Lizzie - Milky Way Productions (15 March 2025)

Before Spotify and other streaming applications changed the way we listen to music with self-curated playlists, there used to be the album. The peak expression of that form was the concept album, a cohesive collection of songs that were thematically linked. Think Tommy by The Who. For me, growing up though, it was Pink Floyd's The Wall, that great work of bombast as Roger Waters howled into the void about alienation, rock stardom, and the loss of his father on the Anzio beachhead. Leavened by the brilliant guitar work of David Gilmour, Richard Wright's keyboard and their combined vocals. 

Here's the segue…

An early Pink Floyd instrumental is called, wait for it, Careful With That Axe, Eugene. I recommend the live performance from Live At Pompeii. It starts softly, melodic, seductive, slowly building in intensity until all hell breaks loose as Waters screams and Gilmour's guitar wails surrounded by Wright's psychedelic soundscape and Nick Mason's pounding drums. Replace Eugene with Lizzie and you're on the money. 

All this is to say that at the interval I remarked to another audience member that Lizzie is not so much a musical as it is a rock concert. This is a live performance of a concept album; that concept being the motivations and fallout of Lizzie Borden murdering her father and stepmother with an axe; decidedly not carefully. That revelation, to me, explains all the choices co-directors Kieran Ridgway and Luke Miller make from lighting design, the staging, the prominence of the band, down to costume design and the stylised movement of the cast. 

Let's start with the seven-piece band who take up most of the stage space with lights interspersed between them, front and back, and amps aplenty. It's a rock concert and they are the engine that drive the show. They are excellent under Musical Director Akari Komoto who also plays piano. I really liked the rock infused score that crackled with energy and was loud and aggressive where it needed to be, and quieter in moments of character introspection. 

Lead guitarist Sarah Curran makes an immediate impression and adds a seventies style tone when the electric guitar was the pre-eminent instrument of the era. The presence of Kiara Burke on cello adds a hint of Spring Awakening texture and class. They all rock out when called upon which had me rocking along with them. Take a bow, Komoto, Curran, Burke, Chelsea Cheah (piano), Silvia Salaza Molano (guitar), Erin Steicke (bass), and Martha Bird (drums). 

Here's the trade off though. In fact there are a few. The volume of the band when they're cranked up and into it is going to submerge the vocalists, even one as powerful as Lukas Perez. That's fine at a concert when everyone knows the words to a decades old classic or have listened to a new release multiple times, however, this is a somewhat obscure musical so the songs were completely foreign to me. 

I certainly understood the gist of what was going on but most of the lyrics were lost in the upbeat numbers. Attitude of delivery, the interaction of our singers, and a passing knowledge of who Lizzie Borden was and what she allegedly did carries me along. Though the writers pretty much put a line through 'allegedly' and point the finger directly at Lizzie as the culprit... while seeking to give plausible reasons as to why that might have been.  

The other trade off is the band takes up a lot of space. It leaves only a narrow strip for our four cast members to work in though there is also a second level where the creation of open barn doors in the rustic wooden set is used as a focal point. Set design by Luke Miller with set painting by Shelly Miller which depicts the two victims' portraits on the rear wall. As an aside, I'm with Mister Borden; pigeons are flying vermin.  

Let's get to our four lead vocalists in this rock extravaganza. Perez shines as Lizzie Borden, both vocally and in depicting an emotionally troubled woman. An early highlight is This Is Not Love where the clear inference is that Lizzie is being sexually abused by her father. Lizzie is surrounded by her older sister Emma (Brittany Isaia), housemaid Bridget Sullivan (Sarah McCabe), and neighbour Alice Russell (Jessica Huysing) and there is the symbolic removal of an outer garment as Perez rocks us in another way with a plaintively sung ballad. 

Isaia brings older sister angst to the portrayal of Emma while McCabe is fussy common sense and practicality as the servant who witnesses all. Huysing's Alice is allowed to be much sweeter in the first half as a suggested love interest of Lizzie's before a harder edge comes into focus after the break. They all sing and harmonise well together though Huysing's mic seemed to have a different tone to it. Perez is given every opportunity to belt out numbers with those impressive pipes and there's plenty of echo and reverb used throughout.

The first half ends with - spoiler alert - yep, you guessed it. The second delves into the trial and aftermath. Any pretence that this isn't a rock concert is dispensed when the four lead vocalists of our rock group come out with handheld mics and are flanked at the front of the stage by guitarists Curran and Molano for the final couple of numbers. They're bathed in an orgy of lights as the band and vocals reach a crescendo. Rock on. 

