AustLit

'A moving tale of self-discovery for all the family

'“Cicada tell story. Story good. Story simple. Story even human can understand. Tok! Tok! Tok!”

'Cicada spends his days dutifully working away in a grey office. Overlooked by his superiors and overworked by his colleagues, he is getting very close to the end of his tether. But one day, looking out over the city from the rooftop of his office building, Cicada has an epiphany.

'Winner of the Children’s Book Council Award for Best Picture Book in 2019, this new adaptation brings master-storyteller Shaun Tan’s much-loved CICADA to life in a stunning puppet show, presented by Sydney Theatre Company and created by one of Australia’s premier children’s theatre companies – Barking Gecko Theatre.

'A small story of epic proportions, Cicada is an allegory of difference, resilience and the light we all have inside ourselves. Children and adults will love this enchanting tale about finding one’s place in the world.' (Production summary)

'Somewhere in the northern seas lies the small island nation of Sólset. Once a thriving metropolis, a decades-long drought has plagued the community and now only a hopeful few remain. From the multi-award-winning team behind It’s Dark Outside, The Irresistible, New Owner and Alvin Sputnik comes a deeply romantic visual extravaganza that will reignite your love of humanity.' (Production summary)

'Let’s begin with two people.

'Deep in the gloom a phone rings. They take the call. The voice on the line slips beneath her skin and curls its fingers around his stomach.

'You can’t see it, you can’t touch it, you can barely feel it. You can’t hold on tight enough.

'These people, these sisters and lovers and pilots and brothers are joined deep beneath the surface, below knowledge, down where desire and depravity lie. The line goes dead and these two people catch a glimpse of what’s to come, as it retreats back into the fog.

'A new work from Side Pony Productions (The Confidence Man, The Pride) and The Last Great Hunt (Falling through Clouds, The Adventures of Alvin Sputnik: Deep Sea Explorer), The Irresistible is a reckless, intoxicating love letter to the subconscious.'

Source: Side Pony Productions.

'A drive to a dress-up party in the country gets complicated bringing out the ugly in everybody.

'Everyone made a special effort for Dave's animal themed 21st. A make-shift lion, mouse, and an unidentified animal pick up a misinformed robot to make the long journey to the remote celebration. On the way they hit a kangaroo which spirals their tenuous relationships into a surreal state of disarray. Hayley is convinced that a dignified burial for the kangaroo is the right thing to do and pours her energy into that plight to avoid her dysfunctional relationship that's not about to end or get better.'

Source: Side Pony Productions.

'Ernest Hemingway loved deep sea fishing, big game hunting and women.

'Hemingway’s love of women led to a long-winded, complicated love life littered with a series of tragically poetic marriages. The inherent theatricality in the demise of so many of his marriages will be the starting point for the development of Side Pony Productions’ The Wives of Hemingway.

'Hemingway had four wives and inevitably blamed each wife for the breakdown of his previous marriage. The overtly theatrical circumstances of Hemingway’s love life coupled with his obsession with death and violence provide fertile ground for a comically tragic narrative. Hemingway was ardently passionate about big game hunting; hunting bears in America and later big game on his many expeditions to Africa. Hemingway saw hunting as a way of bringing a family together, an activity he had done with his father and a tradition he carried on with his sons.

'The Wives of Hemingway draws on two of Hemingway’s texts; ‘The Garden of Eden’ published posthumously which reads as a fictionalised romantic interpretation of the transition between his first and second wife; and ‘The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber’; set on safari this story sheds light on Hemingway’s longstanding obsession with power and masculinity. These texts have been a vehicle to delve into some of Ernest Hemingway’s more interesting preoccupations; androgyny, sexual role reversals, homosexuality and haircuts. Hemingway was a great story teller and his variations on the truth seemed to falter with age as he grew biased toward his more distant marriages and remembered these wives with great reverence and sadness which is most evident in his posthumously published texts.

'The Wives of Hemingway follows the love affair of Catherine and Wilson (Hemingway). Catherine’s obsessive love begins to reveal itself through her desire to be a boy, just like Wilson. This manifests through her dressing like him and getting his haircut. The matching duo are admired by a stranger, Helen. So flattered by her flattery, they invite her to get ‘their’ haircut and come on safari with them. As Catherine begins to assert her new found power Wilson’s affections shift from Catherine to Helen and the dynamics of the trio begin to implode. Catherine is reluctant to relinquish her mantle as wife and the three descend into a surreal and brutal battle for love.'

Source: Side Pony Productions.

"Alvin Sputnik is Earth's last hope. The seas have risen, billions have died, and those who remain live on farms on top of skyscrapers, on top of mountains. The scientists have tried everything. Floating islands sank, space probes found nothing, and the giant sponges, visible from the moon, are now rotting icons of failure.

Now science and humanity are turning to the oceans themselves. It is up to Alvin Sputnik to venture through the mysterious depths to find a place for the human race to live in peace once more. "The Adventures of Alvin Sputnik" uses a unique blend of mime, puppetry and transformative animation to explore the next and oldest frontier, the deep blue sea.' Source: www.pacs.org.au/ (Sighted 22/02/2010).