Livesey embodies Gillard’s quirky physicality, brittle voice and highlights her vulnerability with frequent, poignant references to the vile insults and bullying she endured during her political period. Larcombe captures the essence of Bishop, her ambition, acerbic tongue, robotic manner and alarming death stare, although the role cries out for a parade of glitzy outfits to parody Bishop’s reputation as a fashionista.

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Although the script and production have been overhauled after an initial run at the 2019 Fringe, Gone Girls would benefit from dramaturgical intervention and stronger direction: the staging is too static, needing more physicality and fewer talking heads, the production requires a more intimate stage and more effective set design, and the wildly differing styles of the two halves require fusing into a coherent whole.

Despite its shortcomings, Gone Girls effectively satirises, celebrates, criticises and sympathises with Gillard and Bishop and cynically predicts a long road ahead before Australia sees another female PM.
Reviewed by Kate Herbert

CLASSICAL
MSO Mid-season Gala ★★★★½
Hamer Hall, July 30

English cello sensation Sheku Kanneh-Mason did not disappoint a capacity audience at his Australian orchestral debut with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, yet he impressed by unusual means. Rather than secure a predictably warm ovation by performing the Elgar concerto, for which he has already garnered many well-deserved plaudits, Kanneh-Mason chose Shostakovich’s seldom heard Cello Concerto No.2.

Even by Shostakovich’s standards, this is a remarkably enigmatic work, requiring a highly magnetic musical personality to bring continuity and conviction to its sparse and tenuously connected musical narrative. This Kanneh-Mason did with resounding success, bringing enormous emotional weight to bear on the cadenza passages of the first and third movements.

Filling every note with passion, Kanneh-Mason brought an undeniable immediacy to Shostakovich’s turbulent and often grim outpourings with a masterly marriage of unerring technique and carefully chosen tone colour, aided by excellent contributions from horns and percussion. In the current geopolitical situation, the universality of Shostakovich’s humanity became achingly poignant with this Russian work being performed by a Black soloist.

Sydney composer Ann Boyd’s At the Rising of the Sun began the program, the composer being onstage to offer a brief introduction. After an opening laden with promising ideas, the work drifted into a quiet mystical stasis that set the scene for the quiet opening of the concerto.

After so much unfamiliar terrain, Dvorak’s evergreen Symphony No. 9 From the New World proved a welcome, upbeat finish. Conducting from memory, chief conductor Jaime Martin was intent from the outset on painting a vivid musical picture, whether in the heart-melting slow movement or the rustic finale, galvanising the orchestra into a performance of irrepressible energy, with all sections contributing top-drawer artistry.

How wonderful that this right royal concert proved that star power can sell normally unsaleable repertoire to a large and appreciative audience.
Reviewed by Tony Way

MUSIC
Jack Harlow ★★
Forum, July 28

“This is history,” says Jack Harlow, one song into his debut Melbourne performance. It seems a fait accompli that Harlow won’t be playing venues the size of the Forum for much longer, and he knows it.

“When I come back, we gonna do that f---ing arena,” he says. The crowd, dominated by people who, like Harlow, were born in the late 1990s, couldn’t agree more – phones are in the air from the get-go, as Harlow’s every utterance evokes cheers of adulation.

The Kentucky-born Harlow has risen to pop star level fame in recent years. He’s in a KFC ad, has a signature line of New Balance sneakers, and is set to fill the Woody Harrelson role in the forthcoming White Men Can’t Jump reboot.

But lest you think he’s more of a marketable commodity than an accomplished musician, Harlow offers this pre-emptive rejoinder in the verse-heavy Churchill Downs: “I’m hip hop / Do you fully understand?” The 3000-strong crowd offers hearty affirmation.

Harlow was listed as playing a 60-minute set, a curiously short stay for an overseas headliner. But after the euphoria of his on-stage entrance and the excitement for his on-point Drake-impersonation wear off, the energy in the room noticeably dips.

Three songs define Harlow’s career to date. The first, Whats Poppin, went viral on TikTok in the early months of the pandemic. The second, Lil Nas X’s super-hit Industry Baby, features a guest verse from Harlow. And the third, First Class, the lead single from Harlow’s latest album Come Home the Kids Miss You, is his first solo number one.

The house erupts when Harlow performs all three, and they all sound like contemporary rap hits. But situated within a set list of soundalikes, amid a stream of Harlow’s competent but uncharismatic raps, questions arise about whether Harlow has what it takes to garner long-term legitimacy in hip hop.
Reviewed By Billy Burgess

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