By Lorena Mazuera Grisales and Joachim Matschoss– coming in 2020/2021
This one-woman show is written in three languages, Spanish, English and German. Colombian performer Lorena Mazuera Grisales has composed the music to the moving play by Joachim Matschoss which is part song cycle, part theatre-piece with puppetry elements. It explores legends and myths, namely the Eldorado story. The play is in development for some years now and will eventually tour.
Cast: Lorena Mazuera Grisales
Writer/ Director: Joachim Matschoss
Read MoreTwo actors are trying to juggle work-shifts, shared housing, auditions and the constant urge to be creative. Relationships are difficult because the craft gets in the way. This satirical piece looks at dating, being happy and above all trying to be an actor in a country that doesn’t really value the arts as much as say, sport.
This production received a staged public reading at Heidelberg Theatre Company in early May 2021.
Creatives: Olivia Brewer, Huw Jennings, Giacinta Squires, Shamita Sivabalan, Joachim Matschoss.
Read MoreCreatives: Eva Justine Torkkola, Alisha Eddy, Holly Bohmer, Anna Reardon, Emma Walsh, Nyssa Levings, Lore Burns.
Read MoreThis new play tells the story of a family living on either side of the iron curtain, spanning three decades it is set between 1978 and 2011. It was performed in the Salon at the Abbotsford Convent.
Creatives: Adam May, Rebekah Hill, Georgia Eyers, Matthew Bertram, Ariani Adam, Kate Bailey, Andrew Watson, Esther Schouten, Ben Jamieson, Joachim Matschoss
Joachim Matschoss’s latest play, By the End of the Year is about longing, the longing for a lost brother, killed by the Communists while attempting to escape East Berlin, the longing for a wife who left him for another man, and the pervasive longing for home and family. It is also a play about entrapment. Matschoss’s protagonist, Vitus is trapped by the cruel consequences of history’s judgement, a victim of the time and place that holds him within his spiked walls in Riga. His wife, Lydia, and daughter Anne attempt to escape from the entrapment, only to discover the real meaning of home and family. Only Vitus’s younger daughter, Rosa, is content, bound by loyalty and love. Vitus is trapped by the dark secret of a fateful past and an enforced present. Matschoss’s play is a family tragedy, enveloped in the inevitability of historical events and human longing.
It is told with a directness and compassion that, spanning the years and passing back and forth, casts his characters in the drama of their circumstance and motive. His dialogue is simple and economical, disguising a complex subtext of each character’s longing. The occasional monologues paint the canvas of his drama with the poetic shades of hopes and dreams and desires. Their eloquence is moving and powerful.
By The End of the Year reveals the talent of a playwright, who identifies with his plot and demonstrates a subtle, yet revealing empathy for his characters. It is a play that will resonate with all who bear a sense of loss or long for the fulfilment of their hopes and dreams.
- Peter Wilkins, Canberra Times
Read MoreInternational Tour 2018/2019. What country friends is this? is a new theatre piece devised by the 2019-ensemble and Joachim Matschoss with music by young composers Olivia Smith and Tom Pitts. What country friends is this? sees Viola (Twelfth Night’s heroine) to land in Illyria which looks part forest of Arden, part contemporary city. Viola disguises herself to explore this strange place and tries to find employment and bumps into Juliet (who has just met Romeo at that infamous party). Love hits and a confused Cesario (Viola) runs away, meeting other Shakespearean heroines along the way.
The theatre piece deals with identity, relationships, love, gender and what it means to be young in today’s times. Above all it explores Shakespeare’s themes in a fun way. Soliloquies become songs and the audience will not escape the magic of love.
What country friends is this? will be shown on a bare stage with an ensemble of four actors/singers. They share their thoughts and their innermost feelings with the audience. This is a piece of theatre that includes original songs. It part comic, moving and thought-provoking. The show premiered in Melbourne/Australia in 2018, before touring in late February to April 2019 to HongKong, China, Thailand, Singapore, Germany, the United Kingdom, Sri Lanka, France, Switzerland, the USA, Ireland, the Philippines and the Netherlands.
Creatives: Casey Bohan, Anna Lyons, Megan Mitchell, Olivia Smith, Joachim Matschoss.
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Missing in Me is a new theatre piece devised by the ensemble and Joachim Matschoss with music by Ross Brooks, Matthew Baker and Matthew Ganton.
Missing in Me tells the story of Samira and her sister Tilly who surrounded by wealth and an absence of love. Samira has about to finish her schooling and tries make sense of what is ahead of her. The theatre piece deals with identity, parent-child relationships, love and what it means to be young in today’s times.
