The Basement (fmr. Silo)
July 23-August 1 | Reviewed by Renee Liang

“Every now and then… strangers break into our carefully arranged worlds, leaving us with no point of reference, no language, no understanding…” This is the program’s introduction to the closeted world devised by Medlock and Musgrove in their two plays, Spurs and Blinkers. Each two-hander play is complete in itself, but the link is the performers, and the fact that both involve horses.

Auckland Town Hall
July 19-26 | Reviewed by Renee Liang

“YOU DON’T find your own happiness,” they say, flashing smiles over confidently tossed shoulders. “You make it.” It is a statement that these eleven young women truly live. The Girls Show is about being young, about being a woman and about being an Aucklander – all things which have received bad press in the past, but which is celebrated in this pastiche of true stories.

Gryphon Theatre
July 16-26 | Reviewed by Kate Blackhurst

IN THE SPIRIT of full disclosure, I will admit that Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre is my favourite ever book. Stagecraft’s latest production is Jane Eyre, but not as we know it. Polly Teale’s adaptation imagines Bertha Mason, the mad woman in the attic, as Jane’s alter ego, with implications that don’t always work, but Paul Kay’s direction masterfully highlights all the areas he wants us to notice.

Maidment Theatre
July 10-August 2 | Reviewed by Renee Liang

IN THIS revival of the classic play by Tennessee Williams, the action is transposed from a 1950’s Missipippi river estate to a modern day “hotel”, complete with designer furniture (promoted in the programme!), plastic walls and obeisant hotel staff. The reasons for this staging decision are never entirely justified, and I found myself confused as to which era this play was set - the dialogue and themes seeming to refer more to the original 1950’s while the set and soundtrack suggested a contemporary setting. Apart from this distraction, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof retains its original power as a study in human relationships, focussing on two pairs in particular: frigid Brick and his lustful wife Maggie, and Brick and his dying father, the patriarch Big Daddy.