La Boite 2014
Season Launch
Tuesday December 3 2013
Attended by Xanthe Coward
Did you follow the Twitter feed during the launch?
#laboite2014
I’m sorry if I missed seeing you there, but look, if I told you every time I was attending an event under the fog of a migraine it would get boring. So sometimes I stay and sometimes I go. Let’s hope next year, after some further investigation, meditation on life, and better migraine management, things look a little different! Suffice to say, I was grateful to to be at La Boite’s “Close Encounters” launch last night for the formalities and I’m extremely impressed with next year’s program.
I won’t be writing La Boite Education Notes next year – Program Manager, Glyn Roberts, will take on that role in-house – so if you’re teaching in any capacity, keep an eye on laboite.com.au for the new-look Teacher Feature events, student workshops and ed notes. Between QTC & La Boite Education, plus the many touring options such as shake&stir and Grin & Tonic, Queensland teachers have NO EXCUSE to miss matching up the assessment tasks with ACTUAL live theatre performances. Also, WHAT FUN! Something new for Year 10 students too, check out La Boite Summer School!
No surprise really, but it’s worth noting that La Boite looks set to raise the bar again. Get in early, seriously, to get tickets because as we saw this year, when the supply increases in quality the demand soars!
Season tickets make awesome stocking fillers…
#justsaying #greatgiftideas #happychristmas
Anyway, here it is, La Boite’s 2014 season, all on the one page, in the one place. For even more detail, and to book or buy season tickets, check out laboite.com.au and keep up with the company on social media.
Here’s to more brilliant Brisbane theatre! Cheers!
The Alien aka Kathryn Marquet
Can you actually believe La Boite’s been in the Roundhouse for 10 years?
Where did that time since Hale Street go?! But it’s true, whether or not you noticed it passing you by; it is indeed La Boite’s tenth anniversary in the Roundhouse Theatre next year. And with the launch of the company’s sensational 2014 season, we see a great selection of intriguing new works and much-loved classics, including Roald Dahl’s Revolting Rhymes & Dirty Beasts (January 8 – 18).
Roald Dahl’s Revolting Rhymes & Dirty Beasts bursts onto the Roundhouse stage in a spectacular new live show, taking the world’s best-loved fairy tales and rearranging them with some surprising and hilarious twists.
Seriously funny and frighteningly silly, Roald Dahl’s Revolting Rhymes & Dirty Beasts is the perfect January summer holiday entertainment especially for children 5 to 12.
Following the slimy fun of Out Damn Snot, La Boite teams up with shake & stir once again for a world premiere live show that’s sure to delight and disgust in equal measures.
Oh, how we love Louis Nowra’s COSI! (February 8 – March 8) And look, next year, if Sam and I were not so busy with the Noosa Long Weekend Festival (and writing, and teaching and everything else…), we might have tried harder to put together a production on the Sunshine Coast, which would see our original cast together again on stage at The Lind. The production in 1997 featured Sam Coward, Brad Thompson, David Rock, Synda Turnbull and Jenni McCaul.
La Boite’s COSI will be something else! Starring Jessica Marais and James Stewart (you know them from Packed to the Rafters), and directed by David Berthold, this is an absolute must-see.
BOOK EARLY! Actually, book early for everything. Actually, just bite the bullet and buy a season ticket now. It’s the best season we’ve seen at La Boite! You won’t want to miss a thing!
This landmark new production of the beloved Australian comedy classic celebrates La Boite’s tenth anniversary at the Roundhouse Theatre.
Young theatre director Lewis has just landed his first job straight out of university, staging a production of Mozart’s comic opera Così fan tutte. The catch? The cast are patients from a mental institution, none of whom can speak Italian… or sing. Can this unlikely cohort, including an obsessive-compulsive, a manic depressive and a junkie, pull it off? Or will a patient with a penchant for pyromania spoil all the fun?
As Vietnam War protests rage outside and Lewis confronts the enormity of his task, he begins to realise the frightening and attractive power of madness, politics, theatre and love.