Missing in Me was presented on a bare stage with an ensemble of four actors/singers. This piece of theatre included original songs. It is part comic, moving and thought-provoking.
Missing in Me premiered in Melbourne/Australia, before touring to China, Thailand, Singapore, Germany, the United Kingdom, Luxembourg, France, Switzerland and the Netherlands.
Creatives: Holly Bohmer, Annie Lumsden, Emily O’Connor, Tara Vagg, Joachim Matschoss.
Read MoreA run-down school. Dr. Andrew Bond arrives with a mission: to drag the place into the 21st century whatever it may take. Deputy Kelly Shoe tries desperately to just reach the end of each day in one piece. Open warfare between the Sports-department, headed by control-freak Lex Ratters and the smarmy academic and part-time poet David O’Keefe. Well, real life really…
We have decided to set Teaching and Learning in a stylized make-shift boardroom with no designated audience area. The audience sat at a long table or took their seats anywhere they liked and moved around if they felt like it…the madness that is education happened all around them, maybe even somewhere where they least expected it.
Creatives: Dom Westcott, Anna Lyons, Sean Paisley-Collins, Cara Whitehouse, Ben Jamieson, Jake Matricardi, Isabel Mulrooney, Bridget Sweeney, Alisha Eddy, Rob Downie, Joachim Matschoss.
Read MoreThis all-female adaptation of Shakespeare’s play is a gleefully mischievous take on what is at heart of this timeless piece and was perfomed in 2016 at the Abbotsford Convent.
In the 400th anniversary year of Shakespeare’s death, the play is given a fresh cut.
Why all female? Simple, in Shakespeare’s time it was all men, it’s time to reverse it.
Why contemporary? Why not!
Spontaneous bursts of song: Beatles, Rolling Stones, David Bowie (alas), even Kenny Rogers. There is more: physical comedy, bad poetry (not the Bard’s), live music, the use of natural light and a bare space.
This DREAM was for our times, a little bit anarchic, raucous and irreverent and bursting with life.
Creatives: Amy Bradney-George, Kate Lewis, Anna Reardon, Holly Bohmer, Eva Justine Torkkola, Seon Williams, Freya Timmer-Arends, Grace McKenzie-McHarg, Emma Walsh, Celia Handscombe, Louise Purcell, Diana Stathis, Victoria Nyguen, Tom Hoskins, Joachim Matschoss.
Read MoreStar of Wormwood is a theatre piece by Joachim Matschoss with music by Matthew Baker that deals with the issue of prejudice. It tells the story of a High School student researching the life of Mary Webster, a woman accused of witchcraft in 1680. The student becomes so fascinated by her topic that time and space become irrelevant, and she suddenly finds herself centuries ago on a hill in desolate surrounds talking to Mary Webster.
This haunting theatre piece was being presented on a bare stage but soon the empty space is occupied by a strange mix of characters, all part of a shadow-world. They share their thoughts, their innermost feelings, longings and desires. This music theatre piece is based on a true story, researched from articles, interviews, snippets of reality. Star of Wormwood uses physical theatre, dance, song, puppetry and visual elements to create a moving experience. It received an international tour in 2014.
Creatives: Elsa Caruso, Taylor Troeth, Harriet Reid, Jake Rosen, Ben Jamieson, Chelsey Weisz, Robert Downie, Liam Farrell, Joachim Matschoss, Matthew Baker, Rod Primrose.
Read MoreSmall World is a social satire set in a trendy café in a large city. It was performed at the Abbotsford Convent, the Barbershop Cafe and The Produce store in Mansfield in 2015.
Cyclists stop here because of its coffee and this place is also a popular hang-out for actors and those who aspire to be on stage or grace the screen. Ella and Lisa are friends and love performing, sometimes even in real life.
Creatives: Hannah Koch, Sasha Joseph, Nathan Bocskay, Renee St.Clair, Joachim Matschoss.
Read MoreThe Beauty of Scars is a new theatre piece by Joachim Matschoss with music by Tom Hoskins that deals with the issues of abuse and identity or rather the loss of. The piece tells the story of school-friends Sarah and Sally who grew up in rural Western Australia. Events during that time force them to leave everything behind in a desperate attempt to be safe. Years later (at the beginning of the play) we see them trying to make sense of their past and ultimately wanting to find each other again.
Creatives: Shaun Gurton, Michele Preshaw, Tom Hoskins, Joachim Matschoss, Catherine Lewis, Tilly Legge, Amy Cameron.
The Beauty of Scars was performed in the Tower theatre at the Malthouse in 2016.
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