Backstage | Festival blast-off!
By Renee Liang
For the last few weeks, Aotea Square has been a maze of tape, hardhats and mysterious scaffolding. Tonight all will be revealed. The Auckland Arts Festival has just kicked off and the Fringe is in full swing.
As I write this, a number of premieres are making final preparations before the doors open: Massive company’s Havoc in the Garden, the much-anticipated Vietnamese Water Puppets, gay men’s performance group Silver Stars, risqué cabaret Smoke & Mirrors, Handel’s opera Xerxes, and Who are you?, the dance programme by Black Grace’s Urban Youth Movement.
At the Fringe, a number of shows are opening, some are closing, and some continuing on. One of those closing tonight is Shakespeare’s Will, a one-woman show - expatriate Kiwi Suzy Sampson playing Anne Hathaway – Shakespeare’s wife, not the other one. I went to see it a few nights ago and was struck by the immaculate care which had gone into the soundtrack and stage properties, and by Sampson’s portrayal of a woman whose pact with her husband to “live separate lives” seems very modern. Although much of this play is conjecture (due to the paucity of historical information), Sampson’s repeated affirmation, “but I know what was between us,” brought Hathaway to life for me, as a woman in love but who can’t go back on a promise, even if she now feels forgotten.
On the same night, I went to another one-actor show, The Adventures of Alvin Sputnik, Deep Sea Explorer. This gorgeous creation, written and performed (including lights, sound, puppetry, everything) by Tim Watts, has already won hearts and awards across Australia and should have had a longer season here, such was the response. Described as a “micro-epic”, it celebrated the size of the human heart – big enough to save the world – and showed what magic can be done with a screen, a computer and a few simple props. The response of the audience showed that despite these difficult times, we are not so hardened and cynical after all. A simple tale of love, told simply and sincerely – and there were red eyes aplenty as we exited.
I got an email from fellow playwright Laurence Dolan yesterday. I think it epitomises the spirit of making theatre for the Fringe: "Currently , due to the lack of rehearsal space with over 60 shows in rehearsal for the Fringe, the show is being rehearsed in a room at the back of my garage in Glen Innes. Because it has been rather hot the windows and door are open. The poor neighbours are regailed with the shows “adult themes” and bad language. They must think the garage is being rented out to a prostitute, a rent boy and a married couple who have the same loud argument every third night. I’m not sure if they have figured it out, or think it’s just normal for Glen Innes.". His show, Three by 3, three short plays with the same three actors, opens next week.
- And now for some interviews….
One of the Fringe shows opening tonight is Homeless Economics, the result of a very special collaboration between Auckland City Mission and a small group of artists. Homeless men tell stories from their lives, using music, theatre and a lot of humour. It should be pretty thought-provoking.
Big Story, Small Space, opening next week, sells itself on the promise that it will be performed on “the smallest stage possible.” Roberto Nascimento plays Nikola Tesla, the man who discovered how to harness electricity, so it should be an electrifying night (sorry-couldn’t resist.)
Drowning in Veronica Lake, a play chronicling the rise and spectacular fall of that eponymous screen siren, comes to us from the Wellington Fringe, opening this weekend – I interviewed director Simon Coleman a couple of weeks ago.
From the Festival, I interviewed Black Grace artistic director Neil Ieremia on the ideas and successes of his long-term project, UrbanYOUTHMovement, whose show Who Are You? opens tonight. An example of a leading artist taking initiative and becoming a true community leader.
Gregory Maqoma is another dancer who motivates youth and connects with communities wherever he tours. A South African, Maqoma described his body as “a museum that collects many forms and aesthetics that come with their histories, traditions and they allow me to explore in return my own history and cultural identity.” The magpie artist – I get that. It’s a metaphor for artistic practice that I’ve heard writers and poets use, and it suits how I think of Kiwi identity too – from everywhere, and nowhere.
Tonight, I’m heading off to the first of many Festival shows – Xerxes, the opera, taking my other half with me, who’s never seen an opera. So I’d better go cook dinner, then get dollied up…
Gregory Maqoma
