The Age from Melbourne, Victoria, Australia • Page 15

TUESDAY 12 JULY 1994 THE APE 18 Arts Entertainment Edited by STEPHANIE BUNBURY Picture: CATHRYN TREMAIN 1 i i fay" of the day Ballet partnership to head for England Two Australian dancers will leave these shores to shine for English audiences, reports Patricia Laughlin. The Summer House Rivoli Pleasantly astringent British comedy about preparations for a wedding comes up well on the big screen. Among its virtues are its length (an unpadded 79 minutes), its wit and surprises, its jumps between darkness and light within an elegantly constructed plot, its unobtrusively accurate re-creation of the 1950s, the calm-yet-keep-things moving style of Vtaris Hussein's directing, and a trio of virtuoso turns by Jeanne Moreau, Joan 1'lowright and Julie Writers, who demonstrate that, despite the moaning from some quarters, good roles are still being written for elderly and middle-aged women. Highly recommended. their new lives.

Neither of them has ever been a member of a company other than the Australian Ballet, although both have been guests of overseas companies the Kirov Bal- let, Royal Danish Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet and Boston Ballet "so it will be stimulating for us to go to a company where they don't know us and we don't know them. It is like making a fresh start and having to prove ourselves." English National Ballet does not tour as widely as the Australian Ballet, but it docs many performances and changes its programs more often. They are not sure yet what they will be dancing in their first season except that their fiist performances will be in 'Giselle' a new version by Derek Deane, which will be set in Austria in the 1920s, but (they think) with the traditional choreography. "So that will be something different to start with," said Miss Pavane. She added "Greg has always wanted to go away and try ourselves overseas, hut 1 was the one who didn't want to make a break not just from the Australian Mallet, but from our dogs, house, family and friends.

Now that it has in a way linen Jolted on us and it is all ai ranged, I am very glad and looking li ii waul to it. I used to think sometimes that if we never went away Gieg tnitflil lliink in yea is come about what inifjit have been well, now we will find out!" ir Ballet, Fernando Bujones, Marcia Hay-dee, Richard Cragun and John Neu-meier. This invitation, together with their rapid offer of employment by English National Ballet, indicates the regard in which Pavane and Horsman are held within the ballet world and what a loss they are to the Australian Ballet. Two weeks after returning from Japan they leave for London, and in the meantime they must rearrange their previously settled lives. The least of their problems concerns their two-and-a-halfyear-old daughter, Cassie, because Miss Pavane's younger sister.

Gina, has been living with them and acting as nanny to Cassie since she was born. "Gina has been travelling with us on tour and is looking forward to going to London, so Cassie won't notice any difference in her family life or sense of security." Miss Pavane said. They plan to rent their house in Melbourne. "We don't want to sell it because we love it and want to tome back to it." Once all these things aie si llied they will be able to concenliate on The Vienna Boys' Choir Melbourne Concert Hall, 8 pm Wforld renowned and arguably the finest boys' choir in the world, the Vienna Boys' Choir open tonight at the Melbourne Concert Hall after a special performance at the Robert Blackwood Hall at Mpnash University last night. Director Bruce Myles and actor Janet Andrewartha, working together on 'Underwear, Perfume and Crash Helmet'.

Six actors trapped on stage, surrounded by the big issues LISA PAVANE and Greg Hors-man, who will leave the Australian Ballet at the end of this week, have been snapped up by the English National Ballet as senior principals. The husband and wife partnership, who are Australia's two finest classical dancers, resigned from the AB two months ago in the wake of an eruption of discontent among the company's dancers; their loss will be sorely felt. When it was announced that they had asked to be released from their contracts at the end of the current Brisbane season, they said that they wished to broaden their experience by dancing with different companies and in different repertoires. The unstated reason for them resigning, rather than applying for leave of absence, is believed to be friction between them and artistic director Maina Gielgud, who responded to dancers' discontents earlier this year by saying she would make her relationship with the company more formal. Pavane and Horsman are said to have had a blow-up with her over newly enforced rules requiring attendance at particular company classes and the wearing of specific types of clothing for classes and rehearsals: seemingly petty irritations for dancers of their seniority.

