Art Murmurs - Wellington Reviews

12/07/2024

I want to begin incorporating opt-in star ratings to our reviews. A rating out of five stars is an internationally recognised mark of success and prestige but our productions that look to tour...

07/05/2024

☄️ "Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812 is like if the flamboyant Russians we read about in classical literature were c**t, which they were in their own regard. I think a Russian novel is the perfect thing to turn into a musical, from the broody laments about life, to the opulence of the aristocracy, it all drips with drama."

Just a heads up, this review contains a little bit of course language. ​ Pōneke is getting chilly as we usher in autumn, and I can feel the seasonal depression preparing a fold out chair to...

23/04/2024

🫏 "As soon as he steps on stage, Hurst has command of the audience from the moment he walks onstage. Hurst is a very generous performer when it comes to what he gives to his audience, it is already extremely difficult to do a solo show as you have no one but yourself to rely on and Hurst handles it with expertise."

Seeing Michael Hurst perform feels like something of a rite of passage for a young theatre maker. Getting to experience that rite for the first time with The Golden Ass felt particularly right for...

21/04/2024

🌞 "Each reveal hits me in the gut, until we get the full story of how his brother died, giving context to the previous hints, making it all the more powerful."

This is not my first Wright&Grainger show. The first one was Orpheus in 2019 which I adored. There is a special way with which Alexander Wright tells story, an old, slam-poet, fireside style, which...

21/04/2024

We finally got there! Our enthusiastic shout outs to our favourite shows is now live!
http://www.artmurmurs.nz/theatre/2024-fringe-festival-wrap-up

26/03/2024

🎸 "I enjoy the theme about being ‘different types of Māori’ and how, in order to perform socially and professionally, there is a pressure to homogenise and be a certain kind of Māori which is more palatable or respectable, instead of being your true authentic self, which also happens to be Māori."

Two Guitars in the Circa One Stage, directed by Carrie Green, written by Jamie McCaskill, and produced by Sonia Hardie, is about two Māori musicians (McCaskill as Te Pou and Cameron Clayton as...

21/03/2024

🦘 "The low rumblings of this instrument is truly a gift from a divine being and in the expert hands of Barton, it speaks to a deeper part of our body."

I arrive at the Michael Fowler Centre (MFC) on Friday the 15th of March stressed (due to our wonderful Metlink bus system), a bit wet and (therefore) cold. The weather has really started to pack it...

21/03/2024

🎸 "I feel in awe of Aftab, of the band, of this music.”

Arooj Aftab and her band graces the Michael Fowler Centre one pleasant Wellington evening. The place is busy -- not packed -- full of 30-something year olds and some older members in the crowd who...

21/03/2024

🎤 "The ceremony of the whole event, the sheer importance of it, wore me down. It feels odd to comment on the specifics of its craft, because New Blue feels a lot bigger than that - it feels like a purging of something long quashed."

History is fluid. “The canon” can change quickly and wildly (see the 2023 Sight & Sound list ) as we re-evaluate and re-discover works from our past. The New Blue: A Portrait of Pixie Williams ,...

21/03/2024

🎻 "To my musically uncultured and uneducated ears, it is truly amazing. Gandelsman’s entire body is swept up in the performance, at first not so much, but by the end of the show, the music has channelled through this man and lifted a piece of his soul out for us. We so rarely get to see this level of genius and I have no regrets watching an artist of this level perform to us. Even I, a mere pleb, can understand this."

On a Wednesday evening, my friend and I go to see a GRAMMY award winning violinist and producer, Johnny Gandelsman, perform at St. Mary of the Angels on Boulcott Street. I am quickly informed by my...

21/03/2024

🐭 "A quirky sharing of stories and sections that feel very akin to stand-up comedy. [...] Gribble has a harmonious relationship with the audience."

Rat Tales! by Hootie-Patudi Productions is a humble collection of stories and anecdotes, set up at the Newtown Community Theatre. When I come into the space, it’s none other than Eryn Gribble...

11/03/2024

😇 "Manning brings us on this journey and performs the role of our guide, navigating gender, what it means to be q***r, what it means to really, truly love ourselves – can I get an “a-THEM”?"

False Idol is a sermon for the cynical; the program for this show describes it as “it’s just like going to church, only funnier and s*xier”. And does it deliver! False Idol , directed by...

11/03/2024

🛫🛬 "Nick Robertson’s Leave to Enter is, on the face of it, the story of a guy who is stopped from entering Scotland. The reality of this show is a comedic deep dive into the psyche of young 20-something year old Robertson navigating a difficult situation with humour, sadness, optimism, and Candy Crush."

Nick Robertson’s Leave to Enter is, on the face of it, the story of a guy who is stopped from entering Scotland. The reality of this show is a comedic deep dive into the psyche of young...

08/03/2024

🦋 "The Butterfly Who Flew Into The Rave is the coolest version of the beep test I’ve ever seen, and as an audience we’re locked in, rooting for their success whilst in awe of their prowess. Go and vicariously get your cardio in for a month."

The Butterfly Who Flew Into The Rave is a stamina-driven dance production set to the beats of the techno album Nocturbulous Behaviour by Suburban Knight, curated by Oli Mathiesen, Lucy Lynch, and...

08/03/2024

👭"Page and Torrington give powerhouse performances of such heavy subject matter and I am impressed by how convincingly they both portray such grief. I sincerely hope there is a dedicated wellbeing member of their team that supports them after their performances as they both give so much."

Content warning: discussion of domestic abuse, child abuse, and su***de. ​What are Sisters For? is a deeply personal piece by writer and director Josie Eastwood that intimately retells the...