Following COSI, comes COCK (March 27 – April 12) or as @MelbourneTheatreCo cleverly hashtagged it during the launch in order to avoid all those dodgy new followers of #cock – #mtcCock
This cheekily titled comedy earned rave reviews in London and New York, picking up an Olivier Award, and comes to us direct from its Australian premiere at Melbourne Theatre Company.
Mike Bartlett’s razor-sharp play is directed by MTC Associate Director Leticia Cáceres, stars Green Room Award-winning Tom Conroy and is set to original music by multi ARIA Award-winning singer-songwriter Missy Higgins.
Three people battle it out in a theatrical cockfight to stake a claim on each other’s hearts.
John is dissatisfied with his relationship and wants out. Or maybe he just wants time out, a break from his needy boyfriend for a few weeks. Or maybe months. Actually, the whole problem is John doesn’t know what he wants. But while he’s thinking things through, he meets a girl, and is faced with a whole new world of possibilities and complications.
Cock takes the classic story of the love triangle, turns it on its head and makes it feel utterly contemporary.
La Boite’s Playwrights-in-Residence Program has well and truly proven its worth, especially with Kathryn Marquet penning Pale Blue Dot (July 19 – August 9), to be directed by David Berthold and designed by Helpmann Award nominee Jonathon Oxlade. With original music by Gordon Hamilton, and starring Hugh Parker, Pale Blue Dot is going to be a hot new fave for next year.
“Two possibilities exist. Either we are alone in the universe, or we are not. Both are equally terrifying.” Arthur C. Clarke
Here is a captivating new comedy about aliens, alienation and the terrifying and comforting thought that we are not alone.
Insurance fraud investigator Joel Pinkerton doesn’t believe in aliens. So when his company introduced UFO abduction insurance as a publicity stunt a few years ago, he never gave it much thought. Until now.
When Joel is called to investigate the possible alien abduction of 16-year-old schoolgirl Storm, he finds himself drawn into intergalactic intrigue and conspiracy theories. What happened to Storm during those missing 24 hours? And how did she wake up in an empty field 200km from home? As Joel gets sucked up in the vortex, he begins to feel increasingly alienated from his wife Holly and their newborn baby girl, who is exhibiting some very odd behaviours of her own…
The most recent production seen here, of Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House, was Pan Pan’s A Doll House during WTF in February this year. I didn’t love it but I didn’t hate it, and I’m looking forward to experiencing what Director Steven Mitchell Wright does with this production for Brisbane Festival; it’s a new version written by the one and only Lally Katz. Yesterday was Lally’s birthday and it was with great delight that 500 guests, prompted by a count down on the big screen (unseen by Lally), sang to her a rousing Happy Birthday! I love the La Boite team for thinking of that! So simple! So much joy!
Nora seems to have it all – a successful husband, three adorable children and a beautiful home. But this picture perfect life is actually a complicated trap of secrets and lies. Here is a story of domestic revolution, marriage and motherhood, female empowerment and the journey towards self-liberation.
Henrik Ibsen’s great psychological thriller was recently named as the world’s most performed play. And why wouldn’t it be? It’s brilliantly plotted, boasts striking characters, and tells a story that’s still as charged and moving as it was 135 years ago.
I’m excited about next year’s Indie season. I missed it entirely this year but I know I won’t be missing a thing in 2014…these are just exceptional choices.
4000 Miles by Amy Herzog (April 30 – May 17)
Directed by Anthony Skuse. Featuring Diana McLean, Stephen Multari & Aileen Huynh
21-year-old Leo rocks up unannounced at the Manhattan apartment of his 91-year-old Jewish grandmother Vera. Having broken up with his girlfriend and cycled across the country, he needs a place to crash for the night, no questions asked. But Vera – prickly, stubborn and sharp as a tack – isn’t about to let him off that easily.
As an overnight couch-surf turns into an extended stay, 4000 Miles unearths a surprising commonality between these two generations in this emotionally compelling drama. With disarming frankness and surprising candour, the two negotiate social potholes and trace emotional fault lines that link them to a painful family history.
