A radical re-telling of Nikolai Gogol’s short story, Melbourne independent theatre group The Bloomshed presents The Nose currently playing at the Sydney Fringe until 16 September, before playing at the Melbourne Fringe Festival from 26 September 2017.
Emerging writer and theatre maker James Jackson, in collaboration with actors Elizabeth Brennan and Tom Molyneux, have taken inspiration from Russian author Nikolai Gogol’s famous eponymous short story and turned it into something reflective of the dystopian post-paradise of 2017.
A CEO is crying in front of a mirror. A severed nose is lying on the floor. There are inspirational quotes plastered everywhere – WE CAN ALL BE HEROES – just make sure you don’t stop producing. Disparate narratives collide around the missing appendage; a psychotic, hallucinatory journey as people start falling to pieces. The Nose is an attempt to locate the systems that exploit our bodies.
The Bloomshed creates new things by cannibalizing the old – The Nose is the company’s latest attempt to consume a classic, written by an author who starved himself to death. This is agitprop political theatre raised from the dead and zombified. Like everything else, The Nose is a rotting corpse, animated, moaning and stumbling around for your pleasure.
The Nose
Stage Two – HPG Festival Hub, 225 Euston Rodd, Alexandria
Season continues to 16 September 2017
Bookings: www.sydneyfringe.com
Mechanics Institute, 270 Sydney Road, Brunswick
Season: 26 September – 1 October 2017
Bookings: www.melbournefringe.com.au
For more information, visit: www.bloomshed.org for details.
Image: courtesy of The Bloomshed