GRIFFIN ARTIST BLOG

Griffin Artist Card membership is an initiative to increase access to our theatre. This program facilitates the coming together of artists across different disciplines and at different stages of their career. It supports and strengthens a vibrant emerging artist community, as well as acknowledging this community as an important part of the Griffin family and the wider theatre world.

How does it work? We want to offer a place where artists can see work, discuss work and make work.

To see work, we will continue to offer heavily discounted $15 tickets, which can be booked in the first fortnight of all Griffin and Griffin Independent shows, Performance Space shows at members' rates and ticket deals and giveaways to other theatre companies.

To discuss work, we are introducing regular Artist Card events where the community can come together for a drink.

And finally, we are supporting emerging artists in their making of new, bold and exciting work. Griffringe will continue to be a great avenue for artist card holders to display their work. We will also be offering (where possible!) free use of our space for readings and developments.

The Artist Card is a community. It is the glitter glue that brings all the cool amazing arty people together and helps them sparkle. So it's almost like glitter glue squared. If you are interested in joining the artist card outfit, please email artist@griffintheatre.com.au or come along to our next shindig….Hope to see you there!

Posts tagged Thyestes

Apr 8

ARTIST OF THE WEEK: Q & A WITH BOJANA NOVAKOVIC

What are you working on currently?

At the moment I am working on being a good daughter. I’m staying with my parents and cooking and keeping their house clean when I can. I’m also working on a new record collection. I gave my one to Tim! :(

Who, or what, inspires you to create?

In general, anything peculiar and funny is inspirational to me. People, events, ideas which I am unfamiliar with, which puzzle or frighten me are always a call for further investigation.

What was the most interesting thing you saw recently?

The Book of Mormon on Broadway. The Moth story telling night in LA. And Thyestes here in Sydney.

What is the best piece of advice that you’ve been given?

I am terrible at taking advice. I only really learn from NOT taking advice and making huge mistakes. But just so you have an answer, I try to adhere to these two:

1. “Don’t google yourself” Meryl Streep

2. “Take Fountain” Bette Davies.

Who would you have dinner with and why?

At the moment I just want to have dinner with myself and The Wire. For the obvious reason that it’s the best thing ever made, and dinner time is our only time to spend together.

Bojana wrote and is starring in The Story of Mary MacLane by Herself at Griffin from 4 April to May 12. Remember to grab your Artist Card ticket in the first fortnight here.

Apr 1

ARTIST OF THE WEEK: INTERVIEW WITH JAMES LUGTON

What are you working on currently?

Breaker Morant.

Who, or what, inspires you to create?

Being surrounded by great talent is artistically inspiring.

What was the most interesting thing you saw recently?

Thyestes, New Electric Ballroom.

What is the best piece of advice that you’ve been given?

No risk, no goodies.

Every day’s a school day.

Say the lines in a voice the audience can hear and understand.

OK that’s three pieces of advice…

Ok that’s three pieces of advice…

Oh, and don’t be an actor.

Who would you have dinner with and why?

Anyone who’s paying. Because they’re paying.

Or if you prefer a serious answer, Frank Sinatra and Shakespeare. I think it’d be a really, really good dinner, a lot of laughs, great conversation and the band would really swing.

Breaker Morant is showing at the Seymour Centre April 12-21 in the Reginald Theatre.

Tickets $30/$20

Check out the Seymour website for more details.

Feb 13

Artist of the Week - Q&A with Mark Dessaix

What are you working on currently?

A the moment I am working on The Temperamentals, which is being directed by Kevin Jackson. It’s playing at the New Theatre until March 3 as part of the Sydney Mardi Gras Festival. I read the play back in September last year and fell head over heels for the story, and the bravery of these 5 men who took massive risks to stand up and fight for their rights in 1950’s America. I have also just begun preliminary shooting for a new Australian feature film, working alongside Simon Lyndon. It’s called Lorem Ipsum, and is a remarkable art and style based film. I think it’s quite avant garde for Aussie film.

Who, or what, inspires you to create?

I think inspiration comes in many forms and guises, you just have to be open to it. I find a great theatre production or film helps when I am not working, or even something as simple as reading a play on a lazy afternoon. When I am working, it’s always watching the creatives around me working. The rehearsal room is my happy place. I recently was lucky enough to watch a rehearsal of The Wild Duck, which was beyond inspiring and educational, to watch that calibre of skill was incredible. There is also much to be gained when in a creative slump. They are the times when the art of inspiration through self motivation comes in handy. I think I am lucky in that I am a stubborn capricorn…I don’t give up easily.

What was the most interesting thing you saw recently?