During the recent Melbourne season of 'Swan the pair received standing ovations at each of their three performances, audiences making plain not only their appreciation of the dancers' artistry, but regret at their loss. After their final performance, many in the audience wept. Pavane and Horsman were equally emotional. However, speaking from Brisbane yesterday, Miss Pavane said that they don't want to think about unhappy things now and "we are feeling very positive about the situation. We are disappointed in that we felt we had to resign (although we do hope to come back to the Australian Ballet), but now we have this new job we feel that perhaps it really was time to make a change.

We are both happy and excited and looking forward to dancing different ballets and different versions of ballets we already know." Another aspect of working with the English National Ballet just now, she said, "is that the company has apparently recently been through a difficult time with dancers leaving a bit like what has happened here but they are now rebuilding, with a new artistic director (Derek Deane), and the atmosphere seems to be exciting and optimistic." The immediate future for the Hors-mans will be hectic. Only a week after their return from Brisbane they leave for Japan, where they have been invited to dance in the Seventh World Festival of Ballet. This festival is held every three years, over three weeks. The star-studded line-up also includes Sylvie Guillem, Isabelle Guerin and Patrick Dupond from the Paris Opera Playwright Michael Gurr and director Bruce Myles have an empathy uncommon in the theatre, writes Raymond Gill. 7i 1 Kathleen Southall-Casey, David McSkimming and Michael Terry Mielta's.

Spin The fourth in a five-week series of concerts recorded by ABC FM, tonight's performance features the soprano voice of Kathleen Southall-Casey, Michael Terry's tenor and David McSkimming on piano: all have in common a long association with the Victoria State Opera. They will play a program of Francis Poulenc's challenging music devised hy Denise Shepherd, the Victoria State Opera's French vocal coach. Bookings: 654 2366. for that scene, and so you're throwing 90 per cent out all the time. That's very precarious for an actor.

They need to have a lot of trust because quite often they feel they're playing it simplistically." Myles gives an example of how spare Gurr's writing can be. "There's a moment in the play when a character picks up a drink, says a line and then puts the drink down. He cut the line so that everything Is said by how the character takes that sip. Gurr sits in on all rehearsals but as actor Janet Andrewartha says, this doesn't mean the writer has a simple answer for every issue, line or action in the script. "Sometimes I might ask him what a line means, and he says 'I don't know," says Andrewartha, who plays Caroline, the widow.

She is used to both Myles' directing and Gurr's writing, having played the female lead in the first Playbox production of 'Sex She says that any questions the script raises usually solve themselves because of the empathy between the director and writer, and the understanding that they both allow the actor the right of their own interpretation of their role. "There's a language we have developed, a shorthand," she says. "Initially Bruce had to answer all the actors' questions but now we all understand without really having to talk about it." 'Underwear, Perfume and Crash Helmet' opens at Playbox, CUB Malthouse, South Melbourne, tonight. LIKE HIS 1992 play, 'Sex Diary of an Infidel', Melbourne playwright Michael Gurr's new play, 'Underwear, Perfume and Crash Helmet' puts six disparate characters on stage and not one of them makes an entrance or exit. Bruce Myles, who has directed the original production of three Gurr plays ('Sex Diary', 'Desire Lines' and "The Hundred Year Ambush'), says keeping every character on stage from lights up to lights down maintains energy and tension.

The technique also suits the heightened naturalism that distinguishes Gurr's playwriting style. Not afraid of the so-called "big such as fear, desire, survival and belief, Gurr's work avoids simplistic dramatic scenarios and characters who are either all good or all bad. Like the issues he deals with, nothing is black and white in his plays. Meanings collide, characters can be contradictory, even unfathomable, and there are no neat endings. 'Underwear, Perfume and Crash Helmet' was written after the Liberal Party lost the "unloseable" federal election last year! Gurr takes this as a basis for his play but looks beneath to dissect those forces that shape and shift a people.

