For those in search of culinary variety, food courts used to be the natural go-to. Then came the age of precincts, which boomed in the wake of the pandemic as businesses within walkable footprints banded together to form easily navigable options for a venue-hopping night out. Over the past couple of years, however, a new breed of dining destination has emerged combining the calibre of stand-alone venues that used to be the preserve of precincts with the under-one-roof convenience that was once the food court's monopoly. Hospitality hubs are fast becoming the apex predators of Sydney's dining scene, with many of the most compelling openings of 2024 falling into this ascendant category of venue. Typically operated by a single hospitality group, these multi-venue, often multi-level and, crucially, multi-purpose establishments can simultaneously cater to punters seeking very different experiences, be that a pre-dinner cocktail and a restaurant booking, a laidback after-work drink, a cute date spot or somewhere to let loose with a dancefloor. We've picked out the best of the bunch in Sydney, including two newcomers set to open within weeks. Which will you visit first? Recommended reads: The Best Italian Restaurants in Sydney The Mexican Restaurants in Sydney The Best Pizza in Sydney The Best French Restaurants in Sydney
Strange though it might be to think that one of the world's oldest cities is having a moment nearly three and a half millennia since its recorded history began, Athens has always played by its own rules. And it's the buzzy, no-frills tavernas that line the streets of the modern-day Greek capital — rather than the blue-washed, nautical Cycladic dreamscapes often associated with Greek dining — that are channelled at Homer Rogue Taverna, now open in Cronulla courtesy of brothers Harry and Mario Kapoulas of neighbouring brunch favourite Ham. Much like the city from which it takes its inspiration, Homer zigs where others zag. In contrast to Sydney's slick, white-linen Greek spots, Homer is a deliberately laidback — and pared-back — affair, with a raw contemporary fitout that juxtaposes exposed brick and concrete, chicken wire glass and graffitied walls with elegant mid-century furniture, terrazzo flooring and a rocaro granite chef's counter that frames the stainless steel open kitchen. The 100-seat venue is primarily open for walk-ins — a spot, says Harry, "where you're welcome whether you're still in your thongs after a day at the beach, enjoying a family meal or celebrating a special occasion". [caption id="attachment_1015973" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Trent van der Jagt[/caption] A similar disregard for the rules is evident in the menu — there are no starters or mains here, but instead a generous lineup of dishes designed to be shared as they're ready. You might begin with loukaniko- and haloumi-topped stone-baked flatbread, manouri cheese baked in kataifi and drizzled in honey or a playful take on stifado, which sees the traditional homestyle stew wrapped in a cigar-shaped chicken skin emulsion. Larger dishes include their mum's moussaka and a spanakorizo served with white fish, while the charcoal souvla — and what's on it — is constantly evolving. For dessert, the house-made mint ice cream with marinated watermelon already feels like a classic in the making. The open-plan bar, meanwhile, pours a selection of ouzo, creative cocktails (including a $10 martini mouthful) and Homer's Epic Lager, brewed exclusively for the restaurant in partnership with Young Henry's. Signature serves include the See Through Pornstar — a cheeky riff on the classic topped with champagne foam — and the Athenian Punch, a sweet and sour hit of strawberry, rum and citrus. Guests are encouraged to get up and explore the three-metre-tall, custom-built wine fridge stocked mainly with Greek and Australian varietals, including an old-vine savatiano, one of the world's oldest grapes. [caption id="attachment_1015972" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Trent van der Jagt[/caption] Images: Trent van der Jagt.
