International icon Meow Meow returns to Melbourne this month with Meow Meow’s The Red Shoes, a wildly inventive, darkly funny and achingly beautiful reimagining of Hans Christian Andersen’s classic fairytale.
Playing 19 November — 6 December at Malthouse’s Merlyn Theatre, Meow Meow’s The Red Shoes is the third in a trilogy of Hans Christian Andersen adaptations by the venerated artiste, following on from the global success of Meow Meow’s Little Mermaid (2017) and Meow Meow’s Little Match Girl (2012).
Andersen’s original tale of temptation and vanity brutally punished its covetous protagonist with an ever-dancing curse that propelled her far from heaven’s gates. In this new interpretation, Meow Meow asks: what if she could never start dancing at all? Can we save her? Can we save the world?!
Meow Meow’s The Red Shoes offers audiences the perfect end-of-year escape: a starlit, sonic revolution that will shock you out of stagnancy and into ecstatic oblivion from ‘the queen of chanson’ (Berliner Zeitung) with ‘devilish funny bones and heavenly vocal chords’ (Evening Standard UK). Directed by Kate Champion (Artistic Director of Black Swan State Theatre Company), Meow Meow is joined on stage by a live ensemble of virtuosic musicians and collaborators, including Kanen Breen, Mark Jones, Dan Witton and Jethro Woodward, with musical direction and sound design by Jethro Woodward, set and costume design by Dann Barber and lighting design by Rachel Burke.
Meow Meow is widely celebrated as one of the world’s most electrifying and genre-defying performers. Her ‘kamikaze cabaret’ has been hailed across international stages from the Sydney Opera House to London’s West End, Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall and the Berlin Philharmonie. Known for her ability to shatter the conventions of cabaret while maintaining a deep musicality and razor-sharp theatrical intelligence, she has collaborated with artists and companies including Australian Chamber Orchestra, Pink Martini, Pina Bausch’s Tanztheater Wuppertal, Barry Humphries, and the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
Her acclaimed shows An Audience With Meow Meow, Meow Meow’s Pandemonium, Meow Meow’s Little Mermaid and Apocalypse Meow earned her a global cult following and a reputation for performances that are anarchic, exquisite and emotionally searing. Critics have described her as a “once-in-a generation performance phenomenon” (The Guardian), a vocalist of “astonishing emotional range” (The Times, UK), and an artist who “turns disaster into a kind of ecstatic poetry” (The Age). Meow Meow’s The Red Shoes runs at Malthouse’s Merlyn Theatre from 19 November — 6 December 2025.
malthousetheatre.com.au
