Newcastle Fringe Festival finishes successful season

More than 55 acts and almost 400 performers gave Newcastle an entertaining and eclectic program to remember. Post-pandemic, it feels like the festival has entered a new era, catching a fresh breed of performer and attracting a broader audience.

From the wholesome and uplifting performances on "choir day" last Saturday, to the night-time cabaret, music and experimental shows over two weekends, there was something for everyone.

The launch on March 9 was indicative of what was to come. Nerds & Music, a home-grown Newcastle act, teased with a set of their intelligent and funny songs. Dane Simpson did a quick set of his "black humour" Didgeridoozy comedy act, complete with the most twisted didgeridoo you'll ever see.

Experienced comedian Alice Fraser shone at Newcastle Comedy Club, making me both laugh and cry. As I wrote, "It's sophisticated, authentic humour with a philosophical edge."

In perhaps one of of the highlights of Newcastle Fringe, Lou Chapman's solo show at The Royal Exchange was absolutely captivating.

Wednesday night through to Sunday night last week, Newcastle actor Lou Chapman flawlessly performed The Lou Chapman Show. I was at The Royal Exchange on Friday night, and for an hour the audience watched Chapman embody a variety of characters, some of them funny, some of them scary and all entertaining. I was transfixed studying Chapman's facial expressions and movements as each different character took over her entire persona.

The one-woman performance was made up of six monologues, almost all of them specifically written for her by playwrights and directors locally and internationally. The characters explore issues of human connection, pregnancy, birth, loss, domestic violence, consumerism, what makes us happy, love language, finding common ground and, most importantly, seeing others and being seen.

Chapman, 52, has been acting in Newcastle for decades. She started her performance career as a dancer at the age of four and would later go on to dance in Europe and Russia in 1986. Later she was unfortunately hit by a car and it broke her arm. She could never dance again, so that's how she made her transition from dance to acting. When she started her acting career, she worked for theatre company Zeal in Newcastle.

"We used to have companies that employed and put you on a wage and everything," Chapman jokes.

She went on to study theatre professionally in New York in 1996-1998 where she was taught in master classes by David Mamet and William H. Macy. During the summers of those same years she took a Newcastle show to Kuala Lumpur.

Chapman is brilliant, she's trained with the best, she's polished her skill and Newcastle is lucky to have her.

The first of the six monologues Chapman performed, Force for Good, was by New-York-based writer and actor Tricia Alexandro. It was the only one not written specifically for Chapman. Alexandro shared the monologue on her personal Facebook and Chapman, through mutual friends, was able to get permission to perform it.

"That's a world premiere," Chapman says of the monologue.

Force for Good was a great introduction to the rest of the show. It's a piece about two people actually seeing each other and speaking authentically and joyfully on a subway. Chapman performs her with ease; there's no doubting her authenticity. This act leads gracefully to Chapman's other characters, who were not always as cheery.

Her next monologues was by Fiona Leonard of Blue Goat Theatre. Leonard is an Australian living in Germany, and Chapman commissioned her to write Ten Minutes Past Ten, a disturbing piece on pregnancy, loss and mental illness.

Maitland-based writer Helen Hopcroft wrote the next piece Chapman performed, The Howling where Chapman spectacularly roamed around the theatre with her wine glass, eyes glued to her.

Chapman wrote the next one, Signs from Above, another monologue in a train much more sinister than the intro.

Next was a jolting piece by New York writer Jake Diamond, Pieces of My Heart, with references to the song by Janis Joplin.

At last Chapman laid the audience to rest with a monologue called The Real Thing, by Newcastle playwright Vanessa Bates. It was hands down the darkest and most disturbing of all six pieces, creepy and chilling. (Chapman previously won an award in the World Monologue Games for performing this piece.)

I was exhausted watching her morph into each character and change outfits and styles as well, but I was so impressed by the different range of emotions she showed the audience. She's a seasoned pro.

Chapman won an award this year at the Newcastle Fringe Fest for her performance: Best Newcastle Play, and she is so deserving.

(Chapman will be at Newcastle Writers Festival reading a poem and an excerpt from her work with Mad Bitches, a female-fronted cabaret show.)

Also on Friday night, I entered a very different world for Madam Nightingale, a duo from Melbourne.

Musician Dean Lombard and singer/dancer Phaedra Gunn had come to perform their pop original eclectic pieces. Self-described as a post-genre act performing synthpop-influenced alt-pop songs.

Gunn formed this band in 2020 with writing partner, David O'Toole, so much of what Lombard plays is what the previous bandmate wrote. Gunn comes from a jazz singing background and Lombard from a guitar background.

Working with electronic music is new for him. They're experimental progressive jazz and hyper pop.

She wears a distinctive bright red ensemble complete with a head piece, face paint and facial decorations. She is Madam Nightingale and she's also a self-taught dancer.

The song that resonated most with me was the cheery bop Everyone's Gonna Die, destined to be their first single.

The band is in its early stages; acts such as these help define Newcastle Fringe Festival and push limits and boundaries.