Malthouse Theatre announces its 2024 season with eight works that explore and challenge the concepts of belief, fate and the rituals that bring us together today
From the stage premiere of an award-winning Australian memoir about growing up the child of Black migrants in white middle-class Australia, to a world premiere new work from Back to Back Theatre; from Shakespeare’s Scottish Play reimagined from Lady Macbeth’s perspective to a technically challenging sci-fi adventure; from a new work from the bold and candid Nicola Gunn, to the return season of a much-lauded stage adaptation of a Nobel Prize laureate’s work; from an exploration of secret queer identity within the confines of a 1990s Pentecostal Church, to closing the year with a holiday experience that truly sleighs, Malthouse promises eight compelling reasons to visit our theatres in 2024.
Said Malthouse Theatre Co-CEO & Artistic Director Matthew Lutton OAM: ‘This is a highly theatrical season. There isn’t a moment of domesticity or realism in sight, as every work celebrates theatre that transports you into fantasies, heightened realities, folklore, or ecstasy. It is very deliberately a season of productions celebrating how theatrical theatre can be.’
The year opens in February in unflinching style with the theatrical premiere of The Hate Race, a retelling of Caribbean-Australian writer Maxine Beneba Clarke’s best-selling, award-winning memoir, starring Zahra Newman.
After a triumphant debut in 2022, garnering wide acclaim, four Green Room Awards and numerous five-star reviews—Malthouse is proud to present a return season of Kadimah Yiddish Theatre’s Yentl. Directed and co-written by Gary Abrahams, Elise Hearst and Kadimah Yiddish Theatre Artistic Co-Directors Galit Klas and Evelyn Krape.
In May, audiences are invited to join an odyssey of self-discovery and liberation with Homo Pentecostus. Actor, dancer, and writer Joel Bray unveils an intimate exploration of his secret queer identity within the confines of a 1990s Pentecostal Church.
May also sees the world premiere of the latest work by ground-breaking company Back to Back Theatre, MULTIPLE BAD THINGS.
In the second half of the year, visionary playwright Zinnie Harris reimagines Shakespeare’s Scottish Play from Lady Macbeth’s perspective in Macbeth (An Undoing). Starring Bojana Novakovic (Love Me) and Johnny Carr (Five Bedrooms), it is directed by Malthouse Theatre Artistic Director Matthew Lutton.
The Interpreters (Apologia), a new work from revered first-person artist Nicola Gunn (Piece for Person and Ghetto Blaster), unpacks her personal fantasy of being a French actress.
Acclaimed writer Pamela Carter and Malthouse Theatre Artistic Director Matthew Lutton collaborate on an ambitious, highly technical stage version of Under the Skin, adapted from the Michel Faber sci-fi novel.
Fat Fruit (Sarah Ward & Bec Matthews) and director Susie Dee close out Malthouse’s 2024 program with a wild, mutinous, punk celebration of Christmas, F*ck Christmas.
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