08/03/2024

😶"I couldn’t have been more naïve to the sheer brilliance that underlies the show - Errol. Errol is terrifically unhelpful at the best of times and in his neutral state, he’s got the ‘light-on-but-no-one’s-home’ look."

Everyone’s Got An Errol opens on the Dome Theatre stage at BATS. It’s a quiet tuesday night and there’s nothing in particular that stands out when I walk into theatre. There’s a yellow and...

05/03/2024

👯‍♀️ "Rituals of Similarity is a well-conceptualised, beautifully performed, and cleanly executed production that deftly balances the tensions it holds with weight, lightness, tenderness and humour. The entire creative team demonstrates impactful utilisation of staging and spatial composition, contrast, and texture, which unifies the performance.

This show is so nice, I saw it twice. "

Rituals of Similarity , the newest production from Dance Plant Collective (performed at Te Auaha during Wellington’s 2024 Fringe Festival) is a moving memoir of twinhood, an exploration of the...

04/03/2024

🎩 "His story has to be heard to be believed."

The day after I saw Steve Willburry’s magic show/medical tell-all The Unluckiest Magician , I spot him performing street magic on the waterfront. A crowd of children have gathered around him, and...

03/03/2024

🌨 "Fitting that a show so out of the ordinary has its opening at the peculiar time of 3pm on a Saturday. Antarctic Endeavours, directed by Peggie Barnes, is an absurdist piece of fourth wall breaking theatre. It is a triumph for the whole team to have created something so perplexing and out of the ordinary for a typical theatre show."

Fitting that a show so out of the ordinary has its opening at the peculiar time of 3pm on a Saturday. Antarctic Endeavours , directed by Peggie Barnes, is an absurdist piece of fourth wall breaking...

02/03/2024

👑 "A well-balanced show that creates a gentle space for uncomfortable conversations."

The Eleventh Trip of Lilibet W. by Continuum Theatre Co., written and directed by James Ladanyi and performed by Aimee Sullivan and Tara Canton, is a timely reflection on regret and accountability;...

02/03/2024

💼 "Suitcase Show is sophisticated play, it’s adult bedtime stories with child-like wonder. [...] It’s crafty as all hell. Through deftly wielding scale and shadow, Hannah Smith and Ralph McCubbin-Howell are obvious frontrunners in this corner of the theatre-making world."

Trick of the Light’s Suitcase Show is a collection of tales tucked away and then masterfully revealed, in yes, suitcases. Now, I am no seasoned Trick of the Light audience member, through no...

01/03/2024

⚠️ "Sanders casts the retrospective net wide with this new, realistically pessimistic perception on all consent and informed knowledge, through history. All of your ancestors. We are the best communicators we have ever been as a species and we are still getting it kinda wrong on a daily basis, what does that say about the thousands that have come before us?"

House of Sand is back with Eliza Sanders’ new solo show, directed by Charley Allanah. Part dance, part theatre, part lecture, part improv, Manage Your Expectations aims to take the idea of...

01/03/2024

🎭 "As a work of digital theatre, it’s held back immensely by its craft."

Canadian playwright Norm Reynolds’ is endearingly sincere. His autobiographical, digital, solo-show Making It Up (One Playwright to Another) is charged with schoolboy-esque enthusiasm. The work...

01/03/2024

🌷 "The end of Sweeties fully lands. Quietly beautiful, it’s both a healthy dose of perspective and an act of radical mundanity."

The irony of reviewing Sweeties is not lost on me. Brynley Stent and Ella Hope-Higginson’s “absurdist sketch dramedy” goes to great lengths to pull apart the arbitrary nature of competition....

01/03/2024

🪰 "It is in these moments where the performance challenges the audience to watch and to retch I find the most interesting and tantalizing. These are the moments where bouffon stands out amongst its peers and where I think Pure Grime shines amongst the rest of the Fringe Festival."

Pure Grime by Warped Productions is the newest solo show from Em Barrett and is a bouffon-style 60-minutes that seeks to explore humanity’s relationship to death and decay; asking humans to...

26/02/2024

🌅 "As performance art, it all feels very Fringe."

Dialogue Before Sunset , created by transdisciplinary artist and researcher HT (Shannon Xiao) and her company Temporary Show, describes itself as a ‘live art journey’ that connects Ewengki and...

24/02/2024

⏳ "Sainton-Clark plays around half a dozen different characters, and flits between clear characterisations with impressive ease. He’s a truly magnetic and skillful performer, and even when scenes involve jumping between several characters, he never misses a beat."

All the way from the UK, A Year and a Day is a solo, contemporary folk tale written and performed by Christopher Sainton-Clark and presented by Raising Cane Productions. The central premise is that...

24/02/2024

🐮 "Pope offers a palatable perspective on what it means to be human."

New Zealand Fringe Festival’s Ben Pope: Holy Cow stands as a quaint collection of robust anecdotes and inward reflections, which dares to peak into the deeper meaning of our daily lives. Knowing...

24/02/2024

💄 "S*x workers in contemporary history are still stigmatized by the masses and are put on a crimson pedestal even though s*x work is work and s*x is great for all those who are into it, especially with professionals in a definitive consentual context. If it’s so great on paper, how did it all go so wrong?"

Kaytlin Bailey’s solo show Whore’s Eye View in BATS’ Stage space is described by Bailey as an aggressive lecture. It is a blood-boiling, hilarious romp through a complicated intersectional...

23/02/2024

🌏 "Where ‘Te Kaikohi’ provided bountiful food for thought, ‘Te Whio’ followed after to feed the soul.”

It always excites me to see emerging Māori artists presenting new work, and Hāpaitia by two descendants of Tūwharetoa is a double bill show that gives you plenty to feast on.