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A supernatural horror thriller, Backrooms is a phenomenon that has grown through the internet. Co-writer and director of the film Kane Parsons was just 16 when he used open-source software to create what was initially intended as a visual effects test. The nine minute short The Backrooms (Found Footage) was uploaded to YouTube in 2022. In its first two weeks, what was dubbed the scariest video on the internet garnered 20 million views. While still in high school, Parso

Joan of Arc – was she a saint or a sinner? She was an illiterate peasant girl who believed she was acting under divine guidance when she guided the French army to victory in 1429. What she did was, indeed, momentous. Photos by Iz Zettl She effectively stymied an attempt by the English to conquer France during the Hundred Years’ War. A year after that famous victory, she was captured by Burgundian forces (those French allied with England at the time). Subsequently, Joan

Austrian choreographer and performance artist Florentina Holzinger isn’t known for holding back. So it is when 24 naked women – young and old – take to the stage in A Year Without Summer. The show has been described as apocalyptic theatre and medical cabaret. It blends horror with pop music parody. Photos by Marianna Wytyczak and Mayra Wallraff Holzinger sets up the contention thus: It is 1816 and a group of artists gather indoors at the Lake House for a considerable pe

Based on Victor Hugo’s acclaimed 1831 novel and songs from the 1996 Disney film, The Hunchback of Notre Dame is a dramatic tale of heartache and pain. We are in Paris on 6th January, 1482. Two orphaned brothers – Jehan (Robbie Wilton) and Claude Frollo (Mike Gardiner) – are being looked after inside Notre-Dame Cathedral. The former rejects the church’s strict constraints, while the other sits comfortably within its strictures. Photos by Ben Fon After Jehan tries to gift

In Greek mythology, Orpheus and Eurydice is a tragic love story. Singer, musician and poet Orpheus marries the beautiful Eurydice, whose untimely death sees him seek her out in the underworld. It is there that he does a deal with the devil. Photos by Nick Mick Pics Hades allows Eurydice to rejoin Orpheus in the land of the living on the condition that to get back there Orpheus walks ahead of her and never turns back to look at her. If he does, she will be consigned to th

Magnificent, rich, rounded voices against the backdrop of musical excellence. Clarity of sound, stunning solos, delicious duets and rousing three-part harmonies. But wait. There is more. The six artistes that take to the stage at the Regent Theatre are all leading performers who have fronted the biggest musicals. I speak of The Phantom of the Opera, Chicago, Miss Saigon and Sunset Boulevard, for starters. With personality, energy and versatility to burn, it is not

Newly crafted multi-millionaire Ariel (Tom Stokes) struck up a conversation with the exotic, mysterious, attractive Anna X (Becca Galvin) at a party in New York in 2016. From there, he couldn’t get enough of her. In short, he was smitten from the get go. Photos by Simon Fazio and Chris Parker In her early to mid twenties, Anna proved to be aloof, revealing little, if anything, at the best of times. That only made him hungry to learn more. She was Russian, fashionable and

It is a shocking tale of displacement (being wrenched away from family), discrimination, institutionalisation, foster homes and police intimidation. As a result, there is acting up, trouble making, drinking, smoking and getting in with the wrong crowd. Photos by Steven Mitchell Wright Then there is the opportunity to turn it all around, to create a lasting legacy and, with it, aid the Indigenous cause. This is the extraordinary true story of Taungurung Elder, activist an

The outrage I felt while watching events unfold here was palpable, just as it should be. Racism, hatred, misogyny, political dirty dealings – it is all there in giant technicolour, so to speak. At the centre of proceedings is a young actor still to make it, a man who would go on to become a giant of the screen. I speak of Sidney Poitier (Donné Ngabo), who would, in time, become the first African American to win the Best Actor Oscar (in 1964 for Lilies of the Field). Ph