These forces have nothing to do with Gallup Polls, economics and politicians' media personalities, but with the prejudices, dreams and desperation of ordinary people. Gurr's characters include a young woman set adrift in a park waiting for aliens to rescue her, the widow of a conservative politician who is talked into running for election by her husband's minder, her clarinet-playing brother and a right-wing Canadian pop philosopher, and his slimy factotum. When the playwright removes their blinkers they confront the question "What do you believe in?" The themes and execution of the play are not easy on a director, but the longevity of Myles and Gurr's partnership, and the success of their plays, suggests they have an empathy that is uncommon in the messy and emotional business of play-making. "The beaut tiling with Mike is he never settles where he parked his last play," says Myles. "He pushes further and puts more demands upon himself and consequently those working with him." Myles says Gurr, 32, is still honing his style as a playwright and so part of the job of the director and the actors is to help define that style.

"With Michael's work we often find that in rehearsal it's an actor's task to bring everything they feel about that character all Uie baggage they carry with them into a scene, lie says. "Michael writes so sparingly that the task is to be very specific about what element of that character is required Growing Up Meal Market Craft Centre. 6 pm until 24 July Gordon Flynn has selected 40 photographs of his children, taken over 16 years and hand-colored by their mother, Rachel Flynn, in an attempt to represent "all children growing up together and working out how to get by in the Birthday parties and school concerts are avoided. Greg Horsman and Lisa Pavane in 'Swan Luke': audience wept. Television 'Melrose Place' is a pain in the stomach Ml Viewpoint BRIAN NANKERVIS TWO 6am Open Learning: Accounting 1.

S. 6.30 Australia TV News. R. 7.0 1st Edition. News with Tony Eastley.

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12.0 The World At Noon. News with lohn Lombard. 12.30pm Latellne. R. 1.0 Four Corners.

S. 1.45 Media Watch. R. 2.0 Portraits From A Dream Show. (5.

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R. 4.30 Madeline. R. 4.55 Philbert The Frog. 5.0 Captain Planet And The Planeteers.

R. 5.25 Bangers And Mash. R. 5.30 Vldlot. Teenage quiz show, hosted by Scott McRae.

G. 6.0 After Henry. British comedy series with Prunella Scales. G. 6.25 Roger Ramjet.

G. 6.30 The Brlttas Empire. British comedy series with Chris Barrie. S. 7.0 News, Sport, Weather.

Presented by Ian Henderson. 7.30 The 7.30 Report. Current affairs with Mary Delahunty. 8.0 The Investigators. ABC consumer affairs series, hosted by Helen Wellings.

8.28 News (also at 9.28). 8.30 G.P. ABC drama series: Ties Of The Blood. A hyperactive five-year-old boy has William confused. Is he ill or is his mother unable to cope? With Michael Craig, Denise Roberts, Marilynne Paspaley, Tony Llewellyn-lones, Damian Rice, Peter Bensley.

PG, S. 9.20 Backchat. With Donna Meiklejohn. S. 9.30 Foreign Correspondent.

International current affairs with George Negus. 10.30 Latellne. Current affairs with Kerry O'Brien, including news. S. 11.05 American College i Football.

Don Lane presents Florida state at Notre Dame. 12.30am Australia TV News. 1.0 Global Detective: The Journey Of Death. S. 1.50 Film: Lady In Danger.

1934 romantic comedy starring Tom Walls and Yvonne Arnaud. B8AV, G. 3.0 Jacksonville Jazz. Count Basie and Nancy Wilson. i G.

4.0 Open Learning. S. NINE 6am ITN World News. 6.30 Daybreak News. With Tracy Grimshavv, including Business Today.

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I. 9.30 Ernie And Denise. G. 10.30 News. 11.0 What's Cooking.