It would have to be hands down Thyestes. It held my interest in a vice. Staging was brilliant, the acting was nothing short of fearless. I was disturbed throughout the whole thing, but utterly absorbed. It actually gave me some seriously twisted memory recall dreams for three nights after…it messed up my psyche, man!

What is the best piece of advice that you’ve been given?

The best will always be from my high school drama teacher, Ms Mills. I used to muck around in drama class, but she could see something in me that I couldn’t. She was a professional dancer and choreographer in Sydney and Vienna, so she knew her stuff. She was tough love with me from day one…her advice was always “Mark, if you expect to be a successful actor, you need to start owning your f***king sh*t”. And it’s true, you have to show up to rehearsal, a shoot, audition, fitting, reading, class, whatever and you need to have your sh*t together.

Who, past or present, would you like to share a meal with and why?

arghhhh, this is always a toughy! How can I pick one?! I am picking 3.

1 - My late Grandad. A wonderful man and very funny. I got my sense of humour from this man.
2 - My late Grandpa. We shared a love of literature, and could talk about Shakespeare and the Greeks for hours…he would have loved Thyestes.
3 - The Queen…she fascinates the heavens out of me, like that reclusive old lady that lived down the street I grew up on. I reckon she’d love a cheeky gin or 4. I’d like to be having dinner with her when she excuses herself for the “powder room”, then I’d know she was real.

Mark is starring in The Temperamentals at New Theatre until 3 March. Check it out here.

Jan 30

HUSH HUSH TICKET DEAL

$10 student tickets to catch Thyestes this Wednesday at the 2pm matinee. Use the codeword SOCHEAP to book via Belvoir on 9699 3444.

$10? That’s like a day’s worth of coffee. For a whole play.

Jan 24

Thyestes - Australia Day

Special offer for Thursday’s (Australia Day holiday) 8pm performance of Thyestes, tix at the door at Carriageworks for just $25.

Jan 22

As promised, a return to Thyestes once the reviews started churning out. This piece comes from the hands of Simon Stone, Chris Ryan, Mark Winter, and Thomas Henning, along with the dramaturgical eagle-eye of Anne-Louise Sarks (co-Artistic Director of The Hayloft Project with Stone).

The Hayloft Project is one of the leading independent theatre companies of Australia and their mission statement, if you will, includes this proclamation:

“We are an ensemble committed to shaping an Australian theatre culture that reflects and engages with our changing society, and to attracting newer and more diverse audiences to the theatre. We seek constantly to develop and extend our collaborative theatremaking practice, to find new forms, voices and narratives. Our aim is to create intelligent, passionate, visceral theatre that lives long in the memory.”

Visceral is right. It was how the visceral was made real in Thyestes that I found most interesting. Although it is not obvious at the time, the production does avoid the most graphically violent depictions, instead drawing out the mundane as a prelude to the violence. Mark Winter says that this technique is “harking back to what the Greeks actually did with these shows, which was you never saw the violence or horrific acts on stage…We’re just talking. You see the moments before and after certain events, which is kind of scarier than seeing the events themselves. It leaves more to the imagination, and it’s more theatrically relatable for a contemporary audience. You get that sense of excitement or dread.”

The Artshub review focuses upon Stone’s contemporisation (not a word, I know) of this classic in his effort to avoid “history porn”.

Go here to read it:http://www.artshub.com.au/au/news-article/opinions/performing-arts/the-hayloft-project-and-thyestes-182038

A fantastic article by Pierce Wilcox for The Brag focuses upon the potential of theatre for Simon Stone: it provides some insight into the attraction that audiences have towards watching a staged reality – it is the importance of recognition; of being able to recognise themselves on stage and as a result realise that they are not the only ones who ‘have trouble living.’

http://www.thebrag.com/2012/01/16/theatre-interview-thyestes/

Jason Blake provides an interesting contrast in the current review field with his comment on the difference between learning something from a piece of theatre and being moved by it.

http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/theatre/grim-twists-in-this-tale-of-the-unexpected-20120120-1q9wh.html

Time Out review (Darryn King): http://www.au.timeout.com/sydney/theatre/events/27166/thyestes

Also, check out the Sydney Festival blog post in which Stone is interviewed: http://blog.sydneyfestival.org.au/thyestes-interview-and-behind-the-scenes-look

Jan 15

‘After’ Thyestes

I went and saw the first preview of Belvoir’s contribution to Sydney Festival, ‘Thyestes’, which was directed by Simon Stone and written ‘after’ Seneca. This blog is not the place for a single opinion to take precedence so watch this space for when the reviews start coming out.

But this phenomenon of new work being written ‘after’ a classical text (a style championed by Stone in the last year or so) is fascinating. Tell me what you think of it.

A Student Rush ticket is $29 and concession is $42.

Have a look here for the details: http://www.belvoir.com.au/productions-1/thyestes

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