Opera Up Late takes opera's biggest hits and sprinkles them with some late night fairy dust. Stars of the Sydney Opera House's Dame Joan Sutherland theatre are dragging up, getting down and belting the high notes for an evening of delights that’s making an early claim to be the real highlight of Sydney WorldPride’s cultural... Continue Reading →
Mardi Gras Film Festival 2023 Review: Wet Sand ★★★★
Georgian queer cinema is in the spotlight again with Elene Naveriani’s evocative Wet Sand, a heartbreaking look at the power of repression in a parochial community and the hate that lurks behind the faces we see everyday. Amnon (Gia Agumava) runs the local café, serving beers and meals to the locals. He’s a calm, stable... Continue Reading →
Mardi Gras Film Festival 2023 Review: The Origin of Evil (L’origine du mal) ★★★★
Situations spiral out of control and the classes clash in the juicy lesbian drama, The Origin of Evil (L'origine du mal). Money, murder, and the design choices of the nouveau riche fill the screen in this darkly comic-thriller. Stéphane (a wonderful performance by Call My Agent’s Laure Calamy) works in a factory, packaging anchovies all... Continue Reading →
Theatre Review: CAMP (Seymour Centre, Sydney) ★★★1/2
CAMP, a new play by Elias Jamieson Brown, chronicles the rise of the Australian Pride movement through the women who fought through their pain and losses to win us the freedoms we enjoy today. It’s a decades spanning tale, elevating Australia’s own Gay Liberation story, just in time for Sydney WorldPride 2023. Sydney, in the... Continue Reading →
Mardi Gras Film Festival 2023 Review: Wandering Heart (Errante corazón) ★★★★★
Actor-turned-filmmaker Leonardo Brzezicki’s devastatingly impactful drama Wandering Heart (Errante corazón), is a stunning showcase for the talents of Leonardo Sbaraglia who fills every frame with a brokenness that transcends the screen. This is a fantastic performance that is worth the price of admission all on its own. Wandering Heart (Errante corazón). Courtesy of Queer Screen.... Continue Reading →
Graphic Novel Review: Chef’s Kiss by Jarrett Melendez & Danica Brine ★★★1/2
Life post-college is hard, full of big choices and bigger disappointments. So when aspiring writer Ben Cook can’t get a job, his life takes a major left turn into the culinary arts. It may not be what he planned, but maybe a hot sous chef and an affinity for flavours will give him the life... Continue Reading →
Theatre Review: Blessed Union (Belvoir St Theatre, Sydney) ★★★★★
There’s a simple pleasure to be had in sitting back and watching everything on stage being done well. Belvoir’s new queer family dramedy, Blessed Union, is seamlessly terrific. Funny, emotive, and probing. Flawless. No notes. I could end the review here, but obviously I won't... Ruth (Danielle Cormack) and Judith (Maude Davey) have always upheld... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: Irish drag star Enda McGrattan aka Veda on HIV documentary How To Tell A Secret “art has always been a part of our activism”
The brilliant hybrid documentary How to Tell a Secret busts open the conversation about HIV in Ireland. Winner of Best Documentary Film at the Irish Film Festival London, the film offers stories of HIV+ people, queer and straight, and the culture of silence that often surrounds them. Breaking through that silence are two activists and podcasters... Continue Reading →
Theatre Review: Big Screen, Small Queen (Everything I Didn’t Learn at Film School) (KXT Kings Cross, Sydney) ★★★★
Sydney’s glamour bug, Etcetera Etcetera, is expanding her field of drag with a new one-woman show that gets down to the humanity behind the mask in Big Screen, Small Queen (Everything I Didn’t Learn at Film School), presented during Sydney WorldPride. The night starts like an old school Sydney drag show, lip-syncing to classic film... Continue Reading →
Exclusive Interview: Australian drag superstar Etcetera Etcetera on her Sydney WorldPride one-woman show “Big Screen, Small Queen (Everything I Didn’t Learn at Film School)”
Already loved in Australia for her glamour and quick wit, non-binary drag and visual artist Etcetera Etcetera leapt onto the international stage thanks to her appearance on the first season of RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under. Since then she's toured the nation and sashayed down fashion week runways, while her activism has seen her become... Continue Reading →