From one of America’s brightest playwrights, this compassionate and unsentimental play explores the funny, frustrating, and ultimately life-changing relationship between a grandson learning to face his life, and a grandmother who is starting to forget hers.
Mullah Nasrudin by Niz Jabour (May 8 – 17)
Written and Performed by Niz Jabour
Mullah Nasrudin sat fishing in a bucket of water. A visitor, wishing to be friendly, asked, “How many have you caught?”
“You are the ninth,” said Nasrudin. – Persian folk tale
Raised in Iraq, theatre maker Niz Jabour grew up with the folk stories of Mullah Nasrudin. Memorable and funny with a sting in their tail, the Mullah Nasrudin stories have been passed down through generations, new ones added and modified, and the character and his tales spread to broader regions.
Dissolving the lines between narrator, poet and refugee, Niz draws on this long tradition of spoken narrative and his own experiences as a refugee to unearth the lived and buried experiences of the Iraqi people: their humour, their hometowns and cultures, their difficulties.
Machina by Richard Jordan (May 8 – 24)
Directed by Catarina Hebbard. Featuring Kaye Stevenson & Luisa Prosser.
One month ago, David Sergeant made the ultimate commitment to social media, choosing to forever separate mind and body by uploading his consciousness into social networking site Machina. An experimental and irreversible new process known as ‘going inside’, the user discards their need for a physical body and attains a kind of digital immortality in the cloud.
Now, as David’s family, friends and ex-lovers struggle to come to terms with his physical absence, questions are being asked about why this promising young man committed the equivalent of social suicide. Did he go willingly? Or was he pushed? David’s mother is determined to find out, even if it means reaching out to her son from the other side…
Set in an uncomfortably familiar world of carefully-constructed online profiles and disposable digital relationships, Machina is a bold and ambitious new play by Richard Jordan (25 Down).
Hedonism’s Second Album (August 13 – 30)
Featuring Helen Howard, Patrick Dwyer & Thomas Hutchins
Brisbane band Hedonism took everyone by surprise with their first album (especially themselves), and they’re determined to enjoy their newfound status as rock stars. All they have to do now is record a second album and prove it wasn’t all a fluke…
But frontman Gareth just can’t get it together: lead guitarist Chimney has got cold feet, Sumo the drummer is demanding a ten-minute solo and bass player Michael has up and vanished. After an all-weekend bender involving several school-aged girls, racial slurs on YouTube and a wombat from Australia Zoo, record label exec Phil is sent to pull the boys into line and prevent the looming PR disaster.
During the testosterone-fuelled fallout, closely-guarded secrets are laid bare and friendships tested.
Featuring a live band on stage, Hedonism’s Second Album is a new Australian comedy from David Burton and Claire Christian for anyone who’s ever been let down by their favourite band, or their best mates.
Angel Gear by Sven Swenson (October 14 – November 8) & Dangerfield Park by Sven Swenson (October 21 – November 5)
Directed by Brian Lucas & Sven Swenson.
For this special La Boite Indie event, playwright Sven Swenson (The Truth About Kookaburras) delivers two new interconnected works from the Sundial Plays: Angel Gear and Dangerfield Park, playing in repertory through the season.
Angel Gear – Mild-mannered customs officer Gary hasn’t seen his father, Edge Nagle, since he was four. Raised by his mother in the UK, Gary grew up thinking his Dad back home in Australia was a quiet man whose greatest sin was being dull. He was wrong.
When Gary arrives at an isolated property on the outskirts of Brisbane to reconnect with Edge and the two half-brothers he only recently discovered existed, he is plunged into a world beyond his worst imaginings: drugs, prostitution, and an utter disregard for human life. Within hours of meeting his hate-filled father and reprobate siblings, Gary is convinced he won’t survive long enough to see London again.
Swenson’s horrifying stage thriller that proves blood isn’t always thicker than water.
