Features
The Last 5 Years
Darwin performance artists Stuart Fong and Andi Egan discovered they had a shared passion for musical theatre and, noticing a gap in the Darwin scene, got their own ball rolling...
Bedroom Farce
Four couples, three bedrooms, one night and a hilarious evening of theatre where nobody gets any sex and hardly anybody gets any sleep. This is British playwright Alan Ayckbourn’s comedy...
Diary of a Wombat
There wouldn’t be many Aussie kids born after 2002 that haven’t read this classic picture book. Now the true story of Mothball the very cheeky wombat comes to laughter-filled life...
Q&A with Arj Barker
Australia’s favourite American comedian is bringing his latest show Organic, brimming with free-range hilarity, to Darwin audiences this month. Off The Leash caught up with Barker ahead of his visit...
Review – Man Made
I have been working with Tracks Dance for the past 13 years over four Darwin Festival shows and six Milpirri performances in the remote Indigenous community of Lajamanu. Man Made...
Comics' Corner – Humanely Hilarious: the Ethics of Comedy
I was recently asked in an interview how comedians can make jokes about tragic or serious things and live with themselves? Tough opening question, but while the late Joan Rivers...
Comics' Corner – September
The curtains have fallen on the Darwin Festival and Hanuman has cleaned off the last ghee splatter from its bamboo kitchen but, like a phoenix rising from the ashes of...
The Beat Festival
It's where countless Territorians have got their musical start – including Jessica Mauboy, whose appearances at The Beat Festival included a featured solo performance. The annual Beat Festival began in...
The Merchant of Venice
Bell Shakespeare’s adaptation of William Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice takes the play’s action from 16th century Venice to a contemporary setting, and the themes of religious prejudice, forgiveness and...
In Between Two
When Joel ma was a kid, the matriarch of his family was his Chinese-Australian grandmother Edith. A born-again Christian, she would hold him close before their ritual family yumcha and...
Kirsty and Amy: The Comedy Road Trip
Comedians Amy Hetherington and Kirsty Webeck first met at this year’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival (MICF), where they were playing at the same venue. It wasn’t long before they were...
Q&A with Penny Arcade
Off The Leash was rather thrilled to correspond with legendary New York performer Penny Arcade in the lead-up to her show Longing Lasts Longer, a hilarious and biting satire of...
Between Tiny Cities
It sounds like the plot of the best dance movie you’ve never seen – two b-boys from different cities and utterly different walks of life, face off in a breakdance...
Review – Fringe Art and Vikings
Darwin – what happened? When I agreed to bring my hills-hoist and grindhouse cabaret up to the Darwin Fringe, little did I know I was going to experience one of...
Bamboo Moon (The Tale of Princess Kaguya)
Staged at twilight in the leafy Botanic Gardens, Bamboo Moon is based on the ancient Japanese story The Tale of Princess Kaguya and stars a youthful cast from Darwin’s Corrugated...
Q&A with Kuah Jenhan
Comedian Kuah Jenhan's show Like This Like Dad was inspired by his very traditional Chinese father. Off The Leash caught up with the sought-after Malaysian comedian ahead of his Darwin...
Tracks Dance: Man Made
Tracks’ last Darwin Festival show, Landed, followed three characters returning home to Darwin after a life away from it. Emotions, belonging and connection to place are a crucial theme of...
Hello, Goodbye and Happy Birthday
Two celebrations at the "bookends of life" lead proceedings in Hello, Goodbye and Happy Birthday – birthday parties for an 80-year-old and an 18-year-old. But while the theatre audience is...
Comics' Corner – Darwin Festival Funnies
By Will Crawford. If you like your stand up smart, angry and full of dubious advice to the world's gentrifiers, then the sharp, biting satire of visiting New York comic...
A Midsummer Night's Dream
It's no surprise that Shakespeare's most delightful and fantastical play found further life as a ballet. Set to a romantic score by Felix Mendelssohn, the Melbourne City Ballet brings the...
