Winter Nights 2019
Welcome to The Blue Room Theatre’s Winter Nights 2019 season.
This program celebrates and showcases the incredible craft of making performance – a myriad of bright ideas, sky-high risks and fierce talent meet you at square one in the journey of creation and conversation.
This year, Winter Nights cements itself as one to watch, with the evolution of a mentorship program for the newest playwrights in town; a series of hot-topic forums in Winter Words; and Ground Up, a trailblazing forum for artists to test and make new work in real time across the festival. Supplemented with one off performances and mini-seasons, the program also boasts workshops from nationally renowned badass Van Badham and some of Perth’s best independent artists.
Scroll down for a quick run-down of the projects. Come get cosy and bask in the warmth of experimentation and ideas this winter.
Proudly supported by the Minderoo Foundation and Whipper Snapper Distillery
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Key Events
Keynote Lecture: On Theatre
The Blue Room Theatre and Shelagh Magadza
Theatre as a ritual of storytelling is an essential part of our humanity. The Chamber of Arts and Culture’s new director, Shelagh Magadza, ruminates on how we create the rituals and spaces of theatre today.
Tues 23 July, 6:30pm | $15 | Details
Suddenly 30
The Blue Room Theatre and The Equity Benevolent Guild (PAWA)
Past and present artists of The Blue Room Theatre band together in rambunctious fun and frivolity to raise funds in support of performing artists in hardship.
Sat 3 August, 9pm | $20 | Details
Ground Up
New work explored & made through three presentations on intermittent nights
Winter Shorts
Various
Four short dance works from Summer Nights’ MicroMove and STRUT’s Short Cuts continue their creative journey for an entertaining and insightful session of stories in motion.
Wed 24 + Sat 27 July, Thurs 1 Aug. 6:30pm | $15 | Details
Jiangshi
Squid Vicious
Somewhere between love story and exorcism, Jiangshi collapses horror films, romance serials, circuit parties and trampolines into the hopping corpse of a narrative play.
Wed 24 + Sat 27 July, Thurs 1 Aug. 8pm |$15 | Details
Queer as Flux and/ or The Medicine of Chaos
The Nest Ensemble and Stace Callaghan
One woman intimately packs and unpacks his fluid identities and the idea of transitioning in a society obsessed with binaries and fixing what isn’t broken.
Thu 25 + Tue 30 July, Fri 2 Aug. 6:30pm | $15 | Details
Gojira vs Gotama
Renegade Productions
Philosophy meets Pro Wrestling in this royal rumble of ideas. A mind bending smack down of ringside spectator sports.
Thu 25 + Tue 30 July, Fri 2 Aug. 8pm | $15 | Details
The Dirty Mother
Michelle Hall
Pregnant Clown descends to a post-natal underworld. Her baby is born not breathing. Emergency punk ritual, D.I.Y birth rite. This is the story you’re not supposed to tell.
Fri 26 + Wed 31 July, Sat 3 Aug. 6:30pm | $15 | Details
The Jellyman
Rhiannon Petersen
Jerry is haunted by his dead wife in a strange desert mirage composed of puppetry, drag and party store props. A rumination on power, identity, and the a-cock-olypse.
Fri 26 + Wed 31 July, Sat 3 Aug. 8pm | $15 | Details
Winter Words
Talks and forums exploring theatre craft and culture
Directors in Discourse
The Blue Room Theatre
Meet the newest Artistic Directors of Perth as we peel back the layers and get to know Barking Gecko Theatre’s Luke Kerridge and Yirra Yaakin’s Eva Grace Mullaley.
Wed 24 July. 6pm | $5 | Details
Queer Visibility
Mitch Whelan
Celebrate, ask questions of, or discover your new Gay Icon™ in this fab panel discussion on all things queer.
Fri 26 July. 6pm | $5 | Details
The Mothers of Invention: Occupy!
Michelle Hall with Liz Skitch
Mother makers we invite you to join a conversation that centres on motherhood and the challenges of continuing an artistic practise. Come discuss the obstacles we face in an industry that restricts access to and overlooks the value of women artists with children.
Sat 27 July. 12pm | $5 | Details
‘Ode to the OP’ First Nations Poetry Readings
Yirra Yaakin Theatre Company
After an intensive workshop run by two First Nations rhythmic artists, emerging First Nation’s poets will present their work in an intimate setting, cultivating an evening of story.