Lighting design by Bailey Fellows is a showy, multi-coloured spectacle that enhances the rock concert vibe, particularly with the use of an array of lights nestled around the band at stage level. Costume design by Sarah McCabe is an eclectic mix of 1892 period piece in the first half, then modern goth in the second. McCabe's housemaid could be an extra from Rocky Horror in the latter going with an ostentatious wig (Tashlin Church) capping off the illusion. Choreography by Naomi Capon is angular and awkward but again, it makes greater sense if you think of those gloriously over the top 70s concerts before the arrival of punk skewered the self-pretention of the supergroup and rock god.   

Lizzie is loud, it's raucous, it's aggressive. If I considered it as a musical, does it work? No. As a rock concert, I loved the band, enjoyed the score, and accepted the over-the-top theatricality which is a different kind of spectacle to a stage musical. This feels like a cult classic in the making that will attract a niche audience. That appears to be the M.O. for this production company as they offer up a harder edged selection of lesser known works that will appeal to younger and more diverse theatregoers. 

Lizzie is on at the Don Russell Performing Arts Centre in Thornlie until 22 March.

Henry IV - GRADS Theatre Company (12 March 2025)

Let's talk about how special the theatregoing experience can be... 

A couple of hours before opening night there was a pretty heavy shower where I live. This is going to be interesting, I thought, given the New Fortune Theatre is an outdoor venue. I even took a jumper with me. The rain cleared, the night was still, the jumper was never in danger of being required, the peacocks were mute... it was nothing short of a divine evening. 

I was uncharacteristically indecisive and ended up in the upper wing, audience left, looking down at the stage. As I absorbed the action before me, gazing at the performers, clearly seeing the audience where I'd normally sit, listening to the immortal words of Shakespeare, I was struck by how otherworldly this was. In the best possible way. A terrific cast, performing an epic tale, written by the greatest playwright of the English language, in a replica venue, on a perfect night. It floated across my mind that theatre doesn't get much better than this. 

Afterwards, one of the actors remarked they heard someone laughing from the wings and that they must have known the play. Yes, I laughed. But I do not know the play. What I do recognise is wordplay and japery and an inventiveness of language that has never been matched. When writ large in someone as larger-than-life as Sir John Falstaff the ribaldry is nothing short of intoxicating. A condition Falstaff and his companions are certainly not foreign to.

My vantage point also delivered a stunning visual moment that rocked me; like a spectacular wide shot from a movie that could only have been seen in profile. At the end of the first half, to my right, Prince Hal (Fraser Whitely) is at the rear section of the foot of the stage amongst the audience, head slightly bowed. To my left, Henry IV (Grant Malcolm) is on the stage, behind his imposing desk, in an elevated position compared to his son and wayward heir. Whitely moves slowly down the central aisle, mounts the stairs to the stage, and for the first time ascends to meet his father on his own level. Only to be berated by Henry in a fiery monologue delivered by Malcolm that will not be his last burst of sustained brilliance. 

That image, of those two characters at the extremities of, in film language, the frame; the difference in elevation, in posture, and demeanour said EVERYTHING about their respective status and relationship without a word being spoken. It's imprinted on my brain. The act of humble ascension and subsequent rebuke is superb. If I sat where I normally do I would never have seen it. Not like that. Thank you, indecisiveness!

I digress.

This adaptation by director Patrick Downes is the merging of two plays, Henry IV, Parts One and Two. In short, Hotspur (Grace Edwards) has taken up arms against Henry IV (Malcolm) while Henry's son, Prince Hal (Whitely), carouses with the notorious Falstaff and associates. High court politics, battles, and sword fights ensue with plenty of hijinks along the way. Think of it as Game of Thrones without the dragons. In essence it is a story about the son who will assume the mantle of the father and cast aside his rebellious past. All stirring stuff. 

Grant Malcolm excels as Henry IV. Regal, commanding, exasperated at his son and the folly of those who oppose him. His monologue towards the end of the play as Henry catches Hal wearing the crown is worth the price of admission alone. Wounded in more ways than one, his Henry is distraught at this act. Malcolm is devastating as he conjures a response of raw emotion until Whitely's Hal seeks to placate him. 

Whitely, youthful and exuberant, plays Hal as one of the lads until duty calls and the arc towards regal responsibility is set in motion. It's a likeable and charming performance contrasted by the coldness of Hal's repudiation of his past in the closing moments. 

