MIAF - What would the director recommend?
The Age
Wednesday July 15, 2009
Brett Sheehy says it's his job to "strip away the archness and pretension that is around the arts" and sell his program to the public. So we asked the festival director to match the show to the audience. WHAT CAN I TAKE THE FAMILY TO?They'll like Walk this Way, where we asked Melbourne artists and celebrities to plan their favourite Melbourne walks, and make playlists. We've turned them into maps, so you can go any time. We've got Adam Elliot, Kaz Cooke, Helen Garner and Bert Newton and others.I'M LOOKING FOR SOMETHINGMOVING AND SPIRITUALI always find the Black Arm Band moving. And there's something very spiritual about dirtsong, a celebration of Aboriginal languages, with the show performed in indigenous languages, with a libretto by the novelist Alexis Wright.WHAT WILL INSPIRE ASPIRINGPERFORMERS?It depends on the genre, but I'd say Peeping Tom's show, which has this extraordinary fusing of choreographed movement, acting and song.DAZZLE A JADED TWENTYSOMETHINGHofesh Shechter's Uprising and In Your Rooms will knock their socks off. His choreography is very strong, energetic and edgy, and the music is the closest thing to club music in the festival.MAKE US LAUGH AND CRYVanessa's show Look Mummy, I'm Dancing has a lot of both sadness and humour. She was born a man in Belgium in 1948, but underwent a sex change in 1975.WHAT WILL BE REALLYCONFRONTING?Pornography is the play that British theatre was afraid to take on. When Simon Stephens wrote this after the London terrorist bombings, no British company would take it on.IS ANYTHING BEAUTIFUL?The 13 Most Beautiful not only uses the 13 most beautiful of Andy Warhol's screen tests, but has beautiful music. And much of the visual arts program is beautiful. That's not always a given, but it is in this case.
© 2009 The Age