Malthouse Theatre reveal first 5 productions of 2023 season

Malthouse unveils its first five productions of 2023, running the gamut from bloodthirsty vampires in Tasmania to an exposé of life as an artist in China, and the murky waters of colourism to a sweaty night at The Peel.

Malthouse in 2023 kicks off in a gloriously defiant way in January with the Melbourne premiere of smash hit comedy seven methods of killing kylie jenner (rescheduled from 2022). This deep dive into the commodification of Black women is written by award-winning British playwright Jasmine Lee-Jones and co-directed by Zindzi Okenyo and Shari Sebbens. Iolanthe and Chika Ikogwe star as bawss-babes Cleo and Kara, a duo infuriated by Kylie Jenner and committed to serving the tea hot and keeping receipts. PERIODT.

Nosferatu, Keziah Warner’s scintillating gothic drama based on the iconic 1922 silent film Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror inhabits the Merlyn in February. Set in Bluewater, Tasmania, a mining town that time left behind, it stars Jacob Collins-Levy (The White Princess) and an ensemble of mouth-watering townspeople. Desperate to restore the place to its glory days, they put their faith in a mysterious investor with a green thumb and an appetite for blood – so long as you’re not the one in danger, it’s easy to turn a blind eye to the horrors on your doorstep.

In a change of pace for the third work of the year, Wang Chong (王翀), one of Beijing’s most significant theatre directors, returns to Malthouse Theatre following the sell-out success of Little Emperors 小皇帝 in 2017. Made in China 2.0 sees Chong collaborate with co-director Emma Valente to shine the spotlight on his own experiences as an artist. In this intimate and unexpected solo, he takes us deep inside his creative process to share a personal manifesto for making trailblazing theatre back home and abroad. Part pop culture lecture, part dramatic performance, Made In China 2.0 is a moving examination of the role of the artist in uncertain times.

At the Beckett in May, Loaded finally takes the mainstage with director Stephen Nicolazzo (Looking for Alibrandi) in collaboration with writers Dan Giovannoni and Christos Tsiolkas (Merciless Gods). First adapted as the award-winning 1998 film Head On from Tsiolkas’ debut novel Loaded, then reimagined as an audio adaptation in 2020 by Malthouse, the production is an honest, raw and passionate portrait of a young man who is restlessly searching for himself in opposing worlds. Ari (Danny Ball, A Beginner’s Guide to Grief) is 19 and unemployed—he doesn’t want to be gay and he doesn’t want to be Greek. He doesn’t want to be anything. Drawn by the alluring pulse of Collingwood’s gay clubs, he finds an escape, and a family in the form of drag queens and one-night stands.

Ash Flanders’ new work, This Is Living, a semi-autobiographical play that turns the Merlyn into a Hepburn Springs getaway in July, is a salty, sweet and honest look at love and friendship. Hugh has organised a fabulous weekend away for his partner and their best girlfriends to escape a year from hell. But even deli meats, medicinal hydroponics and soaking in spring water can’t fix everything. Try as they might to float on the surface, life has a funny way of bubbling up—and over. Writer Ash Flanders is notorious for crafting caustic comedy that makes audiences laugh ‘til they hurt, only this time he’s gone somewhere completely unexpected—the real world.

Malthouse Artistic Director, Matthew Lutton said

The stories we are telling in 2023 are not the stories you hear every day. Every story is bringing an infrequently heard perspective to the surface, with creators are drawing on personal experiences to create these deeply felt fictions. They are all stories best told on stage. They are theatrical, and will stimulate you in a way that causes you to forget the outside world and engage with the fiction created for you, and you then take them with you out into the world again.

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The final three shows for 2023 will be announced in detail in March.