Where Grant Malcolm brings the authority, Michael Lamont brings stout and roundly humour in a fabulous turn as Falstaff. He is never less than captivating as he carouses and cajoles; schemes and pontificates. His speech about honour is a highlight as Lamont shifts gears to bring insight to such a boastful man. 

Grace Edwards is all fire and scorn as Hotspur who defies the king and sets in motion the broader political and military machinations. Edwards prowls the stage, her Hotspur restless and discontent, until fury meets destiny in a clash that will define the fortunes of all involved. 

The supporting players inhabit multiple roles with skill and flair - Martyn Churcher, notably as Worcester whose deceit ends in calamity; Anna Head, both regal and common as Westmoreland and Doll Tearsheet respectively; Joanne Lamont who moves between inn-keeper and finely accented, rebel nobles; Nic Doig as a vibrant Poins, in particular; Jason Dohle whose Douglas hunts Henry with rare savagery; Andreas Petalas as a sixth man off the bench taking on multiple roles, highbrow and low; and Kaitlyn Barry, quieter yet no less arresting, as Peto and Vernon.  

Patrick Downes uses all of the space, however, there's a clear delineation, especially in the first half, like an Elizabethan netball court. The highborn and those of authority are on the raised stage; the lowborn and the fallen Prince Hal perform at the foot of the stage. The traversing of those boundaries, when it comes, is of notable importance until the chaos of battle leads to far more fluid staging in the second half. 

Well lit (Fiona Reid), well costumed (Merri Ford), and well staged this is a showpiece for the actors and they deliver in rousing fashion. Music cues were a little off-putting and abrupt to mine ears but maybe that's because the inherent drama and comedy did not need buttressing.  

Shakespeare can be difficult for the modern sensibility. I have to tell you though, sitting there, watching a stirring production on a balmy Perth night was pretty damn special. A unique experience and one that's well worth attending.  

Henry IV is on at the New Fortune Theatre in the Arts Building of the UWA campus until 22 March. 

Photos by Paris Romano Jenner

Endgame - Kalamunda Dramatic Society (9 March 2025)

Life can be absurd. Chaotic. Meaningless. Repetitive. Fraught with setbacks and obstacles. This may sound bleak. But that doesn't mean it isn't honest. Or filled with dark humour and small moments of triumph. 

Most stories lean towards the light. Towards narrative structures and arcs that are familiar and comforting. Storytelling that is ingrained on the human psyche. Aristotle's Poetics. The Hero's Journey. Save the Cat! I'm from that school of writers. Well, maybe not the last one. 

Samuel Beckett is decidedly not. His work stubbornly refuses to conform to those traditional norms. It is absurd, chaotic, and repetitive. It's also often repetitive and bleak. And absurd. Oftentimes chaotic. 

It's a style that can be alienating and confronting. There aren't the normal storytelling rhythms you expect - not in narrative structure, not in the flow and cadence of dialogue. Nor in tidy resolutions or convenient character arcs.

What there is though is adherence to theme. A sort of existential dread as we battle those darker forces in everyday life; from the absurd to the meaningless. The audience grapples for meaning mirroring the characters' own struggle. 

In an intimate theatre such as KADS there's an unspoken compact in a play like Endgame. We are trapped with the characters. We may suffer. We may get frustrated or confused. We laugh at the absurdity and the bleak humour. We might empathise with the plight of these characters. If we pay attention we could actually discern the thread of a more conventional story that is being told; hidden in fragments and ellipses, and the whims of what is possibly an unreliable narrator. At the very least one that delights in bombast. It's a fascinating concoction that challenges an audience and forces us to think. 

It strikes me as a play that demands great patience from its director and cast. Stage directions are performed at an almost metronomic pace which requires an impressive level of discipline. The same with the delivery of dialogue. The pause is the master of all here. In the space between lines. In the stillness between movement. 

The story is set in a place that feels timeless; where the world as we know it has ended for reasons we will never glean. A blind, infirmed man with a cruel intellect - Hamm (Neale Paterson) - who is confined to an armchair set on casters, is engaged in a battle of wills with his servile companion who tends to him and cannot sit - Clov (Zane Alexander). All the while, Hamm's elderly and legless parents - Nagg (Malcolm Douglas) and Nell (Amanda Watson) - who are stuffed in large dustbins watch on helplessly. All of them face an inevitable end the same as the chess pieces and board that adorn the set. 

