Fuckboys are everywhere. You know, the guys who won't get the hint that you're just not into them, or the ones who feel their masculinity is being challenged when a woman takes control. Fuck that. Written and directed by Savanna Pedersen, Fuckboys: The Musical is the story of four women who must navigate their way through a sea of fuckboys to find the diamonds in the rough.
Most of the stories take place at the their local karaoke bar where they down their drinks and talk (and sing) about the various fuckboys in their lives. One woman has recently begun a relationship with the bartender of said karaoke bar and another has decided to stop being so boring and loosen up a bit that results in some unexpected complications. The third one is still recovering from a difficult break-up that's caused her to find comfort in the bottle and the fourth is simply happy to keep swiping right on tinder.
Immersive show Blood is Thicker than Hummus invites audiences into the Parker household for a relaxed dinner party. Except it’s been five months since the patriarch of the family has passed away and each member of the family is still dealing with their own grief, as well as simmering tensions between each other.
Despite being born minutes apart, Penelope and Patrick (Catherine Holder and Pearce Hessling) could not be more different, nor can their animosity be more apparent as they hurl insults and cutting remarks about their life choices to each other through the entire dinner - and in front of their guests. Melina Wylie as Pamela tries to play mediator but even she reaches breaking point with her bickering children.
A text message to meet up for a sexual encounter in a park sets the wheels in motion in Emily Sheehan's Hell’s Canyon. While one sends the text and the other responds, neither Caitlin or Oscar are actually there to have sex. As we soon learn, there are scars that they both wear and the memories they share threaten to consume them both.
Oscar's brother, who Caitlin was dating at the time, has committed suicide six months ago. Oscar and Caitlin have not spoken since, drifting to extreme opposites lifestyles. Caitlin has become known for skipping school and fulfilling the sexual requests of the boys in her school, while Oscar has resorted to an isolated life, which includes eating his lunch in the teacher's staff room. The two are equally discontent with their lives and from their encounter in the park, decide to run away in an effort to shake up their worlds and see where things ends up.
We all want to succeed in life. We all have goals and desires we would like to achieve and to be recognised as successful by our friends, family and society. But how do we measure this? By the size of our property? By how many letters come after our name or perhaps the number of children we have? In Untitled No. 7, Telia Nevile explores the mentality we have on success and our fear of failure.
The show is set up as part fairytale, part poetry and part something unexpected. We are introduced to our heroine Darling, who is searching for a golden key that will open the door of possibilities and opportunities for her. While this is a story we've all heard before, Nevile's masterful use of language and words throughout, lift this story to become something fresh and exciting. It's also great to see how much she has developed as a writer and performer since her 2015 Melbourne Fringe Festival award for Best Emerging Writer.
German musician Nico was a lot of things, as we are told by singer Danielle Asciak in Nico: Songs They Never Played on the Radio. But there's also a lot of things she isn't known for, or at the very least, she hasn't received the acknowledgement that she deserves. On the 30th anniversary of Nico's death, Asciak has teamed up with Forest Collective to host a unique interpretation of Nico's music through chamber music arrangements.
Artistic director of Forest Collective and Nico conductor, Evan Lawson, has brought together eight musicians (Vilan Mai, Ali Fyffe, Trea Hindley, Bec Scully, Erica Tucceri, Isabel Hede, Nikki Edgar and William Elm) to accompany Asciak as she takes us on a journey not just through Nico's music, but also her life. Despite much of the room not knowing who Nico was, the brief anecdotal history we are given and the power of the songs selected, allow the audience to garner an understanding of who this woman was and understand the challenges she faced in how she was defined.
