Theatre MK-Alpha opened its doors in late 2010, inviting works from every end of the playwriting spectrum – from the most established playwrights to newly discovered gems of underground theatre.

For the Melbourne Theatre Company’s NEON 2014 MK-Alpha proudly brought together some of Melbourne’s hottest directors, dramaturgs and actors to present three new readings (plus a brass band, a DJ, and some snacks depending what night you turned up) for Melbourne’s late night viewing enjoyment.

NEON Up-Late featured:

LORD WILLING & THE CREEK DON’T RISE
BY MORGAN ROSE

TRIUMPH
BY LOURIS VAN DE GEER

ALRAUNE
BY MEREDITH PENMAN

WHEN
Jun-Aug 2014
Late Night.

WHERE
Southbank Theatre

DURATION
As long as it takes

FURTHER INFO
Cushions provided.
Though you’d normally fall asleep at the MTC napping will be impossible.

A year after Hurricane Katrina does her dirty dance over New Orleans, blues-sick army vet Zachary Bowen flings himself from the roof of the city’s Omni Hotel. In his pocket, police find a note begging them to go to his apartment. There they find the corpse of his lover, Addie Hall, dismembered and cooked, her head in a pot on the stove.

Only maybe the story happens in Far North Queensland last year. Or maybe it happens in the recently flooded Holy Land to a Palestinian father. Either way the waters are rising and Zachary, or someone just like him, lives near you with his wife/partner/a woman he’s having for dinner/a woman he’s having for dinner.

Jun 06, 2014
NEON UP LATE / MKA

Lord Willing & the Creek Don’t Rise
by Morgan Rose

Director
Kat Henry (MKA Director-in-Residence)

Cast
Sheridan Harbridge
Dan Fredericksen
Kevin Keirnan-Molloy
Jan Friedl

INFORMATION
Contains coarse language, horror, class warfare

In the aftermath of a terrible tragedy, A Woman, ‘The Survivor’, emerges as a voice for those who suffered. We love her. We send her gifts and cards and roses. We watch her on the television.

Two men sit in a car in a forest in the rain. It’s a shame about the rain because someone might catch a cold. But does it really matter now that they’ve made it to the forest?

Then there’s A Young Girl with a long list of symptoms but no diagnosis and A Mother who’s taken vigil by her bedside with the television guide and a pen.

Triumph traces the effect of trauma (real or imagined) and the reality of processing pain through the interwoven threads of three seemingly disparate stories.

Jul 18, 2014
NEON UP LATE / MKA

Triumph
by Louris van de Geer

Director
Mark Pritchard

Cast
Aljin Abella
Fantine Banulski
Paul David-Goddard
Emma Hall
Leone White

Production Assistant/Musician
Robert Johnson

INFORMATION
Contains coarse language

Based on the European folk-tale, Alraune (‘mandrake’) is an alchemical mix of Frankenstein and Pygmalion – a contradictory tale of sexual double-standards, lust and science gone wrong.

When aging genetic scientist Professor Jakob ten Brinken discovers he can create life using the basest of DNA samples, he kidnaps a prostitute and impregnates her with a mandrake root. Nine months later she has a girl-child, born without a soul, whom the professor adopts and names Alraune.

As Alraune grows up she wreaks havoc on those around her – her budding sexuality, seemingly amoral and dangerous, drives men and women to their dooms. In a world of moral panic and repression, Alraune realises what she could become, and a powerful transformation begins.

Aug 01, 2014
NEON UP LATE / MKA

Alraune
by Meredith Penman

Directed by John Kachoyan
MKA Co-creative Director

Cast
Ruben Francis
Virginia Gay
Emily Milledge
Jane Montgomery Griffiths
Gareth Reeves
James Wardlaw
Devon Wilton

WARNING
Contains coarse language and sexual content