STAGE
The Age
Tuesday December 1, 2009
Method directing MOVIE director Nadia Tass, whose fi lms include The Big Steal and Malcolm, is turning to the stage next year, directing the Spanish play The Gronholm Method in Red Stitch€™s fi rst season for 2010. Described as a black comedy, it explores the modern fascination with reality television through a contest for a dream job. Founding member Kat Stewart returns in That Face, an award-winning British drama, after starring as Roberta Williams in TV€™s Underbelly series. The season kicks off on February 3 with Farragut North about political expediency in the US Congress, and includes Fatboy, an American satire of contemporary political violence.Go to redstitch.net.Say a little prayer RELIGIOUS material is present in a surprising number of new Australia plays. Simon Stone€™s Hayloft Project premieres Rita Kalnejais€™ B.C. about a modern-day Mary and Joseph tomorrow, while in Sydney playwright Lally Katz has been involved in a project dealing with Old Testament characters such as Lucifer, Adam, Eve and Noah. Now Platform Youth Theatre presents One is Warm in Winter, the Other Has a Better View at fortyfi vedownstairs from next Thursday.It explores issues of modern-day faith €śin all its diversity and difference€ť. It was written by Adam J. A .Cass after wide-ranging discussions with the theatre€™s ensemble and director Caitlin Dullard. Book on 9662 9966.Stars on stage SUBSCRIPTIONS have been so strong to the Sydney Theatre Company€™s star-studded 2010 program that fi ve shows have had their seasons extended by a week even before the opening of general ticket sales. Such demand is almost unprecedented in Australian theatre. The shows include three plays with foreign connections €” Steppenwolf€™s original production of August: Osage County, Philip Seymour Hoffman€™s direction of Sam Shepard€™s True West and Stockholm, a collaboration with Britain€™s physical theatre group, Frantic Assembly. The others are Chekhov€™s Uncle Vanya with Cate Blanchett, John Bell, Richard Roxburgh (pictured) and Hugo Weaving, and the rarely seen Our Town.Plaudits for Kosky BARRIE Kosky€™s provocative imagination has long rattled theatres in Australia and Europe and now he has been declared Germany€™s best opera director in awards announced last weekend. The annual ceremony for the Faust Prize was awarded to Kosky for his production of Janacek€™s last opera, From the House of the Dead, for the Staatsoper Hanover.His work was chosen from more than 500 productions and follows the announcement that he will take charge of one of Germany€™s leading companies, Berlin€™s Komische Oper, from 2012. Kosky has worked there since 2003, and his productions include Mozart€™s The Marriage of Figaro and this year the Cole Porter musical Kiss Me Kate.Read all about it SOMEBODY€™S Daughter Theatre Company is the big winner from the inaugural Readings Foundation grants announced by the managing director of the Readings book group, Mark Rubbo (pictured). The company was awarded $20,000 to encourage marginalised students in Wodonga to join a creative program with company artists and young people from HighWater Theatre. Other winners were the Fitzroy Learning Network ($8000 to upgrade its music studio), Olympic Adult Education ($13,000 for literacy tuition for older migrants) and the Aboriginal Literacy Foundation ($10,000 for tutoring in Swan Hill).
© 2009 The Age
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