The metaphor is clear - the chessboard is a finite space and the pieces within it can only move in certain predetermined ways until the game finally comes to a conclusion. Hamm is the King who is to be attended to at all times and whose movement is minimal. Clov, I suspect, is perhaps best suited as a Bishop who can only move awkwardly, legs splayed apart, all diagonal. Nagg and Nell feel like hapless pawns though the dustbins are reminiscent of castles.

It's a handsome and striking set credited to Kresna, Melisa Musulin, Leigh Siragusa, Peter Bloor, Peter Neaves and Virigina Moore Price who also directs here alongside Rosalind Moore. It features two portholes set high on either side of the stage walls - lit to represent the dark/ocean; the other the earth/light. Again, the symmetry with the chessboard is clear. Also two large dustbins that sit atop a table, and Hamm's armchair. 

Makeup and costuming is exaggerated for effect - Nagg and Nell especially looking grotesquely decrepit. There is a sense of decay as the end approaches. The lighting design is very atmospheric as it conceals almost as much as it reveals at times. The porthole lighting is beautifully symbolic.

The acting is excellent. Neale Paterson holds our attention as Hamm even though the character is largely unable to move and his eyes are shielded by sunglasses. It's his voice that commands attention here as Hamm cajoles and belittles Clov whilst pleading for his painkillers and occasionally undercutting theatrical virtuosity with the underplayed aside. Again, the pause is used to great effect.

Zane Alexander is at the top of his game with a wonderfully judged physical performance that is exacting in its repetition and pace. We feel Clov's dilemma - he desperately wants to leave... but where would he go? There is a delicate balance of reproachment, reluctant compliance, and utter exasperation which Alexander cycles through with great skill.

Malcolm Douglas and Amanda Watson are the offbeat comic foil with tragic overtones. Douglas delivers a cutting tale about a man and a tailor with a gloriously dark punchline. Watson tugs briefly at our heartstrings in a wistful manner that belies the darkness. 

Director Virginia Moore Price, who also did the lighting design and was sound and lighting operator for Sunday's matinee, and her co-director Rosalind Moore, stick to their guns in terms of pacing and embracing the inherent absurdism of the piece. Nothing is rushed. There are no apologies here for a style that some audience members may blanch at. 

I confess, it took me an entire day pondering what I had seen to slowly grasp the meaning of the play, as incomplete as that may be. In this way it's like that other lauded play that confounded me last year until it all made sense in the Moore directed Top Girls. It took me a little longer this time! 

Endgame is on at KADS in Kalamunda until 22 March 2025. Be patient with it. Chew over it. Come to your own conclusions and epiphanies. It's part of an encouraging trend in community theatre - putting on complex and challenging works that are a little outside the norm. I love the confidence that signals. 

Assassins - Roleystone Theatre (1 March 2025)

Let's not beat around the grassy knoll. Assassins is one of my favourite musicals. I love the audacity of telling a story - a musical no less! - about those misbegotten fiends who successfully assassinated or tried to assassinate a president of the good ol' US of A. All because "Everybody's got the right/To be happy."

Of course it's Sondheim. It could only be Sondheim. With a deliciously subversive Book by John Weidman which features one of my favourite sequences in pretty much anything which I won't spoil here but is still as astonishing a piece of writing as the first time I saw it back in 2015. 

The tone is darkly satirical and by dark I mean at the bottom of a mine shaft, complete absence of light, dark. Which some may find challenging or perhaps miss the point of, whereas I find utterly invigorating. This isn't a hum-hum-hummable musical with happy lyrics and a leggy chorus line - this is a savage commentary on the American dream, gun culture, and the lengths desperate people go to after being marginalised and cast aside. If you tell a whole nation they can be anything they want then create a system where that's abundantly untrue, well, sometimes a president or two might get shot. 

I deliberately called them misbegotten fiends and it's true, there's a high level of dysfunction and self-delusion here. But the musical also scratches beneath the surface of these footnotes in history to try and explain their actions without exonerating them. Some names are eternal - John Wilkes Booth and Lee Harvey Oswald at the forefront; others are largely forgotten or oddities now. It's an eclectic mix across time, across rationales, across personality types and circumstances. It's also bleakly funny in ways that cut deep. 

Director Christopher Alvaro has made several key decisions in this version. The first is to forgo the usual gaming arcade set; instead opting to depict the white frontal columns of the White House with the orchestra nestled behind them. Characters literally take aim at the workplace and residence of  the president; several incarnations of whom wander by in the form of Peter 'Pear' Carr who also designed the set with Alvaro.  

