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Ian Dickson

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Hedda Gabler | Belvoir St Theatre

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August 2014, no. 363

Hedda Gabler (1890) occupies a somewhat schizophrenic position in Henrik Ibsen’s work. On the one hand, it is normally seen as the apotheosis of Ibsen’s realist period, his sardonic homage to the fashionable ‘well-made play’ of the time. But, on the other hand, from early in its theatrical life there have been productions which have reacted against the naturalistic style in which the play seems to have been couched.

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Inside the Dream Palace: The life and times of New York's legendary Chelsea hotel by Sherill Tippins

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June–July 2014, no. 362
Ian Dickson reviews 'Inside the Dream Palace: The life and times of New York's legendary Chelsea hotel' by Sherill Tippins

In the heyday of Manhattan hotels, the Chelsea Hotel had its own special niche. The Pierre exuded wealth and exclusivity, the Plaza a sort of bourgeois glamour as the place where the bridge and tunnel crowd would throw caution to the wind and rent a corner suite for big occasions, and the Algonquin, with its round table and Hamlet the cat, radiated intellectual chic. The Chelsea had a sleazy, dangerous style, a place where almost anything went, where famous edgy artists got up to no good. It is no surprise that when, on a hot summer night in 1953, Gore Vidal and Jack Kerouac decided that they owed it to literary history to have it off, they chose the Chelsea for the momentous coupling. Even in late 1970s Manhattan, among a certain group to have sex at the Chelsea was considered almost a rite of passage.

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Hobart Baroque

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02 April 2014

Hobart is the ideal place in which to have a festival. Big enough to have other attractions but small enough so that the festival becomes a major event rather than just another diversion. A walk through Battery Point, followed by a long lunch at Salamanca Place with congenial fellow festival goers, or a trip out to MONA to wander through the psyche of David Walsh ar ...

Ian Dickson reviews Handel's 'Orlando' at Hobart Baroque

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May 2014, no. 361

Hobart is the ideal place in which to have a festival. Big enough to have other attractions but small enough so that the festival becomes a major event rather than just another diversion. A walk through Battery Point, followed by a long lunch at Salamanca Place with congenial fellow festival goers, or a trip out to MONA to wander through the psyche of David Walsh are exceptional ways to spend the day before the next performance.

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The Leonard Bernstein Letters edited by Nigel Simeone

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April 2014, no. 360
Ian Dickson reviews 'The Leonard Bernstein Letters', edited by Nigel Simeone

How does one get a handle on a phenomenon like Leonard Bernstein? The whirling dervish of the podium was also a brilliant pianist and a composer who wrote for both Broadway and the concert hall, although it is interesting that his most performed orchestral pieces, the overture to Candide and the Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, are both from his Broadway life. He was a great proselytiser for classical music, as one can still see in his Omnibus appearances and his Young People’s Concerts, and a strong advocate for American composers, but he was also a ruthless self-promoter, as some of his erstwhile friends and mentors found to their cost. A mostly happily married man and loving father, he was also a wildly promiscuous, mostly gay, Lothario.

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Once in Royal David’s City

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March 2014, no. 359

At a time when a convicted drug smuggler is rumoured to be about to collect a fortune for her remarkably unremarkable story and when we are heading into a new round of so-called ‘culture wars’, in which an extraordinary amount of heat will be generated with precious little light accompanying it, it is refreshing to be presented with another of Michael Gow’s fo ...

Once in Royal David’s City

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19 February 2014

At a time when a convicted drug smuggler is rumoured to be about to collect a fortune for her remarkably unremarkable story and when we are heading into a new round of so-called ‘culture wars’, in which an extraordinary amount of heat will be generated with precious little light accompanying it, it is refreshing to be presented with another of Michael Gow’s fo ...

Waiting for Godot

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December 2013–January 2014, no. 357

With aching feet, bursting bladders, and the odd carrot for sustenance, Samuel Beckett’s famous pair of tramps have shuffled on to the stage of the Sydney Theatre for an extended run, though run is hardly the apposite word for this stationary duo. Perhaps one could call it an extended slump.

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Waiting for Godot

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18 November 2013

With aching feet, bursting bladders, and the odd carrot for sustenance, Samuel Beckett’s famous pair of tramps have shuffled on to the stage of the Sydney Theatre for an extended run, though run is hardly the apposite word for this stationary duo. Perhaps one could call it an extended slump.

Waiting for Godot (first pe ...

The Perfect American (English National Opera)

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24 June 2013

English National Opera audiences are notable for their complete lack of bling. On opening nights they ostentatiously dress down, in opposition to their social butterfly Covent Garden counterparts, as if to state that they are there for the opera alone. The London opening of The Perfect American, Philip Glass’s opera based on ...

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