★★★★1/2
Adelaide Fringe. Ruby’s at Holden Street Theatres. Presented by Janet Swain.
If this isn’t the smallest theatre in the Fringe, it’s running a close second to wherever the first is! A dozen or so seats fill the intimate space, with j-u-s-t enough room for an electric keyboard and a couple of props. Definitely not a chip packet kind of place.
This is Janet Swain’s first solo show – she references her cabaret band The Loveys, later in the piece. But this is hers, and what a triumph it is. This is what a Fringe show should be, through and through.
It can be just as difficult to capture a small space as a large one, and Swain accomplishes this with ease. Looking her audience in the eye, she takes us through a 14 year-old’s pain and anguish of being ‘forced’ by her mother to play the bassoon, and an abandoned bassoon at that. The bassoon (in French le basson; Italian il fagotto; German das fagott, as we are reminded often) is the forgotten instrument, and as Swain points out in one of her original songs, in an orchestra it is way up the back, just behind the flutes.
Studying via a scholarship in the endangered instruments program, Swain endures the indignity of it all, revealing her passion for cello, and her unrequited love for the cellist, Jaqueline Dupree. Ah what could have been, had she not been a bassoonist!
After failing an exam, Swain leaves the instrument in her mother’s shed, where it remains for 32 years. In finding it again, Swain also discovers her grandmother’s mementos, and uncovers her passion for singing as a young woman in the church choir and touring musical company, with “rehearsals twice a week”. Delphi Coral was her Revlon lipstick of choice and Swain takes it as her nom de guerre.
Swain uses original songs in the telling of these stories, and the passion of her grandmother’s regret, - the tragedy of the choices made by the middle aged house-wife, the lost opportunities - shines through her performance. She is expressive – funny, sad, yearning, circumspect, joyful – and showcases each of these through her original songs, played gently on piano with a couple of raucous bassoon solos tossed in!
As befits the space, lighting is minimal and the sound is just right for the room.
It all appears to work out well in the end, in the way that a well told story of great personal significance should. Grandmother’s torch is carried on and the unappreciated bassoon makes it into a cabaret band. Mother would be proud. As should Janet Swain be.
Arna Eyers-White
When: 27 Feb to 12 Mar
Where: Holden Street Theatres
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
★★★★★
Adelaide Fringe. The Arch, Holden Street Theatres. 26 Feb 2023
It is no wonder Sandi McMenamin is one of the most beloved musos in town.
She has the goods. She gives the goods. She’s been doing it for yonks. She IS the goods.
Holden Street's Arch theatre, thus called because it once was a wee church, is perfect in size and character for Sandi - so much so that she opens her show by singing a song to it and to Holden Street. She was born, more or less, just near here. Hence, performing here is "full circle" for her. Hence the name of her show.
Sandi has songs in honour of all sorts of things. She has the gift. Since the old Ron Tremaine days when she was the resident entertainer at Ayers House, she has been able to pen a clever ditty and set it to catchy music. Patrons vied to become her subject matter.
She’s pretty good on the piano, too. Nimble digits thrive on famously testing virtuoso pieces - and there among them, dizzyingly, is Dizzy Fingers, just as her dad used to play it.
Sandi takes a bow, her gorgeous patterned diamanté jacket throwing rainbow stars from the stage.
Sandi Mac has performed all over the world but this is her first Fringe show. Not the last, she promises. Her repertoire is too immense for just one show.
She has spent a life around theatre shows and theatre people She has stories to tell and she peppers her performance with snippets of biography and the odd anecdote. She sings her wonderful song to the leafy sea dragons of Second Valley, she does a quirky take on Peter Allen with I Go to FReo in which she cunningly rhymes ‘Dockers’ with ‘quokkas’. She pays tribute to South Australian towns, especially Carrieton, and to the weather with a parody of Peter Goers on the ABC in a lovely song called Hello, How Are You, Robe?
Sandi Mac can do anything, including share the stage with a young rising star. It is her granddaughter Hannah Pollard who sings My Funny Valentine with an exquisite voice of impressive range. She stays on to do harmony with Sandi in her Somebody’s Hero song, based on the kindness she admires of the Queen of Tarts cafe which keeps a tip jar to pay for coffees for the destitute.
