Provocative Line-up For An Exciting 1996
The Age
Monday December 25, 1995
The arts calender for next year is extravagant, stimulating and occasionally controversial with Melbourne's usual charismatic mix of local and international talent. Margaret Cook presents some of the highlights.
NEW YEAR PREVIEW.
1996: THE YEAR when the arts in Melbourne promise to be provocative, challenging and entertaining. There will be Crazy Canucks running ``amuck" at the Last Laugh and Robyn Nevin playing Shakespeare's Julius Caesar in a new production at the MTC.
Music lovers can choose from events as diverse as the Melbourne International Festival of Organ and Harpsichord to the rock celebration, The Big Day Out. 1996 will also bring a signicant exhibition of Indian art to Melbourne as well as Verdi's opera Nabucco, directed by the often controversial Barrie Kosky.
Theatre.
THE MTC's season opens in January with Noel Coward's sophisticated comedy, Private Lives, starring Lewis Fiander and Pamela Rabe.
Kid Stakes, the first part of Ray Lawler's famous Doll trilogy, makes a welcome return in February. Probably the MTC's most interesting offering will be a 20th century, streamlined version of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar with Robyn Nevin in the title role.
PLaybox will showcase the works of six relatively new playwrights, including Emna: Celebrazione! by Graham Pitts, Gary's House by Debra Oswald and The Mourning After by Verity Laughton.
It will also present Jerusalem by Michael Gurr and Competitive Tenderness (a farce on local government) by Hannie Rayson.
The Princess Theatre expects Beauty and the Beast to continue well into next year, while the long-awaited Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, Sunset Boulevard opens at the Regent Theatre in October.
Lady Chatterley's Lover - including its controversial nude scenes - returns to Rippon Lea in January.
La Mama promises more exciting and innovative productions, beginning with the cabaret-style show, Shades of Blue, by Andrew Bovell. Other works include Minties for the Tin by Alex Nicol, Sextet by Len Radic and two works directed by Victoria Raywood as part of the Celebrating Women 1996 festival: Mutants by Deborah Levy and 26 Groovy Greats by Michelle Ransome.
We'll also get a double dose of The Secret Garden: the musical starring Marina Pior and Anthony Warlow at the State Theatre as well as a special children's production directed by Kevin Hopkins in the Royal Botanic Gardens in January. The Arena Theatre Company celebrates its 30th birthday in 1996; highlights of its program for young people include Schnorky the Wave Puncher! over the September holidays and Autopsy - reputed to be frantic, funny and fantastic - at the George Fairfax Studio in June.
The acclaimed IRAA Theatre will challenge audiences with another innovative production, The Blue Hour, directed by Renato Cuocolo.
Art.
AN IMPORTANT exhibition of 2000 years of Indian art, including paintings, sculpture, textiles and decorative arts, opens at the National Gallery in February. Other keynote exhibitions are the Hallmark Photographic Collection (a perspective on American photography); 80 major works by the landscape painter Joseph Mallord William Turner, and Art and Empire (treasures from Assyria in the British Museum).
Next year's program at Gallery Gabrielle Pizzi includes exhibitions by Aboriginal urban artists, and from central and northern Australia. Look for the three-dimensional works of Julie Gough, paintings and sculputres by Lin Onus, and paintings by Mary McLean.
The Meat Market Craft Centre in North Melbourne will hold a group show of slip-cast porcelein in April, featuring the work of British ceramicist, Gillian Still. Other exhibitions include work by the Victorian Woodworkers Association in July and a national printed textiles show in October.
A highlight at the Museum of Modern Art at Heide will be Colonial Post Colonial, examining at the works of contemporary artists alongside leading artists from our colonial periodincluding Eugenok von Guerard, Nicholas Chevalier and Robert Downing.
1956: Australia comes of Age - Melbourne Modernity and XVI Olympiad (also at Heide) will exhibit art, design and culture from 1956, the year that brought the Olympics - and television - to Melbourne.
The Westpac Gallery's main events include paintings by Romare Bearden, the National Aboriginal Art Award and the Walker Ceramic Award and Exhibition.
Dance.
THE AUSTRALIAN Ballet's 1996 program ranges from the traditional to the modern. Highlights include new works by Stephen Page, Meryl Tankard and Stanton Welch in an all-Australian triple bill. (The works by Page and Tankard will have their world premieres in Melbourne). The company will also present Stepping Stones by Jiri Kylian In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated by William Forsythe, as well as the much-loved classics, Onegin, Coppelia and La Sylphide.
1996 will also bring Graeme Murphy's Sydney Dance Company to the Comedy Theatre in late February with Berlin. An abstract work about the illusions and decline of that city, Berlin includes a rock score by Ivar Davies and Max Lambert, with choreograpy by Murphy.
Rock.
