Comedy, Reviews, Stage David O'Doherty review (Melbourne International Comedy Festival) Melinda Oliver Are jokes funnier when told in an Irish accent? Or are they just damn funny?
Live, Music, Reviews Bertie Blackman music review (NGV, Melbourne) Melinda Oliver Bertie Blackman transitions from playing electric guitar to drums to keyboard while singing with the ease of a life-long musician. …
Dance, Reviews, Stage Vitesse dance review (Arts Centre, Melbourne) Melinda Oliver Moving slowly but purposefully towards a dramatically depicted seascape to the sound of howling wind and menacing drumbeats, the opening …
Stage Effie the Virgin Bride review (The Tivoli, Brisbane) Melinda Oliver Swaggering across the stage, checking out the chicks but bemoaning his lack of lovemaking (prostate problems), Uncle Vasili threatened to steal …
Live, Music, Reviews, Stage St Jerome’s Laneway Festival 2016 review (Footscray Community Arts Centre, Melbourne) Melinda Oliver Spinning like a whirling dervish, singer Lauren Mayberry of Scottish band Chvrches was perhaps channeling a higher power that gifted …
Live, Music, Reviews, Visual Arts Sugar Mountain festival (VCA, Melbourne) Melinda Oliver With no mud like Splendour, nudie-runs like Meredith, the grit of Laneway or idealism of Golden Plains, it was a …
Dance, Reviews, Stage Last Work – Batsheva Dance Company (Melbourne Festival) Melinda Oliver A man faces away from the audience, seated, hunched over, and frantically moving his right arm up and down.
Stage Lord of the Dance: Dangerous Games review (Arts Centre, Melbourne) Melinda Oliver It’s a spectacle of shameless showbiz, with singers in sequinned gowns, glitzy holographics, a love-versus-desire storyline, and Irish dancers that …
Stage 20:21 Australian Ballet review (Arts Centre, Melbourne) Melinda Oliver The cast of 20:21 deserve an Olympic medal for sheer endurance, power and magnificence.
Stage Cinderella review (Arts Centre, Melbourne) Melinda Oliver Most of us dream of being rescued at some stage in our lives — from a mundane job, a fading …