THE restrictions imposed on theatres and their audiences because of the COVID-19 virus keep changing, with watchers having to sit well apart and the number of empty seats reducing a theatre's income.
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August is a relatively quiet month for theatre companies in Newcastle and the Hunter, but a total of 17 shows are currently listed for September, and the other final months of the year are also busy, so people involved in theatre are hoping the restrictions end.
COVID vaccination NSW
Some touring shows have had to move to new dates, but the proposed changes don't always fit into a theatre company's catalogue.
The 2021 Melbourne International Comedy Festival Roadshow, for example, which features a diverse line-up of Australian stars, talented newcomers and guest international performers from the Melbourne event, was to have had a performance at Cessnock Performing Arts Centre on June 10, followed by shows at Newcastle's Civic Theatre on June 11 and 12 as part of this year's Civic Season.
The show was to have been performed at Cessnock on August 13, but has been cancelled, with the Civic having just one show on October 1.
Another popular show in the Civic Season, Monkey Bar Theatre Company's touring production of the popular Australian musical comedy Pete the Sheep, the company's first touring show in more than a year because of COVID-19, began its tour in late March, and is still touring despite the virus continuing.
The show has four actors in a shearing shed, switching between playing shearers, sheep and dogs, as the men argue and joke about their interactions and the way they treat the animals.
The show, directed by renowned former Novocastrian Jonathan Biggins, will have matinee and evening shows on November 1 and 2.
The continuation this year of the COVID-19 pandemic, and NSW lockdowns, led Melbourne-based company Bjorn Again, which was set up in 1988 to perform the songs of the 1972-established Swedish pop group ABBA as a tribute to that company and has toured globally, led to an Australian tour of its show Bjorn Again - Mamma Mia! We Are Back Again being postponed, including a performance at the Civic Theatre on August 6 this year.
The easing of the restrictions has enabled a new date, November 27, for the Civic show.
The restrictions have not prevented local theatre companies from putting together a good range of shows.
It's Indie season at Lambton
Newcastle Theatre Company lets four independent theatre companies, most of which are small groups set up by people with a passion for theatre, each stage a show for a short season as part of what it calls NTC's Indie Season at its Lambton theatre.
Interestingly, three of the shows this year are being staged in successive weeks.
The first Indie show, which is being staged by Knock And Run Theatre between August 18 and 28, is Trevor, in which the title character is an erratic 200-pound chimpanzee.
It was inspired by true events, and is a subversive comedy about fame, success, and the lies we tell ourselves in order to keep people from taking away things that we cherish.
Trevor, once performed in commercials with the likes of Morgan Fairchild, a real person who was renowned for the way she handled people and animals in US television shows.
And his owner Sandra swears he would never hurt a fly...at least not on purpose.
The pair find themselves continually fighting against a world unable to understand their love.
The play has been described as a moving exploration of family, flawed communication, and humanity.
The play, directed by Allison Van Gaal, has a cast including James Chapman, Karen Lantry, Lissy Shand, Zac Smith, Patrick Campbell, Ben Louttit, and Marissa Saroca.
The second Indie play, 84 Charing Cross Road (September 1-4), is based on real events in the life of American writer Helene Hanff, who, while working in New York, saw an ad for a London book store that did mail orders, with many books being classics published long ago that were hard to get.
So she contacted the store, and exchanged letters with its manager, Frank Doel, for 20 years, with the pair exchanging things such as food parcels.
The cast includes Aimee Cavanagh as Helene Hanff, Noel Grivas as Frank Doel, Ann-Maree Day, Jack Madden, Sam Rogers, Bronte Fegan and Robert Comber.
The third Indie show is The Laramie Project (September 8-11), a play by American writer Moises Kaufman which looks at people's reactions to a real event - the 1998 murder of a gay University of Wyoming student, Matthew Shepard, in Laramie, Wyoming.
The murder was denounced as a hate crime and brought attention to the lack of hate crime laws in states, including Wyoming.
The story draws on many interviews with the town's inhabitants, company members' journal entries, and news reports, with nine actors portraying more than 60 characters in its three acts.
The show is directed by Zac Smith, who has a talent for making shows that reveal the very different natures and relationships of people.
The fourth Indie is Uncle Vanya (September 15 -18), a staging of Anton Chekhov's classic Russian comedy which is the premiere production by new company Her Productions.
It is set on a remote rural estate, where a family is trying to survive and retain their landed-gentry.
The cast for the production of Uncle Vanya is Michael Booth, Marigold Pazar, Charlotte De Wit, Mark Pegler, Matthew Heys, Katy Carruthers, Ben Louttit, and Pamela Cleland.