POPULAR MUSIC lovers can choose from a veritable who's who of international performers next year. Billy Bragg returns in January, followed by Bryan Adams, Chris Isaak, Joan Armatrading, Green Day, Dwight Yoakam, Ottmar Liebert, Robert Plant and Jimmy Page. Artists as diverse as Bjork, Neil Diamond, The Smashing Pumpkins, Celine Dion, Anne Murray and k.d. lang are also booked to perform here.
One of the most popular events on the rock-music calendar is the Big Day Out in January. Next year's lineup includes the colorfully named Porno for Pyros, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Rage against the Machine, Elastica, Tumbleweed, The Jesus Lizard and Regurgitator.
Classical music.
THE GUEST line-up with the Melbourne Symphony next year includes pianist Nikolai Demidenko, cellist Lynn Harrell and Korean violinist Dong-Suk Kang. Highlights will be master classes taken by visiting conductors Gianluigi Gelmetti, Markus Stenz and Yan Pascal Tortelier, who conducted The Damnation of Faust for this year's Melbourne International Festival.
Musica Viva also promises an exciting program, including early music diva Emma Kirkby singing works by Bach and Handel with the Brandenburg Orchestra Ensemble in April. The legendary Beaux Arts Trio will perform at the Concert Hall in May. Kirkby will also give a rare solo recital at the Musica Viva 1996 Festival at the Domaine Chandon winery at Coldstream, a weekend of music, food and wine.
A larger than usual, 47-member Australian Chamber Orchestra will accompany Deborah Riedel when she sings Somgs of the Auvergne by Canteloube in August. Other highlights of the ACO's 1996 calendar include visiting American pianist Robert Levin and conductor Christopher Hogwood presenting a concert in the style of an 18th-century program.
Levin will also take on broad themes suggested by the audience - whether it is Waltzing Matilda or a '60s pop tune - and then improvise them in the style of Mozart.
Opera.
AT THE other end of the musical spectrum, opera lovers will welcome the Victoria State Opera's free performance of La Traviata at the Sydney Myer Music Bowl in January. The VSO will also stage Richard Strauss's opera Die Frau ohne Schatten for the 1996 Melbourne International Festival, with a cast of international performers and Simone Young conducting the Melbourne Symphony.
The Australian Opera's production of Verdi's Nabucco, directed by Barrie Kosky, comes to Melbourne in April. It's an unconventional and very modern production, and has had a highly successful season in Sydney. The Australian Opera will also stage The Makropulos Secret by Janacek in late March, directed by Neil Armfield with Marilyn Richard and Anson Austin.
Handel's Alcina, with Graham Pushee and Rosamund Illing, will be another highlight.
Arts Centre.
JANUARY'S Summer Live series (held in and around the arts centre) is nothing if not diverse. The lineup includes shows from Paul Kelly, Gerry Connelly, and Doug de Vries and Andrew Pendlebury.
There will also be performances of Vivaldi's Ring of Mystery, a Leider recital and the music of Gershwin featuring Debra Byrne, Margaret Ulrich and Renee Geyer.
Next year's Morning Melodies series at the centre includes Max Bygraves, The Australian Pops Orchestra, Geraldine Turner singing Richard Rodgers, and The Royal Australian Airforce Central Band.
Comedy.
THE LAST LAUGH promises high energy, in-your-face comedy with its January show, Canucks run Amuck, featuring The Three Canadians (Eric, Derek, North and Ray) and English comic, Tony Hawks.
Canucks is followed by a season of top Irish comics, all hand picked from the Edinburgh Comedy Festival.
Festivals.
THE MELBOURNE International Festival of Organ and Harpsichord, which includes choirs, orchestras and ensembles, will take on a distinctly Spanish theme next April. Guests include renowned American harpsichordist Glen Wilson, the spanish Ensemble Zarabanda, and Spanish organist Jose Gonzales Uriol.
Sydney may have the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, but Melbourne has Midsumma 96, Australia's second largest gay and lesbian celebration held over three weeks, beginning with a street party in Brunswick Street in January. The Queer Film and Video Festival will run in March at the George Cinema, the State Film Centre and the Capital Cinema.
Expect over-the-top madness in April when the Melbourne International Comedy Festival celebrates its 10th birthday.
There will be stand-up comedians, shows, late night venues, music and exhibitions as well as comics Lynn Ferguson and Bill Bailey from the United Kingdom, and Will Durst and Rich Hall from the United States.
Often described as the inner-city's version of the Port Fairy Folk Festival, the Brunswick Music Festival is on in March. And the highly popular Monsalvat Jazz Festival in January - this year held in venues across Melbourne - promises another exciting program of top international and local performers.
Highlights include performances by four greats of jazz from New York: Carlos Wood (alto saxophone and flute player), John Hicks (piano), Andrew Cyrille (drums) and Mark Helias (bass).
Circus.
MARCH WILL see the return of The Moscow Circus to Melbourne, the same time that our homegrown Circus Oz tours regional Victoria. Circus Oz will perform at the Melbourne Town Hall in September. And despite their financial problems, the Fruit Fly Circus still expects to perform in Melbourne next year.
© 1995 The Age