Redfern's new watering hole, Moya's Juniper Lounge, takes a reverent approach to all things gin. Since opening on Regent Street, the little hole-in-the-wall venue has been generating industry buzz, and it's not hard to see why. It's not flashy or elaborate – forget extensive menus that cater to your every whim. Instead, the Moya's team are single-mindedly interested in perfection. The mainstay of the operation is the sassy gin-centric cocktail list, each garnished with the words of great drinkers and thinkers of the ages – including the Queen Mother, Robert Downey Jr. and George Costanza. "All the drinks are classics," says co-owner and operator Charles Casben. "We're not doing anything new but we're trying to do traditionalism well." The bar currently serves a small but well paired menu, featuring pickle plates, cured meats sliced to order, and a ham and cheese sandwich on a brioche bun. Perfectly sophisticated, dahhling. The interior of the venue hints at traditionalism, and that's fitting. The history of gin reaches back over two hundred years and has appealed to completely polar identities during that time. When gin was introduced in England in the early 1700s, it was thought an unethical and wicked vice of the lower classes. After doing battle with prohibition and alcohol reform and emerging as a gentleman's drink, gin production became more refined, more like the gin we know (and love) today. Moya's Juniper Lounge references the gin palaces of old with a cosy but plush atmosphere, mismatched velvet lounges, long runner rugs and old fashioned decoration. Still, while they may serve cocktails and delicate sandwiches, there's nothing snooty about this place, which is gunning to become your new local. "We really wanted it to be a local, friendly little cocktail bar," says Casben. "When I was working at Ester, the community around Chippendale/Redfern had a really local, genuine, friendly atmosphere and it was really enticing; we wanted to be a part of it." Images: Steven Woodburn.
Australia's best interiors for 2025 have been revealed — and a theatrical Brisbane restaurant has nabbed top honours. Central, the subterranean restaurant by J.AR Office, claimed the prestigious Premier Award for Australian Interior Design at this year's Australian Interior Design Awards. Celebrated for its moody, immersive atmosphere and inventive use of constraints, the venue also won the Hospitality Design Award and Best of State Commercial for Queensland. The annual awards, now in their 22nd year, recognise excellence across residential, hospitality, retail, installation, public and workplace design, as well as achievements in sustainability and emerging practice. The program is a collaboration between the Design Institute of Australia and Architecture Media's InteriorsAu, with this year's entries honouring aesthetic impact and user-centred thinking. [caption id="attachment_1010109" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Central by J.AR Office[/caption] The jury praised Central as a "highly inventive project" that's "executed with a level of cleverness that uses constraints to its advantage". In a year defined by refined aesthetics and clear design narratives, the 80-seat, Hong Kong-inspired Central stood out for its emotive interiors, with low lighting and cleverly juxtaposed accents of granite, timber and exposed rock, which all set the stage for a singular experience. Elsewhere, southern states swept the residential awards — Montage Apartments by Studio Prineas in Sydney's Double Bay received both the Residential Design and Best of State Residential for New South Wales accolades, commended for its "strong and nuanced colour palette and detailing", while the "joyful, sophisticated and colourful" Panorama House by Sally Caroline won the Residential Decoration Award and Best of State Residential for Victoria. Design Office claimed Retail Design honours for Vic's Meats in Chatswood Chase, Sydney — the project was also awarded Best of State Commercial in NSW for its "bold and highly distinctive design" that "honour[s] the tradition of the butcher's craft through a contemporary expression". [caption id="attachment_1010110" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Coopers Brand Home by studio gram[/caption] In the Public Design category, Studio SC was recognised for its moving and detailed interior at the new Australian War Memorial entrance in Canberra, which also took home Best of State Commercial in the ACT. The jury was split down the middle for the Workplace Design award, with top honours shared by both Cox Architecture's Adelaide Studio (which also won Best of State Commercial for South Australia) and the Arup Workplace Perth/Boorloo by Hames Sharley with Arup and Peter Farmer Designs — the latter also received the Sustainability Advancement Award for its conscious use of resources and sensitivity to human interaction. The jury noted that this year's awards represented "an opportunity for our industry to stand back, take it all in and genuinely celebrate the quality of interior design being produced in Australia today". And they're confident that the future is in good hands, too: "We can give ourselves a collective pat on the back as we continue to produce work that is inventive and sophisticated." [caption id="attachment_1010111" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Good Luck Restaurant Bar by Akin Atelier[/caption] [caption id="attachment_1010112" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Good Luck Restaurant Bar by Akin Atelier[/caption] [caption id="attachment_1010113" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Melbourne Place by Kennedy Nolan[/caption] [caption id="attachment_1010114" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Melbourne Place by Kennedy Nolan[/caption] [caption id="attachment_1010115" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Melbourne Place by Kennedy Nolan[/caption] [caption id="attachment_1010116" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Palace Coffee by Kerry Kounnapis Architecture Practice[/caption] For more information on the Australian Interior Design Awards 2025 and the full list of winners, head to the awards' website.
