Every Single Saturday

Every Single Saturday has been playing at the Glen Street Theatre. It is a musical comedy written and composed by Joanna Weinberg.

It is a great idea, four parents on the sidelines during a football season. The parents are from different backgrounds with different issues. It starts at the beginning of the session with three of the four looking forward to what will happen. As the season progresses you learn more about each parent. Maria de Marco plays a fitness freak with a problem with food and is half starving her daughter who plays in goal. Christopher Horsley is the coach, a former footballer himself he lives through his son, trouble is his son hates football and just wants to dance. Scott Irwin enters the stage a little later, he has just moved back to Australia to look after his son. He knows nothing about him, having had nothing to do with him up until now. He is a conductor and has a few issues to overcome in adapting to become a father. His son, of course, is an excellent player and helps turn the Magpies round. Katrina Retallick plays a single Mum trying to do the right thing by everyone but has a hard time being excepted and who's son spending every game running the wrong way up the field! The underlining moral to the musical being that parents have to let their children be what they want to be, rather than making them live the dream that they wanted. The music on the whole is fairly good with some catchy songs. The set was effective, though I did think it was a shame that you couldn't really see the musicians behind the netting.
My general view of this production however, was that I felt I was watching a production for children. The talking Magpie was amusing but childish. Katrina Retallick looked for much of the time as if she was on playschool with over exaggerated facial expressions, it just seemed very false (sorry)! The other issue I had was the opening was very weak, the song, only sung by three actors just didn't pack the punch that the opening of a musical should. There was no chorus and I think that would have helped lift some of the songs.
I did enjoy the way the musical progressed as the characters enfolded and it did keep you entertained.
It will be playing at Parramatta and the Laycock Theatre during March.

Interview with Maggie Scott

Maggie Scott is the director of Bouncers which is about to commence at the Cat and Fiddle, cabaret style! It will be a great night out. Maggie has been in the world of theatre for many years and has founded her own company Insominac Theatre.

Find out more, listen to Maggie's interview on Triple H 100.1 fm on the Hubbub.

(please note the link will become inactive in about 3 months time, call 02 99403649 if you would like to listen)

The Temperamentals

The Temperamentals by Jon Marans is playing at the New Theatre until 3 March. It is in association with the Sydney Mardi Gras and is an Australian Premiere.
Kevin Jackson the director has striped the play down to rely almost totally on the quality of the actors and the play itself. It is a brave move but it works and actors have to be commended for the role(s) they play.
Jon Marans has produced a piece of work that marks an important historical time in gay social history. It is set in the early 1950's long before Stonewall. It is a docu-drama based on true stories about Harry Hay and a group of men who set up the Mattachine Society. The Mattachine was organised to assert the human rights for sexual minorities. It is not a play that packs a powerful punch, there is drama and laughter, but it quietly and simply re-tells the stories of these men and their lives. I use the word 'quietly' because all the time you are reminded how secretive they had to be; living in fear of being arrested. Of course this happens to Dale Jennings, he is arrested for allegedly soliciting a police officer in a toilet. Dale confessed to being a homosexual (this was unheard of as people shied away from public scrutiny) but denied any wrongdoing. Dale was acquitted on the basis of police intimidation, harassment, and entrapment of homosexuals, and the case was dismissed. It was a landmark case and increased peoples awareness of the gay movement. Behind the actors throughout the show you will see projections of the men themselves which is a constant reminder that this is a true story. You are reminded how unacceptable it was to be gay, you had to be married with children to be socially acceptable and even to advance your career, as Rudi discovers. You see conflict in the men between what they would like to be and what they have to be. Harry Hay (Douglas Hansell) the leader of The Mattachine is living a lie, he is married but having an affair with Rudi Gernriech (Daniel Scott). He also wrote a manifesto for homosexual rights. He eventually divorced realising that marriage wasn't going to 'cure' him!

This docu-drama serves as a reminder that we shouldn't forget what life was like for gay men and woman and how brave these men were and that even today people are still fighting for Gay Rights, with marriage being top of the agenda at the moment.
If you like social history you will enjoy this and if you intend on going to the Mardi Gras Parade seeing this first will give it a more powerful meaning.

Listen to our interview with Daniel Scott (Rudi Gernreich)