Featuring Nick Barclay, Michael Deed, Brian Lucas, Christos Mourtzakis, Cameron Sowden & Sven Swenson.
Dangerfield Park – Marc and his partner Perry are about to get hitched, despite having just lost everything they own in a house fire. Otis has reluctantly agreed to be their man of honour, even though he’s never had much luck in the relationship department. In the meantime, they’re crashing with Sholto, who’s desperately trying not to fall for gorgeous journo Tim. And young Reyer is left reeling after being outed to his fundamentalist Christian family.
In the early morning darkness of Brisbane’s Dangerfield Park, one of these men is brutally bashed and left for dead – and none of their lives will ever be the same. As the accused invokes the Gay Panic Defence, and the men brace for the political and legal turbulence ahead, their differing viewpoints mean that a perfect world is almost as hard to define as it is to achieve.
Unflinching and unmistakably ‘Queensland’, Dangerfield Park explores a world where violence, hatred and even love sometimes come from surprising sources.
Featuring Zachary Boulton, Michael Deed, Stephen Geronimos, Kieran Law, Cindy Nelson, Jack Palmer, Daniel Stockwell, Casey Woods & Sven Swenson.
Or Forever Hold Your Peace (November 12 – 29)
Directed by Dave Sleswick. Featuring Thomas Bartsch, Zoe Cobon, Chris Farrell, Kitty Gatling, Rachel Gobel, Jose Gonda, Amy Ingram, Kieran Law, Abe Mitchell, Robbie O’Brien, Sam Plummer, Kevin Spink, Steph Tandy, Peta Ward, Ben Warren, Amy Wollstein.
Adapted from Euripides’ play and brought to life by a cast of 20 performers, Iphigenia 2.0 is a compelling conversation about the nature of democracy, leadership and the power of the collective voice.
Faced with their impending deployment to the Trojan War, a troop of gung-ho soldiers with nothing to lose demand from their leader something unspeakable. Using a sham wedding to the handsome warrior Achilles as bait, Agamemnon lures his daughter to Aulis and sets in motion a chain of events that brings an empire to ruin.
Drawing parallels between Greek tragedy, modern warfare and the state of the local political landscape, Or Forever Hold Your Peace is as physically explosive and athletic as it is ephemeral.
“A petrifying array of love and violence that will keep you chained to your seat.”
XS Entertainment
In 2010 La Boite created a new platform for independent theatre in Brisbane. Since then, La Boite Indie has fostered a brilliant blossoming, deeply impacting theatre and performance right across the city and beyond.
Independent theatre is theatre made by artists coming together, often with few resources or little infrastructure, to create work they passionately believe in. It is the wellspring of the theatre ecology. La Boite Indie sees the Roundhouse Theatre transformed into a 95-seat space. Sometimes we venture into even smaller spaces. La Boite provides financial, technical, marketing and artistic assistance.
Crucially, La Boite Indie works to create pathways to propel these independent companies to even greater opportunities. The Harbinger moved from La Boite Indie to La Boite’s mainhouse season and will tour nationally in 2014. After creating two productions for La Boite Indie, The Danger Ensemble moved to La Boite’s mainhouse to co-produce The Wizard of Oz with La Boite and the Brisbane Festival. A Tribute of Sorts came to life for La Boite Indie and will feature as a part of Queensland Theatre Company’s season in 2014. Sarah Winter’s A Dinner With Gravity also premiered as part of La Boite Indie, and has had further performances in Iceland.
One of the companies presented at La Boite Indie 2013 will move to the Queensland Performing Arts Centre in 2014. This partnership with QPAC will continue, enabling one of the independent companies in La Boite Indie 2014 to move to QPAC in 2015.
VOTE HERE
La Boite Indie’s aims are clear and considerable: to nurture a sustainable independent theatre culture in Brisbane, to enable closer ties between independent practice and La Boite, to help create outstanding theatre made with passion and rigour, and to cultivate new audiences for theatre right across the city.
XS Entertainment 
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