This winter, garage goths, a fusion of jazz and metal played by musicians in clown masks, a head-on collision and sand raining down on a man in an hourglass are all on the agenda — on Dark Mofo's 2025 agenda, that is. If you needed any proof that the Tasmanian winter arts festival is back after sitting out 2024, consider the above sample of the lineup as overwhelming evidence. This has always been a fest where expecting the unexpected is the baseline, and that isn't changing in 2025. Dark Mofo already gave the world a sneak peek at what's to come from Thursday, June 5–Sunday, June 15, 2025, when the bulk of the event takes place — the Nude Solstice Swim is on Saturday, June 21 — when it announced Nathan Maynard's We threw them down the rocks where they had thrown the sheep back in March. Accordingly, when it revealed that it'd be hosting a mass installation from the multidisciplinary Trawlwoolway artist, and one that uses sheep flesh to make a statement about the treatment of First Nations people, it signalled that it was still the boundary-pushing fest that folks love flocking to when the weather cools. Now comes the full program, the first under new Artistic Director Chris Twite, which has a date with riverbanks, deconsecrated churches, rooftops, basements, bank vaults and more. 'Dark Mofo is back!" said Twite, revealing the lineup. "Once again we will bathe the city in red, filling it with art and taking over disused and hidden spaces all across Nipaluna/Hobart. Night Mass — the late-night labyrinth of revelry — will carve new paths through the city and a host of Australian-exclusive artists from around the world will storm our stages." That filling downtown Hobart with art and music for Night Mass was set to be a part of Dark Mofo 2025 was announced last year — as was the return of the aforementioned Nude Solstice Swim, the Ogoh-Ogoh and culinary highlight Winter Feast. The festival has shared more details on each now, however, including that Niyati Rao from Mumbai restaurant Ekaa is Winter Feast's guest chef, working with Craig Will, Bianca Welsh and James Welsh from Launceston's Stillwater; that Night Mass: God Complex boasts 100-plus talents involved; and that a giant Maugean skate is the focus at the Ogoh-Ogoh. [caption id="attachment_998147" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Netti Habel[/caption] On the music side of the lineup, the full program now adds The Horrors and Clown Core, plus Tierra Whack, Cold Cave, Boy Harsher, Baroness, Crime & the City Solution, Show Me the Body, Alabaster DePlume, LUCY (Cooper B Handy), Machine Girl and Mong Tong — all in Australian-exclusive gigs, and all demonstrating how wide-ranging even just the fest's tunes will be. Rap and R&B, progressive metal, art-punk, hardcore both ceremonial and digital: they're just some of the genres on offer. Portishead's Beth Gibbons is also performing at Vivid Sydney, RISING in Melbourne and Brisbane's Open Season, but her spot on the Dark Mofo bill is no less exciting — and via two shows at The Odeon, she's launching the music program. Or, you can catch Rival Consoles give the ambient synth of Landscape From Memory its Australian premiere; see Spectral Wound, Imperial Triumphant Hymns, Hulder and Slimelord at the return of Hymns to the Dead; and witness Dead Can Dance founding member Lisa Gerrard and William Barton perform their Under In Between project live for the first time. DIIV, Jessica Pratt, Drain Gang's Thaiboy Digital, Keanu Nelson, Shackleton, Siddhartha Belmannu, Gut Health, Forest Swords, Brighter Death Now, Evicshen: they're hitting the stage as well. So is a new project from German music festival Berlin Atonal, and London Contemporary Orchestra's Robert Ames teaming up with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra. Featuring Brazilian artist Paula Garcia and a stunt driver, Crash Body is one of the performance highlights. The Havana-born Carlos Martiel is contributing two pieces, video work Cuerpo and new unveiling Custody, which is where the hourglass comes in — and, as part of his unpacking of systemic violence against people of colour, where Dark Mofo gets another must-see. A empty warehouse will be lit up like the sky thanks to SORA by Nonotak, Simon Zoric's Coffin Rides contemplates