Wed 31 July. 6pm | $5 | Details
Dancing with the Void
Chelsea Gibson
Art is propaganda for the self. An empathy machine. How can theatre and performance contribute to conversations about mental health and illness?
Fri 2 August. 6pm | $5 | Details
Political Badassery with Van Badham
The Blue Room Theatre
A facilitated conversation that explores ideas around the playwright as political activist and public intellectual, art in a time of political anxiety and Van’s public activism around feminism and social justice.
Sat 3 August. 6pm | $5 | Details
All Ages Theatre Development
A work-in-process showing of a new WA work for young and old alike; supported by Barking Gecko Theatre Company
The Children Grim and Wild
Jeffrey Jay Fowler and Clare Testoni
A song cycle with shadow puppets based on fairy tales of brothers and sisters lost in the woods, but with all the weird, wild, and gruesome bits in it that your parents skip.
Saturday 27 July. 3pm | RSVP essential FREE | Details
Playing Up
Readings of a fresh new crop of WA plays-in-development
For Now
Isaac Diamond
Red dirt and battered bodies. For Now crash lands in the wastelands of Mars’ Old Colonies. Depleted resources have led to dehydration and incurable disease…sound familiar?
Thurs 25 July. 6pm | $5 | Details
Supertongues and Supertasters
Elise Wilson
In a world where human value is dictated by a person’s taste-sensitivity, a Nontaster, Parsley, aims to instil equality by revolting against Supertaster Incorporated.
Sat 27 July. 6pm | $5 | Details
Untitled Wars
Noemie Huttner-Koros and Mararo Wangai
Echoes of history ring out when the descendants of a Jewish resistance fighter and a Kenyan soldier cross paths in modern day Melbourne.
Thurs 1 August. 6pm | $5 | Details
She
Sally Davies
In rural Australia, two women face the same problem: their sheep are dying. A murder mystery, an exploration of isolation, and a look at womanhood before Instagram.
Sat 3 August. 4:30pm | $5 | Details
The Unexpected
A smorgasbord of special theatre projects, cameos and new works in-process
The Red Shoes
Xarna Rappold
A post-dramatic and experimental re-visitation of the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale. With a child-like pop-up book aesthetic and enraged female fury!
Wed 24 July. 7:30pm | $15 | Details
The Lion Never Sleeps
Noemie Huttner-Koros
A participatory walking performance meets queer treasure hunt. Explore where the queer community met in Northbridge during the AIDS crisis and their stories from the period.
Wed 24, Thurs 25 + Fri 26 July. 7:30pm | $15 | Details
Private Function
Static Drive Co.
Private Function is a series of one on one, intimate artistic encounters. Delve into the realm of the uncanny and the vulnerable to find something human between the 1’s and 0’s.
Thurs 25 + Fri 26 July. 7:30pm | $15 | Details
Saga Sisterhood
Centre For Stories
An exploration into the array of shades of what it means to be a South Asian woman in Perth. We’ll hear stories of searching for home, love, friendship and a yearning to belong.
Sat 27 July. 4:30 + 7:30pm | $15 | Details
Punch Up Club
Variegated Productions
A satirical sketch cabaret show that is based on the week’s news, written the day before. Bangers so sharp they will catch your breath. This is the Punch Up Club.
Sat 27 July + Sat 3 Aug. 9pm + 7:30pm | $20 | Details
Fed Up!
Jen Jamieson
A dinner show that is part performance, part discussion, and definitely dinner. I’ve cooked soup – come chat about what you’re fed up with. Drop in or stay for the whole 3 hours.
Sat 27 Jul. 6.30pm – 9.30pm | $5 | Details
Glimpses
Tone List and Fonder Physical Theatre
Four dancer-musician duos meet for the first time on the night and play for ten minutes before the chime of a bell signals the end, game-show style.
Tues 30 Jul. 7:30pm | $15 | Details
VHS Tracking – Live!
Tristan Fidler
A live panel about movie recommendations! Special guests present their personal cinematic faves around a special theme.
Wed 31 July. 7:30pm | $10 | Details
Feminah
Charlotte Otton
An ode to women who refuse the notion of having it all and instead chose to annihilate it. Feminah’s back, baby.
Thurs 1 + Fri 2 Aug. 7:30pm | $15 | Details