Lysander’s Aunty brings riotous laughs to Aotearoa New Zealand Festival of the Arts and Te Ahurei Toi o Tāmaki / Auckland Arts Festival
A dazzlingly irreverent take on William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream will premiere at Aotearoa’s biggest arts festivals this March. Nominated for the prestigious Adam Award for Best New
Zealand Play, this larger-than-life contemporary comedy is written by multi award-winning New Zealand writer Ralph McCubbin Howell and directed by Hannah Smith.
In Shakespeare’s original work, young lovers Lysander and Hermia defy the Duke by eloping to an aunt’s house in the
woods – who is only briefly mentioned. But, who is this law-snubbing, free-loving aunty who lives in the bush?
This riotous reworking of the Bard’s most popular play takes a cannon to the canon. With quick, witty dialogue and a
pacy plot, this world premiere and energetic production stars Miriama McDowell (Coming Home in the Dark, Astroman, Whina) as Lysander’s outrageous renegade aunty. An acclaimed actor of stage and screen, McDowell won Best Actress Award at
the New Zealand Film Awards for her role in The Great Maiden's Blush in 2016 and the 2020 New Zealand Television Award for Best Actress for her character Renee in TVNZ’s Head High.
Sepelini Mua’au (Big Data, Stravinsky’s The Soldier’s Tale, A Traveller’s Guide to Turkish Dogs) makes his Auckland Theatre Company debut as Lysander alongside a swag of celebrated NZ performers, including 2021
Billy T Award winner Brynley Stent (Six Degrees of Separation, Shortland Street, SNORT) and 2021 Comedy Festival Fred Award winner Eli Matthewson (7 Days, Earnest, Funny Girls), Stephen Lovatt (The Power of the Dog, Things I Know to be True), Claire Chitham (Mean Mums, Outrageous Fortune, Nell Gwynn), and Jonathan Martin (Twelfth Night, Falling Inn Love, Jersey Boys) plus an outstanding ensemble cast.
Auckland Theatre Company has joined forces with award-winning theatre makers Trick of the Light (The Griegol, The Bookbinder, The Road That Wasn’t There), Brilliant Adventures, Aotearoa New Zealand Festival of the Arts and Te Ahurei Toi o Tāmaki / Auckland Arts Festival to bring this inventive and large-scale collaboration to audiences in Wellington and Auckland. The play was
commissioned by The Court Theatre in Christchurch and set to premiere in 2020 when New Zealand’s first lockdown scuppered the season.
Director and Trick of the Light co-founder Hannah Smith says, “Our original premiere season with The Court Theatre got COVID-ed off the stage four days before opening, halfway
through the lighting plot. It was as if someone had offered us a giant triple scoop ice-cream and then dashed it out of
our mouths just as we were about to take a bite.
“This season feels like an incredible chance to make a new version of this bonkers, madcap romp of a play – it is an
antidote to the introversion and downsizing and bleakness which has characterised the last two years, an unapologetic,
irreverent, splashy comedy. It was probably Shakespeare who said: we could all use a laugh, couldn’t we?”
Smith leads a top team to bring the dazzling production to life. Creatives include Set Designer Daniel Williams (The Seagull, BOYS, Filthy Business), Costume Designer Elizabeth Whiting (The Life of Galileo, Shortland Street - The Musical, Joan/The Daylight Atheist), award-winning Lighting Designer Sean Lynch (Black Lover, Winding Up, The Audience), Sound Designer Eden Mulholland (Red Speedo, Movement of the Human, Belle), with Movement/Fight Director Dan Bain and Choreographer Brigid Costello completing the experienced team.
Lysander's Aunty sits alongside a number of great theatrical and screen works that bounce off Shakespeare's plays: The Lion King and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead pull from Hamlet; Shakespeare in Love is based on Twelfth Night; Kurosawa's Throne of Blood is a samurai interpretation of Macbeth; West Side Story is a contemporary reimagining of Romeo & Juliet.
Hilarious, unique and a little bit magical, the unmissable Lysander’s Aunty will take audiences on a wild ride with a fresh Kiwi spin on one of the greatest stories ever told.
Tickets are on sale now for strictly limited festival seasons in Wellington and Auckland.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uub6S2IJjzITRAILER & IMAGES:
LYSANDER’S AUNTY or A Most Rageful Irreverent Comedy Concerning an Offstage Character from A Midsummer Night’s Dream10 – 13 March | Wellington Opera House in the Aotearoa New Zealand Festival of the Arts
www.festival.nz17 March – 3 April | ASB Waterfront Theatre in the Te Ahurei Toi o Tāmaki / Auckland Arts Festival
Tickets and info atc.co.nzCAST:
Aunty: Miriama McDowell
Lysander: Sepelini Mua'au
Egeus: Stephen Lovatt
Hippolyta: Claire Chitham
Theseus: Jonathan Martin
Helena: Brynley Stent
Ricky: Eli Matthewson
Dogberry: Anya Tate-Manning
Hermia: Mirabai Pease
Demetrius: Andrew Paterson
and introducing Lahleina Feaunati, Louise Jiang, Rosalind Lay-Yazdani and Madison WadeCREATIVES:
Written by: Ralph McCubbin Howell
Direction: Hannah Smith
Set Design: Daniel Williams
Costume Design: Elizabeth Whiting
Lighting Design: Sean Lynch
Sound Design & Composition: Eden Mulholland
Animation & Motion Graphic: Tim Hamilton, POW Studios
Movement & Fight Direction: Dan Bain
Choreography: Brigid CostelloNotes to the Editor:About Auckland Theatre Company
Founded in 1992 by Simon Prast, Auckland Theatre Company opened its first production at the Watershed Theatre in 1993.
From 2003 to 2021 the company was led by acclaimed Artistic Director Colin McColl ONZM and in July 2021 Jonathan Bielski
took the helm as Artistic Director & CEO. Auckland Theatre Company presents an annual season of theatre shows as well as extensive education, youth, touring
and new work development programmes.
www.atc.co.nzAbout Trick of the Light
Trick of the Light is an award-winning theatre company from Wellington, founded by Hannah Smith and Ralph McCubbin
Howell.
Hannah is a Wellington based director, designer and producer who grew up in Ōtepoti. She has an honours degree in
English and Theatre from Victoria University of Wellington. She received a nomination for Most Promising Director at the
2011 Wellington Theatre Awards, and received the same award in 2013 for The Road That Wasn’t There. Hannah has a background in puppetry and paper-art, and her work with Trick of the Light has been performed around
Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia, the UK, USA, Canada and South Africa.
Ralph is a Wellington based theatre maker who grew up in Waikari in Te Waipounamu. He was a member of the NZ Young
Shakespeare Company and completed a BA (Hons) in Theatre & English at Victoria University of Wellington before training at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in the UK. He
received the award for Outstanding New Playwright at the 2011 Wellington Theatre Awards, and Outstanding New NZ Play for The Road That Wasn’t There in 2013. He won the Bruce Mason Playwriting Award in 2014 and received a Masters in Scriptwriting at the International
Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University.