Banging Denmark by Van Badham | PIP Theatre
PIP Theatre’s Banging Denmark advertises itself as a fun night of solid entertainment and it delivers on this in spades. It’s real, raunchy, and wriggles its feminism in underneath the laughs in a way that keeps it squarely in the land of entertainment rather than delivering a gender studies lecture.
GODZ | Headfirst Acrobats
When we talk about beautiful men, we will often say ‘Awh, he’s like a Greek God’. Headfirst Acrobats take this aphorism and run, giving us GODZ: a one-hour high comedy, high camp, circus extravaganza, all the while keeping it extremely sexy.
Jack Sharpe and The Curse of The Forbidden Fruit | Fake Blood
I loved the detailed research, the entertaining Harry Potter and Indiana Jones references, the story arc of the show, and the high-energy performances by each of the three artists. And I enjoyed the clever use of the apples as a metaphor for opening the eyes of performers, creatives, commentators and audiences.
Love it, hate it, leave it, return to it. Work out your local pride complex at ‘All My Friends Are Returning to Brisbane.’
Call it what you will the ebb and pull of the Sunshine State has its young people running away, and then running back to Brisbane, in a perpetual state of disenchantment and ocker pride. These themes are explored in the production, All My Friends Are Returning to Brisbane.
"The Festival will showcase the best and most innovative comedians and performers." Rosa Sottile on the 2023 Brisbane Improv Festival
This week we have some killer shows in a huge diversity of formats from horror to musical to drama to classic improvised comedy - it’s something for everyone!
The Human Centipede Parody Musical | Synergy Production Co & Anywhere Festival
Writers Liam Hartley and Oliver Catton have taken the storyline of the horror movie and turned it into a camp, self-aware, and ridiculous romp, a parody of the film and the cheesiness of musicals generally. The musical numbers are hilarious, clever, and performed with great skill. The content is gruesome, but the energy is high, and the choreography is peppy. We are even treated to a tap-dancing centipede nightmare, complete with a cane held by Dr. Heiter.
Murder Village | David Massingham & Brisbane Comedy Festival
Murder Village is great night out for lovers of absurd comedy, Agatha Cristie style murder mysteries and all those inbetween. With a rotating cast of some of the best improvisers in the country, it’s also the perfect introduction to improv and a show you’ll want to see again and again. And not just because it will never be the same show twice.
Queen and Friend | Grimes Productions & Anywhere Festival
With a complete lack of props, set or special effects, they crafted vivid worlds with just their voices and bodies, illustrating the different characters through changes in posture, voice and positioning. A real highlight, I have to say, was watching Imogen portray both the human-eating horse and human being eaten by the horse, both the consumer and the consumed, simultaneously. Bloody funny.
Venus in Fur | The X Collective
What truly made this play stand out was the performance of the actors, AJ and Nick Sinclair, who dynamically portrayed the two main characters. The performances were nothing short of exceptional, with both actors delivering nuanced portrayals of their characters. They both playfully and skilfully moved through the complex tonal and vocal shifts demanded of the piece.
Brisbaret at Queensland Cabaret Festival
I can see why Brisbaret is a popular feature in the Brisbane arts scene, as a firmly local platform for a wide variety of music, comedy, drag, and cabaret artists. Variety is a tried and tested format—at its finest when hosted by talented MC’s, who program an eclectic collection of invited artists and keep the evening on track.
The Wharf Revue: Looking for Albanese | Jonathan Biggins, Drew Forsythe and Phillip Scott
The Wharf Revue is an irreverent adventure combining popular culture, cabaret and politics cleverly executed just as much as Scomo ruled the nation singlehandedly and got away with it till he didn’t. This show is just as ambitious as Clive Palmer spending $123 million to win one seat to open another iron ore mine. With such a huge field of contenders to choose from, this show delivers one punch line after the other, meticulously crafted to squeeze out every climate denying, debt defying, corrupted and lying gag possible.
Poncho: Keep It Up! | Dani Cabs
There’s an undercurrent of struggle in Poncho, of wrestling with shame, of being emotionally cauterised by a culture that punishes any deviation to the rigid, limiting forms of male connection and expression that patriarchy demands. But Cabs has an innate talent for balancing tension and levity, which he deployed masterfully during the piñata sequence towards the end. He brought many in the audience to tears (myself included), and then, moments later, had us laughing again.
Death In A Statesman | Debase Productions
Death in a Statesman has a lot of fun playing with genre conventions, taking things we typically associate with gritty American crime stories and placing them on a journo in Bundaberg who uses a bike to get around. The whole audience was really receptive to that playfulness and humor, laughing heartily along with the fourth wall breaking jokes and the over the top minor characters. Noir and comedy make a fun combination and I think that genre blend made a good vehicle for a story about family and transitions.
"We were inspired to create an event that celebrated and centred the art of improvisation!" Rosa Sottile on the 2022 Brisbane Improv Festival
We were inspired by the New Zealand Improv Festival and other similar festivals to create an event that celebrated and centred the art of improvisation! Improvised theatre and comedy is so special because every show is completely unique and different - you literally will never get the same show twice.
Cool Story Bro | Big Fork Theatre
One of the coolest parts of Cool Story Bro is that every show night is its own opening and closing night. What happened on Friday night will never happen again, and the only people in the world who got to experience it are those who were in the room. So for all those reading this, I’m sorry, but you will never, ever, get to experience the pure extasy of watching a group of people spontaneously assume the role of sperms and egg in the fight for fertilisation.
The Ugly One | AllEntertainment
This performance is lively and light-hearted, not skirting away from its darker undertones but embracing them with a jaunty devil-may-care attitude. It’s an absurd play, with the supporting actors playing multiple characters each with the same name; which had me tumbling for clarity on a couple moments. It is relentless; the scenes blur quickly into, across, under and over each other, and the actors did a fantastic job of taking us along for a ride with them.
The Anniversary | Salvador Dinosaur
I’m not even going to try to mince words, The Anniversary is a physical comedy masterclass. The performances, direction, physical comedy, sets, props, puppetry – basically everything - combine to create a rollercoaster of a ride that had me crying with laughter throughout. If you are a fan of absurdist comedy, clown or dark humour, do not miss this one if it comes to a theatre near you.
“We give a platform to the best improv and comedy shows.” Rosa Sottile on Big Fork Theatre’s dedicated comedy theatre
There are so many great shows on. Every week we have totally new improv shows and also regular stand-up and variety shows! If you want to see improv for the first time I would recommend our classic improv format, ‘Cool Story Bro’ on Friday nights. It’s Big Fork’s flagship show. True stories inspire hilarious improv scenes! Some other particularly exciting shows coming up are the BrisAsia Festival shows – ‘BrisAsia Stands Up’ and ‘Wer Ya From’. We also have some great Brisbane regular shows coming to the theatre like ‘Stand Up vs Improviser’ and ‘Freak Box’, and our first show making a comeback ‘Get It Inya’, an experimental comedy show!
Die Hard: The Movie, The Play | Act React
It was really great to be part of the live audience. I enjoyed the laughter (including watching some audience members almost in tears, as they were laughing so hard)… and it was wonderful to spend a whole hour in 1988 (a world away from the challenges of 2021.
The Unspoken Word is ‘Joe’ | The Reaction Theory
This production showcased some incredible young talent in Meanjin | Brisbane and was a true delight to watch. The script was clever, witty, and fast. Meanjin needs more theatre like this and every comedy I see following this will have a very high bar to live up to.