Review - Muddy Shorts

Review by Iain Finlayson

If Muddy Shorts is the “flagship” event of Mudfest, as its website proclaims, it would be easy to think the festival might be sinking. I’m a fan of short work in any art form. I like the way in can spark something in your imagination and leave it there, without feeling the need to draw a conclusion. Or alternatively the way it can punch you in the face with its snappy message. The success of events such as Short and Sweet and the increasing popularity of short fiction and poetry, shows that I’m not alone in my appreciation of short bursts of art. But I would be lying if I said that Muddy Shorts didn’t leave me slightly underwhelmed.

My main disappointment was the attendance numbers. Last Mudfest, Muddy Shorts played to packed houses over two nights in the Carlton Courthouse. As a one night only event in the Mudfest Club, I was sure this was going to be a sell out. In fact there was only a handful of people in the audience, many of them Muddy Shorts performers or Mudfest volunteers themselves. Thankfully the audience swelled later in the night when cast and audience members came in after Hangman and Into the Unknown.

I was surprised when the short film Adam, David and Daniel go to Europe, which had already featured as part of Mudfest two years ago, was trotted out again. While the film has some amusing dialogue, it is little more then your average holiday camcorder video with a voice over. It certainly made me think the organisers had struggled for content, whether this was the case or not.

That said Muddy Shorts still managed to showcase some of the rich artistic talent that exists on campus. Sherwin Akbarzadeh’s short film I Had A Dream I Went To Coney Island, created a surreal and elegant dreamscape out of Coney Islands amusement rides, sideshows and burger joints. Marisabel Bonet’s poetry was earnest and sincere. Although her work may have lent itself more to reading then to performance, it was interesting to hear Marisable talk about the various people and experiences in her life that had inspired her. Paige Marshall’s one women retelling of Rapunzel was a very polished performance in which Paige seamlessly embodied the various characters in the story. However it was Biddy O’Loughlan’s monologue, The Girl Who Thought She Was Irish, that was the stand out performance of the night. Clever and irreverent, Biddy had most of the audience laughing out loud.

Muddy Shorts played for one night at the Mudfest Club on Saturday August 22.

Diary of Lock In! The 24 Hour Musical

By New Beat Theatre Company

7:00pm
People started to arrive. A real mix of talent: song writers, lyricists, writers, performers all ready to tackle the next 24 hours with a bang! Lots of random ideas placed in the $1.99 blow up paddle pool. Highlights include: “Sexual Frustrated Librarians”.

8:00pm
MUDFest Festival Director, Davfid Ryding, chose three “Titles Shows” and three “Big Number Songs”. The cast and crew cheered for the most popular titles: “Wild Nights and Awkward Mornings” and “Clean That Upholstery”.

9:00pm
Time to brainstorm those crazy ideas! The entire group were asked what ideas they had thought about after hearing the winning titles. Some of fantastic ideas that we didn’t use: Wild Knight, Ghosts of the Future and 7 Minutes in Heaven! Too many to use!

10:00pm
Time to split up into areas of expertise. Turns out we have 14 actors, 6 writers, 4 tech, 1 camera man, 3 production! Writers went off to flesh out the plot and characters. Actors played some theatre games.

11:00pm
Plot: Group of people who know each other from a single apartment building, meet on top of the building to welcome the end of the world! Time to get casting! Apartment locals: An old couple, A love triangle between a guy and two girls, three bitchy career women, a homeless guy, a blokey bloke and who could forget the Stud!

12:00am
First couple of You Tube Videos grace the web! Cast told the writers what their characters were all about to help the writers get song writing.

1:00am
First lull. Cast are catching up on much needed sleep while the writers keep plowing along writing those songs! It’s a tough gig for these guys! And the crew – well they’re working on another show. Trinity’s Grease – Check it out!

2:00am
And the marathon continues! Lots of red bull has been drunk by all. Song writing continues in groups and the crew peeps have been tech trouble-shooting. Cast members who had naps were woken up quite groggily. Does pay to stay awake the whole time!

3:00am
The plot of the show has been finalised! Everyone sat down to debrief over the plot to add any ideas that might add to the show. Already 8 hours in and the plot is sorted! Songs are still progressing and actors will soon start improvising their scenes.

4:00am
Song writing continues...

5:00am
Song writing continues some more... (Obviously too tired to think of something witty to say).

6:00am
Song show and tell! We have some amazing songs that have extraordinarily been created in such a short time. The songs are coming together really well. Though the cast still have songs to be learnt, lines to be memorised and compositions to be written! We leave our nightowl location at 8:00am – then its breakfast!

7:00am
Last minute touches on all songs before we pack up at the nightowl location. Everyone seems to feel the pressure of the next 12 hours. Most of the hour is spent cleaning up the venue.

8:00am
BREAKFAST!

9:00am
Everyone migrates to the Guild Theatre for a superfast Bump In! All hands on deck to get lights and set constructed. A lot of napping in the seats from the cast – just making it that little bit harder for them to find that energy. But they’ll get there!

10:00am
More napping and more bumping in. Flyers to be handed out to Open Day crowd made in 20 min flat. Program starts to be made.

11:00am
Gorrilla style wake up call for the cast. Nap time is OVER. Time to get cracking with learning songs, memorising lines and boosting up those energy levels! The entire cast are in the theatre learning the opening number! Sounds good from out here!