With chef Geoff Jansz. G. 11.30 Entertainment Tonlght.PG. 12.0 Midday With Derryn Hlnch. PG.

1.30pm Days Of Our Lives. PG. 2.30 The Young And The Restless. PG. 3.30 Dlff 'rent Strokes.

G. 4.0 The Bugs Bunny Show. G. 4.30 Wonder World. C.

5.0 Strike ft Lucky. Game show, hosted by Ronnie Burns. G. 5.30 The Price Is Right. G.

6.0 News, Sport, Waather. 6.30 A Current Affair. 7.0 Sale Of The Century. S. 7.29 KenO.

G. 7.30 Australia's Funniest Home Video Show. PG. 8.0 The Bob Morrison Show. Australian comedy series.

Lizzy believes lake makes mistakes because Steve keeps putting him down. With Amly Anderson, Nikki Coghill, Chris Lyons: PG, S. 8.30 Married. Children. US comedy series.

A misunderstanding occurs when Ed is admitted to hospital for surgery after injuring his back at a football game. With Ed O'Neill, Katey Sagal. PG. 9.0 Hale And Pace. British comedy series.

M. 9.30 Law Of The Land II. Australian drama series. Kate is angry when she discovers her father has asked Andy to join their law firm without consulting her. With Lisa Hensley, Peter O'Brien, Ally Fowler.

PG, S. 10.30 Nlghtllne. News. 11.0 Star Trek: The Next Generation. US science fiction series: Imaginery Friend.

With Patrick Stewart, lonathon Frakes. PG. 12.0 The Late Show With David Letterman. PG. 1am Entertainment Tonight Showbusiness news.

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You Asked For ft. G. 4.30 The Famous Teddy Z. G. 5.0 Bill Cosby You Bet Your Life.

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G. 6.30 Neighbours. S. 7.0 Conan The Adventurer. G.

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PG. I. 30 Donahue. US chat show: How To Be A Better Seductress, Bitch And Stripper. PG.

2.30 The Oprah Winfrey Show. US chat show: Frugal Viewers Reveal Money-Saving Techniques, ft. PG. 3.30 Live It Up. Health and lifestyle series.

PG. 4.0 Hogan's Heroes. G. 4.30 Totally Wild. C.

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Australian drama serial. An unforgiving Cheryl demands that her mother leave at once. Rick's parachute jump doesn't go as planned. S. 7.0 Roseanne.

US comedy series with Roseanne Arnold, John Goodman. G. 7.30 Seinfeld. US comedy series. Jerry meets one of his favorite baseball players while performing his comedy act.

With ferry Seinfeld. PG. 8.30 Melrose Place. US drama series. Michael decides to contest his grandmother's will.

Alison consults a psychiatrist about her nightmares. With Andrew Shue. Heather Locklear. PG. 9.30 Law And Order.

US drama series. The death of a Nigerian girl leads the detectives on a search for an international smuggling group. With Paul Sorvino. M. 10.30 News.

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US comedy. G. 2.0 Film: Nashville Grab. 1981 western starring Jeff Conaway. PG.

4.0 Amen. G. 4.30 Rhythm And Blue. G. 5.0 General Hospital.

PG. SEVEN 6am Sons And Daughters. S. 6.30 Agro's Cartoon Connection. G.

9.0 The Book Place. P. 9.30 At Home. Infotainment with John Mangos. PG.

10.30 News. 11.0 Eleven AM. News and current affairs with Neil Mercer. 12.0 Film. A Mother's Courage: The Mary Thomas Story.

1989 drama starring Alfre Waodard and A.J. lohnson. The story of basketball great Isaiah Thomas and his dedicated mother. Directed by John Patterson. PG.

2pm Five Mile Creek. Australian drama series with Rod Mullinar. G. 3.0 Acropolis Now. G.

3.30 Family Ties. G. 4.0 Mighty Morphln Power Rangers. G. 4.30 A'mazing.

Children's series with lames Sherry. C. 5.0 Family Feud. G. 5.30 Wheel Of Fortune.

