Fold : Shudder
Jo Randerson : Pip Hall
These two exceptional one act plays from two leading
young playwrights were both hits at Young and Hungry Festivals,
and make excellent companions.
Fold is an hilarious and grotesque series of increasingly coldhearted birthday parties.
Set among five celebrations grimly enjoyed by five jaundiced and
peculiar partygoers , it is an unnerving and disturbingly amusing
play - a chaotic soup of insecurity, obsession and scary self-analysis.
The ugly views and behaviour of this group of weird, semi-clothed
acquaintances finally degenerate into mayhem ... watch out for the
cat.
Shudder was inspired by Dylan
Thomas'
Under Milk Wood, and ranges
over a dazzling cross-section of Wellington characters. This prose-poetic
monologue wanders through a day in the life of the subcultures of
earthquake prone Wellingon, weaving together the essential concerns
of those living on both the physical and emotional edge. The inevitable
crisis comes throught the anguish of Ruaumoko, the child of Maori
legend who will never be born.
From reviews of
Fold -
"To see Fold is to enter a grotesque, shadowy and hilarious realm ... Randerson
is Wellington's playwright of the moment ..."
Capital Times
"... hilariously self-centred and pretentious people. Their children are fashion accessories ..."
The Listener
" Profoundly funny and clever comment ..."
The Dominion
From Reviews of
Shudder -
"Shudder is an exceptional play - 'Under Milk Wood' on acid ..."
Capital Times
"... this metaphor challenges us to consider how much of our potential remains unborn ... "
National Business Review
"Shudder could have been inspired by the films of Robert Altman, with its gripping stories about
a cross section of Wellington from Khandallah to Aro Street."
Evening Post
Jo Randerson graduated from Victoria University in 1994 with a BA
in Theatre and Film. She has written over 20 plays and has published
three books -
The Knot,
The
Spit Children and
The Keys to
Hell. Her short stories have been published in journals and
anthologies, and she also regularly performs her own work. Jo was
the 2001 Burns Fellow at Otago University, Dunedin.
Pip Hall graduated from Otago University in 1994
with a B.A in Drama. She has extensive experience as an actor, stage
and production manager and writer for both stage and screen. Her
work includes No Man's Land, Landmine, queen b, Red Fish Blue Fish;
Skitz, Shortland Street, Telly Laughs, and WNTV. She now has two
small children and is working on a new play about motherhood.
