AUSE01Z01MA - V1 THE AUSTRALIAN, TUESDAY, JUNE 26, 2018 14 theaustralian.com.au/arts ARTS YOUR NATIONAL No expense spared in triumphant blurring of social classes CULTURE GUIDE rhythm, not just vocal pyrotech- high society and in mucking out But it’s Murphy’s direction and OPERA nics. And if you don’t get the the stable. Meanwhile, Hobson’s choreography (assisted by Shane The Merry Widow extensive ballet component right, trademark charm, charisma and Placentino) that triumph over By Franz Lehar. Opera you don’t have a show. clear-ringing tenor just make you the necessary evil of an amplifi- NOW SHOWING Queensland. Lyric So hats off to Nolan for choos- want to hang out with him, chas- cation system that magnifies any Theatre, QPAC, Brisbane, ing the legendary choreographer ing grisette showgirls in Maxim’s vocal imperfections. Ideal Home (M) June 22. Graeme Murphy as director. Nightclub. At risk to life and limb, the dim- Food, wine and travel feature in It pays off in a lavish and lov- The production looks a million inutive Peluso is held aloft on a Ideal Home, in which English MARTIN BUZACOTT ing production where the many dollars, and presumably cost it, makeshift tray by three dancers actor Steve Coogan is Erasmus dance sequences are an absolute yet there’s still plenty of room for as she hits the high notes in her Brumble, the flamboyant host of Right repertoire, right director, highlight. locals to shine in the support roles. signature aria Vilja. Maxim’s a television cooking show. His right leading couple. Patrick Beautiful to look at, Michael Jason Barry-Smith is command- really does look like the best anxious director, Paul Nolan sure demonstrates a deft Scott-Mitchell’s set and Jennifer ing as the Baron whose wife, place in town. (American actor Paul Rudd), programming touch in his first Irwin’s costumes earn applause in Valencienne (Katie Stenzel), And Opera Queensland’s Cho- feels like the one under the main house production as the Acts 2 and 3 before a note is sung, seems unduly fond of Camille rus and the QSO under Vanessa whip. He and Erasmus are a new artistic director of Opera while Justin Fleming’s new trans- (James Rodgers). Virgilio Marino Scammell support admirably. couple. They seem to have a Queensland. lation strikes a beautiful balance and Shaun Brown form an ex- Provided it doesn’t send Opera good life. Their home is a Franz Lehar’s operetta The between lowbrow comedy and STEPHANIE DO ROZARIO cellent comedy double-act of Queensland bust, it’s a triumph. luxurious ranch in New Mexico. Merry Widow is a classic, but it’s high-society pretence. Natalie Christie Peluso soars as farm-girl-made-good Hanna would-be suitors in search of the They have lots of friends. Their SOUTH AUSTRALIA no gimme production-wise: its And that blurring of social widow’s fortune. Bookings: 136 246 or online. relationship is taken somewhere plot moves at the pace of a sloth classes is what the plot is all (Natalie Christie Peluso), who socialist. Credibility is no problem And local actor Hugh Parker Tickets: $59-$179. Duration: 2hr unexpected when a 10-year-old STAGE under sedation and its music has about, an uncomfortable romance marries well, and a loose-living here, Peluso’s fine acting ensuring comes close to stealing the show 50min, including two intervals. boy arrives at their door. He is to seduce through nuance and between simple farm girl Hanna Count (David Hobson) who’s a she’s equally at home in Parisian as the Baron’s offsider Njegus. Until Saturday. Erasmus’s grandson. Earlier we Brothers Wreck see his deadbeat father taken in Line for line, Jada Alberts’s by the police. “You f..k writing is tensile and engaging. everything up,’’ the boy says to The opening scene of Brothers dering the compositions more him. It’s what happens next that Wreck — with its lack of I’ve always been accessible to listeners; hinting at makes this movie, written and apostrophe: are we keeping their worlds-within-worlds aes- directed by Andrew Fleming, a count or is wrecking something a dreamer, says thetic, at the universe contained bit different. Coogan and Rudd brothers do? — is one of the Eliane Radigue by the human body; underscoring are believable as a gay couple. most powerful and realistic the message in the music’s swirls Erasmus is more camp, wearing evocations of shock and grief I and spirals, to heed intuition and a fur coat to a Taco Bell for have seen on a stage. Trevor JANE CORNWELL acknowledge our underused po- example, while Paul is Jamieson pictured above, plays tential. Radigue hopes that experi- straighter-looking but more David. encing an OCCAM might volatile. Both are proud of their CHRIS BOYD The composer Eliane Radigue sufficiently slow us down and sexuality. While the boy is the Odeon Theatre. 