BLACK Swan State Theatre Company of WA has launched a 2020 season of stories set to surprise and start conversation.
Artistic director Clare Watson said the ‘Stories from Here’ season looked at power, progress and place.
“The places we will visit together hold stories that seep into the people that inhabit them,” Watson said.
Get in front of tomorrow's news for FREE
Journalism for the curious Australian across politics, business, culture and opinion.
READ NOW“Those that hold power will try to cling to it, while others seek it and succeed, only to discover that it’s perhaps not the prize they were hoping for.”
The season begins during the Perth Festival with the Malthouse Theatre co-production of Tim Winton’s Cloudstreet at the newly renovated His Majesty’s Theatre.
The five-hour epic starting February 21 will be Black Swan’s biggest production of the year.
May will feature a Kath & Kim-style adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard, while Unsung Heroes in June is a collection of six home-grown stories of alternating programs directed by Emily McLean and Joe Paradise Lui.
The theatre company will host the inaugural Maali Festival during Naidoc Week on July 12, a First National takeover of the State Theatre Centre curated by Black Swan resident artists Chloe Ogilvie (Yamatji Nhanda) and Ian Michael (Nyoongar).
Audiences should prepare for a hospital ghost story in the August/September season of York.
Set in the oldest inland town of WA, the production is a collaboration with WA Youth Theatre Company and inspired by 200 years of real accounts.
George Orwell’s Animal Farm will be staged in September as a prelude to the 2020 US elections, adapted by Van Badham and featuring a three-hander cast of comedians, improvisers and storytellers.
The thrills continue during October with Malthouse Theatre’s stage adaptation of Wake in Fright set in the Australian outback.
Wild west Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Oklahoma! finishes the year at Heath Ledger Theatre from November 28 to December 20.