30 May – 10 June 2018
Following their sold out and critically acclaimed ‘The Happy Prince’, Melbourne’s “leading light in indie theatre” (The Age), Little Ones, return to Theatre Works to revisit Oscar Wilde’s dark and humorous fairy tales with a haunting re-imagining of THE NIGHTINGALE AND THE ROSE.
A lush gothic fable, THE NIGHTINGALE AND THE ROSE, explores the beauty of love, art, creation, and song from the perspective of an effervescent nightingale who hears the longing cries of a young student desperate to find a red rose to give to his sweetheart.
On her quest to retrieve the red rose for the lovesick student, the nightingale is confronted with a haunting decision that will shake her and the very universe to its core, her life and voice for a red rose, or eternal heartbreak.
Told through a highly stylised, bombastic, and queer aesthetic, Little Ones Theatre’s exploration of Oscar Wilde’s most bewitching and melancholic fairy tale will unpack the adult longing laced within Wilde’s poetic prose, highlighting idealistic and cynical perspectives of love with all his decadent symbolism and cheeky wit.
“Director Stephen Nicolazzo has constructed an exquisite ode to Romanticism in this adaptation, as detailed and precise as anything he’s put on stage before. Nicolazzo is the ideal theatre maker to bring these fairy tales, quivering and beautiful, back into the light.”
TIME OUT
“The ingredients that make up this production are a recipe for brilliance. I was captivated. Keeps your mind ticking over. A must.”
STAGE NOISE
“Little Ones Theatre capture the bittersweet and painfully beautiful nature of Oscar Wilde’s tale with great artistry and passion for the text…so as the company plans ahead for an adaptation of a third story in the future, we can only hope for more!”
THEATRE PRESS
Directed by
STEPHEN NICOLAZZO
Set and Costume Design
EUGYEENE TEH
Lighting Design
KATIE SFETKIDIS
Sound Design and Composition
DANIEL NIXON
Performed by
BRIGID GALLACHER, JENNIFER VULETIC, JUSTIN WANG
Photography
SARAH WALKER
