THEATRE: SALOME – IN COGITO VOLUME III

PREVIEW BY AMELIA GROOM

She was not only an instigator in the death of John The Baptist, but – so the story goes – she requested his head on a platter. Salome has been an icon of dangerous female seductiveness since early Christian traditions, and in Renaissance art she was often depicted dancing naked. Oscar Wilde later added a new ramification by making her a necrophiliac ‘ and this was retained Richard Strauss’ opera version.

In the latest re-imagining of the old tale, The Rabble present Salome as a groomless, bed wetting, albino bride tormented by her masochist father and drag-queen mother. In a small Australian town swept with plague and drought where citizens have been left infected and feverish, Salome rampantly pursues John ‘ a German-speaking prisoner and occasional paraplegic prone to accidentally drowning his disciples. Sound interesting’

The Rabble are an ambitious collaborative of three co-directors – Syd Brisbane, Kate Davis and Emma Valente – seeking to push the boundaries of independent theatre. In a style inspired by Caravaggio, Castellucci, Robert Wilson, and Barrie Kosky, Salome – In Cogito Volume III is a provocative, grotesque and surreal theatre experience. Using bright suburban Australian imagery alongside the brooding dark sexuality of Renaissance paintings, it is visual theatre that is loaded with the perverse, erotic and sublime.

Salome ‘ In Cogito Volume III
CarriageWorks, Bay 17
245 Wilson Street, Eveleigh
May 8 ‘ 17
$20-30
Bookings: www.ticketmaster.com.au or 1300 723 038