The second is to dial up the performances to 11. This is a full-throated assault as the cast magnify the grievances, real and imagined, of these figures, almost haranguing the audience in the process. It's bold and, when it works best, utterly electrifying. Apologies, Giuseppe Zangara (Marshall Brown). 

The satirical tone is immediately established as The Proprietor (Carr again) entices our wannabe assassins to purchase a gun in the opening number Everybody's Got The Right and solve all their problems by shooting a president. The intensity that follows is led by the wonderfully earnest performance of Mark Thompson as the pioneer of all American presidential assassins, John Wilkes Booth. He commands the stage as he does the other assassins, imbuing Booth with commitment and passion. We have no doubt Booth believes in the (misguided) cause he spilled blood for in notorious fashion. The vainglorious actor who changed the course of history.

In contrast, the transparently vain Charles Guiteau (Rp van der Westhuizen) hawks his book, claims he is extraordinary, and demands to be Ambassador to France; the refusal to name him as such leading to President James Garfield's demise. The showstopper, The Ballad of Guiteau, becomes an increasingly fraught display that verges into true horror as Guiteau stares mortality in the eye as the gallows are assembled before him. The manufactured charm and confidence van der Westhuizen portrays the character with earlier evaporates into manic fear. Not for the fainthearted! 

Ethan Battle doubles down on the earnestness as his Leon Czologosz features in several key moments - the harrowing story of how a bottle is made after John Hinckley (Lochlan Curtis) carelessly breaks one in a bar; the encounter with the anarchist Emma Goldman (Erin Craddock) who he has been following and declares his love for; leading off the aptly named The Gun Song; oh, and his assassination of William McKinley. 

Paul Treasure, bedraggled and decked out in a Santa outfit befitting a child's worst nightmare, excels as Samuel Byck. Gifted with two brilliantly written monologues - one directed at Leonard Bernstein ("Lenny"); the other to Richard Nixon ("Dick") who Byck intends to kill by flying a 747 into the White House. Treasure expertly modulates his delivery from conversational to outright bile as he pours Byck's disenchantment and rage into a tape recorder while happily munching away on a sandwich or burger. It's exhilarating to watch.   

Another standout is Sonja Reynolds as Sara Jane Moore, the absentminded, would be assassin of Gerald Ford who teams up with Charles Manson acolyte, Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme (Madeleine Shaw) in a compression of real events. Shaw brings the creepy, cult-like vibes while Reynolds imbues Moore with a ditzy air that adds genuine comic relief. You sense Ford was never in any real danger though fried chicken and pooches should be wary! 

Marshall Brown adds to the intensity in stomach churning fashion playing the man who tried to assassinate FDR while Lochlan Curtis is quietly obsessed as Hinckley. The closest you get to a ballad in this musical is Curtis and Shaw singing of their love for, ahem, Jodie Foster and "Charlie" respectively. Yep, it's dark alright!  

Erin Craddock is featured as Emma Goldman and leads the ensemble, most notably in the show closer Something Just Broke which follows the exceptional 15 or so minute sequence that is brilliant in its sheer audacity. And is where we talk about Matthew Walford's Balladeer, the clean cut presence who seemingly mocks this collection of misfits before... go see it, you'll be astounded. Walford adds a slice of genuine Yankee spirit that turns into bewilderment as events transform his character. 

The score, as you would expect, is superb and well played by the orchestra under Krispin Maesalu. Lighting design by Alvaro is very stylistic with each assassin having their own colourful backdrop as Booth thrusts them literally into the spotlight. Like the musical styles Sondheim uses, the costumes also have to cover a range of time periods and fashions which Cherie Alvaro manages well; that grimy Santa suit and Booth's handsome attire to the fore. First time choreographer, Tatum Stafford, adds more movement than I expected with, again, a playfully satirical style at work. 

My main issue, however, is that this IS Sondheim so the lyrics are incredibly important. With no pit and a sizeable orchestra directly behind the cast, it was a battle at times to clearly make out and savour those words. The volume on the mics was turned up high to compensate which often led to some distortion and, when there was shrieking to be done in non-musical moments, became somewhat painful.  

However, I walked away impressed by a total cast commitment to going for broke with their characterisations and how relevant this musical is today, perhaps more so than its debut off-Broadway in 1990 and its 2004 Broadway revival given current events in America. An outstanding entry into the Sondheim canon which is tackled with real verve here. 

Assassins is on at the Roleystone Theatre until 15 March.