Check out the premier events for the 2015 Midsumma festival in Melbourne.
The Midsumma Festival in Melbourne premier events for 2015 were:
Transgender Seeking…
Sunny Drake’s hilarious and tender theatre production explores the idea of reinventing mainstream relationship ideals during the age of social media and technology.
“I hope the audience leave with questions rather than answers”, says performer and producer, Sunny Drake.
“Questioning their own relationships, a generosity with themselves and others and a commitment to figuring out how to be responsible when we mess up in relationships”, adds Drake.
Dolly Diamond Under A Big Top
2015 celebrated Dolly’s 11th Midsumma Festival, as she presents a cabaret performance that has been years in the making.
Laugh, cry and be entertained as she lifts the lid on her colourful and memorable career as one of Melbourne’s best cabaret divas. The show features all of her untold stories and secrets – including her nine month stint with the circus and why she has a need to work with penniless performers.
Dolly will be joined by four-piece band, led by Musical Directors Camera Thomas and Caleb Garfinkel, as well as a mix of astounding backing singers, beautiful couture costumes and special guests including Shirazz and Rachel Dunham.
Edi Donald and the Transients
Through an impressive audio-visual show, Eli Donald and the Transients presented with music that highlights the ideas of gender identity, inclusion and isolations that trans and queer people face to the desert.
“I want to deliver a kind of creativity and sound that has been brewing in the desert parts of Australia and is unabashedly and unequivocally shaped by living here,” says lead singer Edi Donald.
The idea of queer and trans culture in the desert is further explored by showcasing a visual show of deep Australian landscapes that is mixed with rust.
“As the songwriter, many of the songs are linked to my own experiences as a genderqueer trans person, and there is a motivation to tell these stories – not just in solidarity with other trans and genderqueer people but with people who feel marginalised or invisible in the current social climate,” adds Donald.
Connect with like-minded people, and enjoy a musical style that ranges from soothing acoustic sounds all the way to theatrical opera.
The Jacobeans
The Jacobeans parallels the social issues of today with a time where thinking and acting out was discouraged. Created during late night conversations in the kitchen about the changing times, co-writers and performers Hannah Malarski and Jack Richardson uses this particular era in time to tackle the ever-growing conservative social values that Australians are facing today.
“We found that many of our social values were becoming increasingly conservative and reactionary, and in many ways more primitive – more reminiscent of an era where thinking was discouraged, and people in power were absolute and infallible,” says Richardson.
“A queer audience is already in touch with the complex issues of social value construction, and how gender can be performative,” says Malarski.
By identifying the social traps of today, The Jacobeans aims to not only explore and understand them, but to also potentially escape them.
Black Faggot
The 2015 Midsumma Festival is bringing the highly acclaimed Black Faggot back to Melbourne, after sold-out performances in the Edinburgh, Auckland and Melbourne Fringe festivals.
Showing at Gasworks Arts Parks from 3 to 7 February, Black Faggot tells the story of growing up gay with God and your mother watching. Written as a response to the 2004 Destiny Church protest against the New Zealand ‘s Civil Union Bill, Black Faggot tackles the issues of being gay in a straight world.
Set in New Zealand’s migrant Pacific Islander communities, Black Faggot uses colourful and different characters that parallel each other to explore the difficulties the LGBTI face when living in a minority situation. With its confronting and unsettling title, Black Faggot, approaches these issues with a sense of energy and fearlessness to explore the universal issues of tolerance and understanding.
Featured as one of the 2015 Midsumma Festival’s premier events, Black Faggot will make audiences laugh, cry and believe in the power of love as colourful characters collide in a series of hilarious and poignant monologues.
