Column: Art / Music / Theatre
Apocalypse, death and disaster at the NGV
This easily overlooked gem, situated above the NGV’s blockbuster Napoleon exhibition, can be seen as a kind of grim companion piece: while Napoleon is steeped in the rhetoric of glory, The Four Horsemen: Apocalypse, Death and Disaster lingers on the suffering caused by unchecked human ambition. The … Read more
Column: Art / Music / Theatre
The hollowness of privilege: Queen Lear
Image credit: Jeff Busby For my money, King Lear is the problem child of Shakespeare’s major tragedies. While the other three of the ‘Big Four’ – Hamlet, Othello and Macbeth – are resolved in a deeply cathartic manner, Lear’s relentless bleakness stymies the audience’s relief at every … Read more
Column: Art / Music / Theatre
A climate of mendacity: The Heretic
It must be tough writing drama about the political issue du jour. Worthy causes can be adapted into unwatchable dross, while intellectual scrap metal can be spun into theatrical gold. A case of the latter is The Heretic Read more
Column: Art / Music / Theatre
The Trouble with Coriolanus
Coriolanus is a puzzle. In this strange conclusion to Shakespeare’s dizzying series of tragedies, the playwright seems to jettison complex emotional dynamism in favour of ferocious single-mindedness. Read more
Column: Art / Music / Theatre
Review: Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Australian Shakespeare Company
The scandal-plagued Lady Chatterley’s Lover may seem like a logical choice for today’s stage. After all, DH Lawrence’s novel about a sexually frustrated aristocrat who develops a taste for the rough-cut charms of her husband’s groundskeeper had an extraordinarily liberated attitude toward sex for its time. It’s … Read more
