Sydney Festival preview!
The city comes alive again this January as the 2009 Sydney Festival erupts. Time Out previews the highlights
Fergus Linehan can look back on his tenure as Sydney Festival director with a great deal of satisfaction. With a combination of star power and cheaper tickets - no brainers, when you think about it - the congenial Dubliner turned a rusty institution into a big summer party that's set the city abuzz for the past three Januaries. Revenues are up and expectations are high for Linehan's swansong.
So what can we expect come January 10, 2009? As in previous years the big music names are out in force, most notably Grace Jones and the All Tomorrow's Parties festival curated by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. Otherwise, a strong year for theatre is promised, as well as an exceptional program of free events.
THEATRE
Think big names, ambitious shows and lengthy running times.
In partnership with the Sydney Theatre Company, Sydney Festival presents The War of the Roses. Shakespeare's cycle of eight plays spanning the history of the feuds between the Lancasters and the Yorks includes some of his best work - Richard II and III, Henry V - and the lot have been condensed down into two four-hour shows starring Cate Blanchett. (It might be wishful thinking, but we reckon she'd make a great Prince Hal.)
If eight hours of the Bard doesn't phase you what about nine hours of Robert Lepage? Canada's king of innovative theatre craft is returning to Sydney to present Lipsynch, a global tale of intersecting lives that spans an entire afternoon and evening with four intervals and a meal break.
Melbourne's answer to Lepage, Barrie Kosky, has a much shorter offering in his Edgar Allen Poe adaptation The Tell-Tale Heart. Essentially a one-hour mini-opera, this story of murder and madness performed by actor Martin Niedermair (with Kosky on piano) was highly acclaimed at this year's Edinburgh Fesival.
If you're a fan of Irish playwright Brian Friel (Dancing at Lughnasa) then you'll love the fact that Dublin's Gate Theatre is bringing three of the 80-year-old's plays to the Sydney Festival and a cast including Francesca Annis. Hardcore Chekhov fans will flock to a production of Ivanov by Hungary's Katona Joszef Theatre, performed in Hungarian with surtitles.
Our own Belvoir St Theatre is co-presenting two major productions. Belarus Free Theatre is a company that officially doesn't exist because its activities have been outlawed by the repressive Belarusian government. They are presenting a show called Being Harold Pinter in tribute to the Nobel prize-winning English playwright's pro-freedom stance. Belvoir St is also hosting a theatrical version of The Pianist, based on Wladyslaw Szpilman's story of Holocaust survival that inspired the Oscar-winning film. Piano virtuoso Mikhail Rudy plays Chopin while an actor will perform Szpilman's story.
If you hate crowds then you'll love The Smile off Your Face, a half-hour performance designed for one blindfolded audience member at a time seated in a wheelchair. It's from Belgium. And festival favourite La Clique returns to the Famous Spiegeltent - book as early as you can as this erotic cabaret circus is always a sell-out.
DANCE
There's only one item on the dance program, but it's a doozy. Christopher Wheeldon has been acclaimed as the most sought-after choreographer in the world. Morphoses: The Wheeldon Company will present three works including Polyphonia, a stunning dance piece set to the music of György Ligeti (whose music punctuates the freak-out moments in many Stanley Kubrick films).
MUSIC
Grace Jones may not be Sir Roger Moore's favourite person but the enigmatic superstar was hugely influential in 1980s music and fashion. She'll be performing all her hits and tracks from her new album Hurricane in three shows at the Enmore.
Anyone captivated by last year's indie movie triumph Once will be happy to hear that the movie's musical stars Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová, aka The Swell Season, will be playing three shows at the Opera House Concert Hall with Hansard's band The Frames. Another well-loved duo, Dennis Hayes and Martin Cahill, will return to the Sydney Festival bringing four other Irish folk musicians, as the Masters of Tradition. Seminal American post-punk band Throwing Muses are making an appearance at the Beck's Festival Bar (lead singer Kristin Hersh is presenting her autobiographical one-woman spoken word show at the Bosco Theatre too).
Wisconsin's Bon Iver has a voice that "evokes a ghostly choir of young Neil Youngs", according to Time Out's New York reviewer. Catch him at the Spiegeltent. Juana Molina, St Vincent, Bill Callahan, Joe Henry and the Moscow Art Trio will also grace the tent's elegant stage.
Nu jazz outfit The Cinematic Orchestra, a UK six-piece, promises beautiful and evocative soundscapes in their Sydney Festival appearances, while The Matthew Herbert Big Band promises a contemporary take on classic Big Band sounds.
Reggie Watts is a loop sampler and singer with a 10-octave vocal range whose stream of consciousness ramblings astound music and comedy fans alike. And the ever-popular Parisian chanteuse Camille (she of the much-loved Nouvelle Vague) will return too.
FREE EVENTS
Festival First Night promises a host of free music in the Domain, Hyde Park and Angel Place - Grace Jones is headlining. iinet Films Afloat will involve Darling Harbour screenings of cult movies Run Lola Run, Enter the Dragon and Fantastic Planet with live scores performed by different musical luminaries. The 20 musicians and dancers of the Gypsy Kings and Queens are giving a spectacular free performance in the Domain. And for early risers, a 5.30am Dawn Chorus of 100 singers will occur each Wednesday of the Festival on one of Sydney's beaches.
KIDS
Linehan's final festival will again reach out to the little ones with a range of kid-friendly shows and activities centred around the Riverside Theatres. Local company Erth will present a stage version of Patricia Wrightson's novel about strange outback creatures, The Nargun and the Stars. When a planet of cheese suffers global warming and melts into fondue, one brave inhabitant survives and makes it to earth; that's the premise of The Tragical Life of Cheeseboy. Venerable Australian young people's troupe The Flying Fruit Fly Circus will also appear.
Sydney Festival runs January 10-31. For complete programme information and booking visit Sydney Festival 09.
ALL TOMORROW'S PARTIES
All Tomorrow's Parties began life as a vague idea in 1999 by Scots band Belle & Sebastian that a weekend festival with all their favourite bands would be pretty awesome. They rented out a Butlins Holiday Camp in Camber Sands, England, asked the likes of Teenage Fanclub, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion and Godspeed You! Black Emperor to play, and then invited their fans to buy tickets. It was such a roaring success that their promoter, Barry Hogan, decided to ramp it up as its own event - and All Tomorrow's Parties was born.
The basic format has never changed: a weekend fest, with cabins rather than tents, and a curating artist who invites the bands that make up the line-up (UK and US curators have included Portishead, Sonic Youth and Simpsons creator Matt Groening). The inaugural Australian ATP will be chosen by headliner Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - and it's set to include the original lineup of The Saints, Spiritualized, Fuck Buttons, James Blood Ulmer, Laughing Clowns, Harmonia, The Necks, Robert Forster, Silver Apples, Rowland S Howard and Bridezilla, with more to be announced in late November.
All Tomorrow's Parties happens on Cockatoo Island on Sat 17 and Sun 18 Jan, and tickets go on sale Mon 10 Nov.
