and stressful that, emotionally, I can’t reach the end of Rainbow Road without shedding some real-life baggage. That’s the game Charlie (Brandon McClelland) is playing with flat-mates Clara (Contessa Treffone) and Tommy (Tel Benjamin), literally and metaphorically, in their rundown Perthian apartment. Whatever he’s trying to shed, they seem…

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Theatre Review: The Hanging – Sydney Theatre Company, Wharf Theatre (performances until 10th September)

There’s an overwhelming urge amongst Australian societies to divulge themselves in to the case of missing people – particularly children. Stories that dominate the media also capture us. The case of Daniel Morcombe is a case in point, where the pubic followed it religiously for more than a decade until there was some sort of…

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Sydney Theatre Company invites audiences into the forest of desire with a new staging of A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Sydney Theatre Company’s Resident Director Kip Williams will be diving back into the world of Shakespeare later this year, bringing what is  promised to be a bold new staging of the perennial favourite, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, to the Sydney Opera House stage. This new production will feature ABC’s Cleverman star Rob Collins as Lysander;…

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