From Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, to Bond, king of the spies – this weekend’s picks include the Feast Film Festival, an Adelaide Symphony Orchestra tribute to the 007 movies, and Glenelg’s Winter Wonderland.
Feast Film Festival
Adelaide’s gay and lesbian cultural festival, Feast, is running a stand-alone film fest at the Mercury Cinema this weekend and next. The program opens tonight with a 20th-anniversary screening of The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, followed by a Priscilla party at Café Caos on Hindley Street, complete with drag fashion parades and drag artist performances. But it’s not all glitter and feathers at the fest, with the 17 films on the program also including To Be Takei, a documentary about Star Trek actor George Takei; coming-of-age story Boy Meets Girl, starring Twilight’s Michael Welch; and Australian film Out in the Line-Up, which explores the taboos of homosexuality in surfing. “The Feast Film Festival program is diverse in style, genre and subject matter with films from all around the globe, but the one binding feature is that they remind us of our humanity and of our need for love, laughter, empathy and compassion – as well as to sometimes be darn right silly,” says Feast artistic director Catherine Fitzgerald. The full program can be downloaded here.
ASO Plays James Bond
The Adelaide Symphony Orchestra is promising audiences will be shaken and stirred by this concert at the Festival Theatre. Under the baton of conductor Guy Noble, and with guest singers Blake Bowden (South Pacific) and Debora Krizak (A Chorus Line), the orchestra will play the great theme songs from Bond movies, including “Goldfinger”, Diamonds Are Forever”, and “Nobody Does it Better”. Performances are at 8pm on Friday and Saturday (June 27 and 28), with pre-show martinis available in the Festival Centre bars.
Winter Wonderland
Get your skates on and head to Glenelg for some cool-weather fun on an all-weather 150sqm ice rink at Moseley Square. Dubbed Mamma Carmela’s Winter Wonderland, the ice festival is an initiative of Jetty Road traders. It begins on Saturday and will continue until July 27, with five 1.5-hour skating sessions daily (starting at 10am, noon, 2pm, 4pm and 6pm). The rink is in a clear marquee and has capacity for up to 100 skaters at a time. There will also be special performances by ice dancers.
Darkness & Light
The Adelaide Chamber Singers are joining with the Zephyr Quartet for an eclectic program of music inspired by composer Ola Gjeilo’s Dark Night of the Soul, which features text from St John of the Cross’s 16th-century poem of the same name. In addition to Gjeilo’s work, Darkness & Light will include music by Mozart and Tallis, and new compositions by Zephyr Quartet’s Hilary Kleinig and the Chamber Singers’ Carl Crossin. There will be two concerts: on Saturday (June 28) at 6.30pm in Adelaide’s Pilgrim Church and on Sunday at 3pm in the Church of the Epiphany in Crafers. Details here.
The Hushes
Cal Williams Jr, double bassist Kory Horwood, singer Emily Davis and banjo player Ben Timbers are The Hushes and they will be bringing a bit of bluegrass, gospel and folk to the Wheatsheaf Hotel with a free gig from 9pm tonight (Friday). The rest of the weekend at the Wheatie is an all-women affair, with Monique Brumby and Courtney Robb playing on Saturday night, then SA singer-songwriters Tara Carragher and Kelly Menhennett bringing some folk, roots and alt-country to the mix on Sunday.
A Dance Revolution
Costumes from dancers who have toured Australia are on display in this new exhibition opening on Saturday in the Adelaide Festival Centre’s Festival Theatre Foyer. The display tells a story of the history of dance, featuring glamorous costumes worn by dancers in productions including the Australian Ballet’s Swan Lake and La Rondino and the film Don Quixote. The exhibition, which continues until August 26, also features photographs, books and artists’ drawings. Pictured is the costume worn by Leonie Leahy in the Australian Ballet’s La Rondino in 1964.
Beggars Can Be Seekers
As the title suggests, this show celebrates Australian music industry veterans The Seekers. Adelaide vocal group The Beggars have joined with guest musician Dennis Surmon to play hits from The Seekers’ 50-year career as well as their own songs, all linked by amusing narration revealing similarities between the history of the two groups (read InDaily’s review here). Beggars Can be Seekers is being presented at Nexus Cabaret on June 27-28 as part of the Cabaret Fringe Festival, which finishes on Sunday. Other closing weekend shows include Viva la Diva! Queens of the Cabaret at The Soul Box (Saturday) and The Cocktail Hour (and a half) featuring the Zephyr Quartet at La Boheme (Sunday). The full Cab Fringe program is online.
Art Gallery of SA
A free talk about the portraits of women by influential South Australian artist Mortimer Menpes (1855-1938) will be delivered at the Art Gallery of South Australia at 1pm on Sunday by Maria Zagala, associate curator: prints, drawings & photographs (meet at exhibition entrance). The World of Mortimer Menpes: painter, etcher, raconteur is a retrospective exhibition running alongside an exhibition of work by fellow painter and printmaker Dorrit Black (1891-1951). Both exhibitions are free and run until September, with daily tours at 11am and 2pm.
On screen
See InDaily’s reviews of the latest films screening in Adelaide:
Yves St Laurent
Good Vibrations
Maleficent
Edge of Tomorrow
A Million Ways to Die in the West
Grace of Monaco
Godzilla
Aim High in Creation
X-Men: Days of Future Past
The Babadook