G. 6.0 News, Sport, Vteather. 6.30 Real Life. Public affairs. 7.0 Home And Away.

Australian drama serial. Jack gives Alf all the proof he needs to clear his name. S. 7.30 Blue Heelers. Australian drama police drama series.

The travelling magistrate has to deal with a backlog of cases at Mount Thomas. With Grant Bowler, Ann Burbrook, Lisa McCune, lohn Wood, William Mclnnes. PG, S. 8.27 Oz Lotto. G.

8.30 Between The Lines. British police drama series. Tony and the Complaints Investigation Bureau are called in when an elderly man witnesses some police officers beating a prostitute. With Neil Pearson, Tom Georgeson, Siobhan Redmond. M.

9.35 The Extraordinary. Warwick Moss hosts a series examining unexplained phenomena. PG. 10.35 Denton. Offbeat chat show, hosted by Andrew Denton.

M. 11.35 Hampton Court. Australian comedy series with Julie McGregor. G. 12.05am Herman's Head.

US comedy series. PG. 12.35 NBC Today Show. G. 2.35 Film: Jewel Of The Gods.

1988 adventure starring Marius Weyers. M. 4.10 1 Witness Video. PG. 5.05 Beyond 2000.

R. S. G.P. Channel 2, H.iOpm In this week's episode Dr William's prodigious eye brows are sent a-fluttering by the blood tests of a rascally five-year-old boy and his baby sister. Is the boy hyperactive, sick or misunderstood? His stepfather reckons he just needs to be told who's the boss but his mum has heard that before and besides, she's sick and tired of the cliches and the neglect.

The Cutting Edge: The Kevorkian File SBS. 8.30pm Documentary on Dr Jack Kevorkian, the American doctor celebrated by his supporters as a merciful angel of death and vilified by his opponents as a cruel man obsessed with death. He is currently fighting murder charges in the courts for assisting more than 20 people to end their jives. Footage from videotapes of several of Kevorkian's patients is mixed with interviews with the doctor himself and snippets from 'The Late Show With David Letterman'. Denton Channel 7.

10.30pm Andrew Denton's guests include Jack Thompson, the Australian Forum Male Centrefold of the Year and the ever-chatty British comedian Ben Elton, currently performing stand-up comedy around Australia. Jacksonville Jazz Channel 2. 3.00 am William "Count" Basie was one of the most important jazz figures of the 20th Century. He perfected the concept of "riffing" (repeating an insistent melodic statement against a strong basic rhythm) which has filtered down to become an essential element of rock and roll. He -collaborated with Billie Holiday in the '30s and Frank Sinatra in the '60s.

I WATCHED a couple of episodes of 'Melrose Place' (Channel 10, 8.30 pm) earlier this year and it made me think of 'Peanuts', the Charles M. Schulz cartoon strip. In particular, the time when Lucy's educational lectures to Linus made Charlie Brown's stomach hurt. Melrose Place is a block of flats in leafy IA where half a dozen handsome and hollow rich kids live in each other's pockets. The building is Spanish-style stucco with a pool in the middle, the kids fall in and out of love and they betray and blackmail each other, and at the end of the day there's no time for much else.

I really liked the idea of living with your friends around a pool. They didn't seem to be liking it that much. By the third episode, 'Melrose Place' made my stomach-hurt. I couldn't stay in the same room as the rotten Michael and Amanda. Sweet lane and Kimberly both fell for Michael and that just got me cranky.

Billy the Dork and Alison -made me laugh for all the wrong reasons and the gang collectively took heavy sighing and mouth-acting to new dramatic heights. Sydney slept with her sister's husband and flirted with high-class prostitution; Jake and Joe droned on and on and on about motorbikes and boys; the whole thing reeked of spoiled white-brat egos on heat and I'd had enough. I couldn't bear it. 1 listened from the kitchen. I still knew enough to have a shriek with the girls and a grizzle with the boys on Wednesday morning but soon I was just bluffing and sighing and doing Billy's mouth in the mirror and then I didn't care.