That’s our Sandi. Not just a fabulous pianist and cabaret entertainer but also one of this world’s good spirits.
Samela Harris
When: 25 Feb to 5 Mar
Where: The Arch, Holden Street Theatres
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
★★★★★
Adelaide Fringe. Hung Dance, Lewis Major. AC Arts Main Theatre. 24 Feb 2023
We say ‘see you’ as we leave someone or group we’ve spent time with until the next meeting. One day they are gone.
Pain of loss. Seeing, seeking, searching in hope and never finding the elusive lost one after the moment. Trying to forget. Such a profoundly painful life paradox.
Choreographer Lai Hung-Chung tackles this deepest mystery of human frailty utilising simultaneously fluid, shimmering movement and taut, jerking, sharp, jittering angles sprung from every body joint. Detail is extraordinarily focused, to very precise movement of hands and finger joints. The pain those jerking moments evoke is vivid.
A series of tableaux and duos evoke the deeply spiritual, emotional and raw mortal pain of loss, its guilt riven psychology ripples through the hour, building a physicalised sense of an inner other world from which escape is sought, but never achieved.
Its power is greatly increased by Tsai Chao-Yu’s exquisitely subtle lighting which works in a tremendously effective relationship with the dancers and Hsu Chau-Wai’s elegant electronic, at times elegiac score of which the chief undertone is the sound of bells, always reminding us emotional and physical loss is near. It is unceasing in its brutal assault on the soul.
See You is a magnificent, deeply powerful meditative work. Lai Hung-Chung’s contribution to contemporary dance in this work is outstanding in offering a new approach delving into the inner world of human experience.
David O’Brien
When: 22 Feb to 5 Mar
Where: AC Arts Main Theatre
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
★★★★★
Adelaide Fringe. Ponydog Productions. Arhur Artbar – The Tarot Tavern. 24 Feb 2023
The Tarot Tavern venue upstairs at Arthur Art Bar is another world away from reality.
The tiny intimate space is festooned with dark coloured drapes, splashes of black and white, and intimately lit with fairy lights and candle lights. There are ancient tomes stacked about small tables. The music softly playing is melodic.
Designers Phoenix May, Amy Rose Jackson, Andi Snelling and Sound Designer Sophie Parker have spared nothing to create the most beautiful, entrancing environment for what proves to be an absolutely spell binding evening.
Tarot Master/Storyteller-Director Davey Seagle is a commanding, riveting, warm hearted, powerful presence in the room.
He guides his audience into the mystery of the story we will create though the Tarot cards we will chose.
Ever wanted to experience the feeling and fervour of myth-like takes in the moment? This is that experience.
Cards chosen, the choices made by the audience effect what happens to the world and characters inhabiting them. It is truly an epic thing to experience live in the moment!
Seagle is like a master storyteller from the most ancient of times. He strings together consequences; each card unleashing a tale of heroic, spiritually profound, dark and light mythical legend being told for the first time in history. It is indeed the first and only time it will be told.
That’s the great magic of this immersive experience. You walk away with a legend in your mind and heart that is yours and yours alone.
David O’Brien
When: 17 Feb to 5 Mar
Where: Arthur Artbar – The Tarot Tavern
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
★★★★★
Adelaide. Fringe. Holden Street Theatres and Thebarton Theatre. 25 Feb 2023
A flock of galas can be seen at the Fringe but this is the biggest and probably the best. You need the 2000-seat Thebarton Theatre to fit in all interested parties - its reputation precedes it.
Emcee Eddie Bannon was a great warm-up, but there wasn’t much warming up required – the audience was pretty pumped and ready for a few laughs. I think the first thing we laughed at was Covid because so many of us wouldn’t have been in the buzz of a room like that for maybe years. Still, Bannon brightened things up even more with his jokes and repartee and by discussing menopause with a 15-year-old girl. In this review, I will plug the comedian’s Fringe show if they have one.