57a Queen Street, lives and works in the 14th arron- open us up that we will pay atten- centre of the story, it’s the Norwood. Tomorrow, 6.30pm and dissement of Paris, in a one-room tion to the wisdom of ancient cul- relationship between the two 8pm. Tickets: $34-66. Inquiries: 131 apartment down a side street op- tures, with their oral traditions men that taps some emotional 246 or online. Until July 14. posite a primary school, just up and dialogue with the spirit world. depths. from a leafy patch of park. Musi- Indeed, in these increasingly STEPHEN ROMEI hhhjj cians from across the world visit fractious, fast-paced times, the re- her here, lugging their instru- newed fascination with Radigue’s ments up two flights of stairs to work seems to indicate a want to Brothers’ Nest (MA15+) TASMANIA take tea and musical direction take time out. Brothers’ Nest, a film starring from the charming great-grand- MARC MOREAU “It is not a want.” Radigue’s the Jacobson brothers, Shane CLASSICAL mother, 86, a long-time Buddhist cornflower blue eyes spark. “It is a and Clayton, is a clear departure who spends most mornings ab- need! Our bodies and our minds from the brothers’ previous Hough plays Rachmaninov sorbed in meditation. are instruments, too, and we must work. In contrast to Kenny or Pianist Stephen Hough No matter that the lift doesn’t look after them. People are not the recent joke film That’s Not performs Rachmaninov’s work or that, of an afternoon, the meant to be running everywhere. My Dog!, this is an intimate Rhapsody on a Theme of chatter of children returning We are ignoring the fact that we suspense movie. It all starts as Paganini, Tchaikovsky’s The home tickles the air. Impressed by have so much possibility, so many the siblings in question, Terry Tempest and Dvorak’s Radigue’s 60-plus years of con- components, within ourselves.” (Shane, pictured below) and Jeff Symphony No 6. Johannes centrated creative practice in her She pauses, sighs. “We over- (Clayton), cycle along country Fritzsh conducts. commitment to accessing a cor- look this potential because we roads until they arrive at the Federation Concert Hall. 1 Davey nucopia of delicate sounds, these think it isn’t rational, because we isolated house where they grew Street, Hobart. Friday, 7.30pm. like-minded talents bunch up on a want everything explained to us in up. It soon becomes clear that Tickets: $46-$104. Bookings: 1800 001 pair of cream couches arranged at a bright, intelligent way. the duo is plotting to murder 190 or online. right angles or, as with 30-mem- “If we are busy all the time we Roger, their stepfather, to ber French improvisation orches- cannot learn from other cultures; prevent him from inheriting the tra ONCEIM, colonise the space Australia has this great indigen- house when their mother, who between an abstract bronze statue, ous culture with the Aborigines is dying of cancer, expires. a cat scratching pole and several Eliane Radigue today and, that can teach so much. Now we Although Brothers’ Nest feels VICTORIA remarkably lush houseplants. above right, in younger are even killing the planet because very much like a short story “Some instruments don’t fit in days; right, Cat Hope ORELIE GRIMALD we don’t have this basic under- uncomfortably expanded to MUSIC here easily,” says the diminutive VINCENT PONTET standing of ourselves. Can you im- feature length, it’s not Radigue, a classically trained agine the despair of being the last unentertaining. The Jacobsons, Summer Nights pianist who in the 1960s worked as person on earth? leaving behind the obvious The program starts with Gabriel an assistant to Pierre Schaeffer “We have been racing along, laughs for which they are Faure’s Madrigal, followed by and Pierre Henry, founders of mu- putting aside other ways of think- famous, convincingly portray a Ernest Chausson’s La Nuit, sique concrete (which used found ing, rejecting things out of ignor- couple of conniving, murderous Camille Saint-Saens’ Le soir sounds to create innovative ance and suspicion, when what we bastards, and the film, despite an descend sur la colline, Hector music), before going on to New need to reject is narrow-minded- obviously modest budget, is very Berlioz’s Les nuits d’ete, Jules York and experimenting with Time’s on her side ness.” Another smile. “If we are efficiently made. Massenet’s Nuit d’Espagne, and feedback, loops and drones. She open and accept that we don’t DAVID STRATTON hhhjj Claude Debussy’s Chanson hung at out at Warhol’s Factory, know everything, we will find a Espagnole, concluding with met practitioners such as chor- Contemporary Arts in 2015.