12:00pm
Pyscho moment of nearly losing the file of the program! Panic attacks were nearly had. Tempers flare as cast members try to get the lyrics, harmonies and dialogue in their scenes.

1:00pm
Writers were finalising the script and actors were getting blocked in their scenes. Unfortunately, one of our cast members had to go home sick with a fever and their song had to be re-written with a different cast member. As they say, the show must go on!

2:00pm
Set construction was going well but some of the pieces started to fall off. Gaffa tape will fix any problem. Everyone is a little bit delirious at the moment.

3:00pm
Blocking of the scenes continue. It is a mad scramble around to get everyone and everything ready to get the show up and running. Highlight of the hour: The “super-mega – awesome-sexy EIGHT part harmony” that the whole cast had to learn with only a couple of hours to spare.

4:00pm
Tempers start to flare as last minute rush to get the program, tickets, documentary ready without the help of the Powers That Be. But as true Music Theatre pros, we banded together and got the job done.

5:00pm
DRESS REHEARSAL!

6:00pm
SHOWTIME!

This week in the Mudfest Club...

The Mudfest Club looks like the place to be this Mudfest. With its tropical themed decorations, Hawaiian shirt wearing staff and comfy deckchair seating it is easy to imagine you might be some place warmer then the cold reality of Melbourne outside. Unfortunately there is not a lot of info about the program for this week. We’ve done out best to get the low-down of what’s going on but information such as performance times has not been made public yet. If your interested in a particular performance our only advise is to keep checking www.mudfest.org.au/club or alternatively just head to the Club early and make a night of it. There are worse ways to spend an evening then sipping Stella’s in this make-believe paradise.

WEDNESDAY: Film Night

A variety of short films plus music from Alex Duncan.

THURSDAY: Bogan Night

Bogan Bingo and bad 80s tunes.

FRIDAY

Eleanor Garran in acoustic performance be scared plus a preview of poetry installation Hierachy.

SATURDAY

Launch of Lock In! The 24 Hour Musical Project and music by Mr Brady.

Mudfest - Open for art

It was a cold, dark and wet night as the glitterati of Melbourne Uni made their way to the far-flung outpost The Open Stage, transformed into a decadently tacky calypso affair of fake flowers (fake enough to look real but actually fake) hallucinogenic deck-chairs (thank YOU rooftop bar!) and romantically placed down-lights. I will enjoy my $4 Stella very much, and talent-wise its good to know Melbourne Uni is one of the best places to get a good (FREE) night out and an exciting (gotta use that word sometime) start to the FEISTA DE MUD. Highlights of the night/festival where put together in a user friendly slideshow of A-Z, with sexy results: Ananth Gopal usurping Mr Bean as ultimate in the ol’ flicky tongue movement thing, (La Promenade des Gen Betes) HOTT (extra t for titillating), belly dancing from Danielle Asciak (Everyone Wants a Piece of Malta!) nothing like audience participation with Into the Unknown (snaps for focus, girls) The Greeks Omniprop up to it again (up is the operative word, in a biblical way- The Trackers of Oxyrhynchus). I was ‘mystified’ with outrageous accents/lisps with Heist (Mysterious Mysteries!). Also, Simon Taylor’s a hoot. The magic isn’t bad either.

Without sounding too desperate:

OH MY GOD GO AND SEE THE SHOWS MUDFEST IS GONNA BE AWWWWWEESSSSOOOOOMMEEEEEEE

This is Lauren Bok signing off from the Opening Night of Mudfest 11.

Join the Club

The Mudfest Club has been a Mudfest institution since the first festival. Originally it was housed in the Union’s coffee lounge (now Bluezone) and provide late night entertainment and alcoholic refreshments for students who stayed back on campus to take in the festival. Since then it has had stints in the Food Co-Op, North Dining Hall (now the Members Lounge) and most recently in a configuration of shipping containers set up in South Court. But this year the Mudfest Club has decided to embrace the festival’s theme of “hidden spaces” by locating itself in one of Melbourne University’s most unknown and under-utilised arts spaces – The Open Stage.

While the Union and Guild Theatres have back-to-back performances throughout most of semester, The Open Stage sits empty and forgotten over the other side of campus. “The University hates it being used as a performance space” says Chris Summers, Arts Officer of the Student Union. “Its ridiculously expensive”. Luckily Mudfest has secured the support of the Theatre Board in covering the cost of the venue. More then just political manoeuvring to ensure the University still sees The Open Stage as a vital resource on campus, Chris says the venue offers a unique opportunity to completely curate a space. While the organisers are being tight lipped about the designs for the Club, Chris assures me it will challenge people preconceptions about the space.

Nearly as secret as the Club’s design is the Club’s program, which had not been realised at time of printing. Chris says the response from acts wanting to perform in the Club has been really good, particularly from music acts. He thinks a particular highlight will be a “weird trippy performance group” called Mr Brady, which he compares to a 1970s version of Flight of the Conchords. There will also be a number of nights which will allow budding performers to turn up and get involved, including Comedy Survivor and Acoustic Idol. Another highlight is likely to be the 24 hour installation project in which four artists will produce an arts installation using only things they find on campus.

Your first chance to see the Club will be on Tuesday when it plays host to the Mudfest Opening Night party. Hosted by Simon Taylor, the night will kick off from 8pm. For coverage of the Opening Night and full details of this weeks Club program, see Wednesday’s edition of Mudmap.

The Open Stage is located on Level 2 of the Arts Centre, corner of Swanton and Grattan Streets.