Damian Callinan (Damian Callinan – Double Feature) is a stalwart of stand-up and theatre. I’ve seen him in the 5 Star show, Damian Callinan – The Merger, and the magnificent The Wine Bluffs – always his material. Super funny and slick with a friendly smile. Sri Lankan-Australian Dilruk Jayasinha (Dilruk Jayasinha – Heart Stopper) was super funny – bright and witty on the cultural exchange issues with a non-stop schtick. Rudy-Lee Taurua (Rudy-Lee Taurua: “Diverse”) – when your self-proclaimed background is “gay, mixed race, First Nation, raised by a single mother on the pension, working class, anxious, clinically depressed, and domestic abuse survivor,” you have more than enough material for a laugh-fest. Rudy-Lee makes the most of the hand he was dealt. Confronting and punchy, he knows how to shock and awe with delicious irony. The first half was finished by Amos Gill (Amos Gill – The Pursuit of Happy(ish)). Amos makes a living in Los Angeles, which you might guess is highly competitive for comics. But perhaps more opportunity than the Adelaide he was brought up in and where he studied law. Gill’s style is full in your face – the ordinary is turned on its head for delicious satire.
After intermission, Bannon barely needed to re-energise the audience – everyone was heady. Next up, Ivan Aristeguieta (Ivan Aristeguieta – Citizen). Entitled ‘Citizen’ because Ivan is from Venezuela and just got his citizenship – 10 years later. When he arrived on our shores, he thought we were so funny, he took up stand-up. I didn’t think there was any funny way left to laugh at Australian lingo, but Ivan’s material was murderous. Ivan won Best Weekly Comedy Award at the Fringe last year, and was nominated for Most Outstanding Show at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival in 2021.
Fiona O’Loughlin (Fiona O’Loughlin, and Nickyboy & Queen Fee: Fiona O’Loughlin) puts on an act of being addled by alcohol but with some experience after a revealing performance incident in 2009, which she bravely and candidly discussed with ABC’s Australian Story. Dressed in hippie chic, Fiona stretches the international theme unless Yorke Peninsula separated and nobody noticed. The grandkids cop it in her act - it’s about time - they get away with so much. Fiona is an exceptional person and a beacon to all who crave to bounce back with comic timing and chutzpah.
I first reviewed Heath Franklin in 2007 doing his Chopper thing. He’s lost the handlebar mo and sunnies and the repulsive and ludicrous persona and you can see him in Heath Franklin – Out of Character being his regular funny self. From the foreign land of Western Sydney, he does a good chicken impersonation.
Another intermission and on to the third half. Carey Marx (British Comedian, Carey Marx: The Dead Don’t Heckle) won Best International Comedy Show at the New Zealand Comedy Festival, twice. And I can see and hear why. Sipping a beer and bearded, his deadpan takes are hilarious. Prince Harry lamented in his book, Spare, that he was never going to be king, saying, and Carey retorts, “Finally, here is somebody who understands me.”
Sorry, John Lynn, if you have a Fringe show on, it’s not easy to find. The luck of the Irish. John uses effective vocal effects to accentuate his lockdown story, but Carey Marx is a tough act to follow. The fulsome evening ended with James Donald Forbes McCann (The James Donald Forbes McCann Catamaran Plan Extravagan(za)!) whose Fringe show will apparently appeal to the mariner in you. Having graduated from Call Centre High, James had much to say about operations there and his lucky escape. “Don’t talk to the white guy, talk to the Indian immigrant with three degrees awaiting recognition of his qualifications.”
The Gala is great value. For a measly $28, you are thoroughly entertained with laughter, cheeks hurting and trying to remember the jokes after nearly three hours of non-stop comic heaven. Bravo!
PS Ok, Ok, I get it. You only have enough money to see one of these comics and you want to know who I recommend. Please deposit $25 to my account: BSB …. Ha, just kidding! If I had to pick one, it would be Carey Marx, and if I had to pick two, Ivan Aristeguieta. But remember, I’m just a small boat in the sea of opinion, and any of these stand-ups will have you in stitches.
David Grybowski
When: 25 Feb
Where: Thebarton Theatre
Bookings: Closed