1 felt good. Now I feel left out. 'Melrose Place' has become the TV talk of the town. Posters in classrooms. Articles in the features section of 'The Age', 'Rolling Stone' and 'luice'.

The real inhabitants of the real Melrose Place are now famous and most of them are actors anyway so that's just great. Melrose reality. There are Melrose champagne parties in private homes, Chapel Street discos and function rooms across Melbourne. What a ratings success. 'Who' magazine gives us the Melrose guys "Super Spunk Soap Hunks or Dopey Dumbos? Wild Heather: Heather Locklear stars in 'Melrose Place' (Ten, H.iOpm).

SBS 6.30am WorldWatch. Including Greek News. 7.0 Italia News. 8.0 Mandarin News. 8.30 Das Journal.

9.0 Le Journal. 9.45 Novostl. 10.15 Wsatherwatch and Music. 11.0 The Journal. 11.30 Business Report.

12.0 English At Work. R. 12.30pm Film: Nadla. Israeli drama starring Hana-Azulai-Hasfary. PG.

2.0 Wsatherwatch and Music. 2.30 Professional and Graduate Education. R. 4.30 TV Ed. R.

5.0 FYI (in Tagalog). 5.05 MacNellLehrer. Current affairs from America's PBS. 6.0 Cycling. A report on the 1994 Tour de France.

6.30 World News. 7.0 Soccer. The official 1970 FIFA Vvbrld Cup film. 8.30 The Cutting Edge: The Kevorkian File. An insight into Dr Jack Kevorkian, inventor of the "suicide his cases and the issue he has come to personify.

9.30 Film: Monsieur Hire. 1988 French suspense starring Michel Blanc and Sandrine Bonnaire. A reclusive voyeur becomes a prime suspect when a young neighbor is murdered. Directed by Patrice Leconte. M.

11.0 Soccer: 1994 World Cup. Highlights from the USA. 12.0 Film: In The Wolf's Mouth. 1985 Spanish drama starring Gustavo Bueno and Tono Vega. Village leaders are slaughtered after witnessing a brutal murder committed by a Peruvian government soldier.

MA. 2am Temporary Close. 5.0 Soccer: World Cup 1994. Telecast of the first semifinal match, Bulgaria Italy, from the Giants Stadium, New York. and the Melrose gals ad nauseam.

Week in, week out. Hie head of a major Australian publishing company plans a cocktail party for a future epi- sode when Kimberly comes back from the dead. Whew! This show is hot, so hot. In tonight's episode, lane and Michael are reunited. Sydney goes to jail and orchestrates an empire with Ijiuren, Heidi I'leiss-style.

and Jake and Amanda put on a show in the shower for the new boy on the block. Hot. Wet. Alison's black-and-white MTV childhood flashbacks drive her -away from snorin' snoozin' Billy and his dreams of domestic bliss on to the couch of a man she hardly knows. "He 1 was so reassuring and gentle and com- fortahle and caring and smart and gor- geous and sophisticated and well dressed and he has this adorable smile I did a monologue for an hour and -k he listened.

He really listened." Fortunately, we don't get the mono- logue. Whew. Too hot. On the other side of America, Jerry, George, Elaine and the K. Man could 'j! all do one-hour monologues and I'd want more.

'Seinfeld' (Channel 10, 7.30 pm) is everything 'Melrose' is not. Tonight's episode. 'The Boyfriend', takes up the whole hour and is a beau- Jerry makes a new friend and the others get a little peeved. Jerry gets.3 infatuated, nervous, then jealous, then offended. Elaine is intrigued, infatuat- i ed then indignant.

Geoige tangles with; the Social Security Department with 1) predictably hilarious results, and Kra- mcr meets Oliver Stone and shakes the 1' snit from thp hnrlr nf tile nwlr In otnrl-' ous slow-motion jerkiness. What great show. Philippa Hawker Is on leave. .).