the afterlife and collaborative music project Everything Is Recorded from Richard Russell will ponder the winter solstice in an improvised piece. Claudia Comte's La Danse Macabre is set to combine two pianists playing the titular piece as a motocross rider jumps through a the flames from a wooden sculpture on fire — as everyone can witness on a screen in Dark Park — to comment on capitalism, while Ida Sophia's video work Witness muses on religious fervour, and Nicholas Galanin's Neon Anthem will get visitors taking knee and scereaming. From Ronnie van Hout's Quasi and Travis Ficarra's Chocolate Goblin sculptures to the extreme metal vocalisations of Karina Utomo's Mortal Voice and Dark Mofo Films making a comeback, too — with Sound of Metal, Eraserhead, The Proposition, A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, The Lighthouse, Wake in Fright, Melancholia and more — if you're not finding at least 20 events on the program to get excited about instantly, then you're not looking hard enough. [caption id="attachment_994599" align="alignnone" width="1920"] We threw them down the rocks where they had thrown the sheep images: Jesse Hunniford, 2025. Image courtesy of Dark Mofo 2025.[/caption] [caption id="attachment_998148" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Ednid Alvarez[/caption] Dark Mofo returns from Thursday, June 5–Sunday, June 15, 2025 and for the Nude Solstice Swim on Saturday, June 21. Head to the festival's website for further details and tickets. Images courtesy of Dark Mofo. Top image: Marcos Cimardi.
After chronicling the day-to-day chaos at a company that sells paper, what comes next for The Office — in the US, that is? Documenting the daily reality of life working at a newspaper. As announced in 2024, the beloved American version of the hit sitcom is getting a spinoff. In The Paper, which is led by Domhnall Gleeson (Echo Valley) and Sabrina Impacciatore (G20 and also The White Lotus season two), a midwestern newspaper publisher is in the spotlight. The series debuts on Thursday, September 4, 2025 in the US and in Australia, streaming in the latter via Binge. If you're keen for a sneak peek, The Paper has also just dropped its first trailer. A new boss arriving to shake things up, staff ranging from apathetic to overenthusiastic, office-set awkwardness aplenty, a familiar face: they're all featured in the initial glimpse at the show. As its predecessor was, this is a mockumentary series. The setup: the same documentary crew that turned their cameras towards Dunder Mifflin's Scranton branch have found a new workplace to explore. Their time pointing their lens the Toledo Truth Teller's way coincides with Ned Sampson (Gleeson) joining the publication as editor-in-chief, with the paper's newest employee underwhelmed with the status quo and brimming with ideas about how to change things. Chelsea Frei (The Life List), Melvin Gregg (Fight Night), Gbemisola Ikumelo (Black Ops), Alex Edelman (Unfrosted), Ramona Young (You're Cordially Invited) and Tim Key (Mickey 17) also star in The Paper, as does Oscar Nuñez (The School Duel), reprising his role as Oscar Martinez. Accordingly, the new series is set in the same universe as the Steve Carell (Mountainhead)-led hit dwelled in from 2005–13 and sports multiple ties to it, but definitely isn't simply walking back into Dunder Mifflin with new staff. Also, Gleeson starred with Carell on 2022's The Patient, giving the two series another connection. Greg Daniels — who created the US version of The Office to begin with, and has also been behind Space Force and Upload — is steering The Paper behind the camera with Nathan for You co-creator Michael Koman. And yes, the franchise that initially kicked off in the UK version in 2001 just keeps expanding, after the Australian version dropped in 2024. Cringeworthy bosses, annoying co-workers and soul-crushing office jobs show no signs of fading away, of course, which all things The Office has understood for nearly a quarter of a century now. Check out the trailer for The Paper below: The Paper debuts in Australia on Thursday, September 4, 2025, streaming via Binge. Images: Aaron Epstein and John P Fleenor/PEACOCK.
Back in 2018, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced that it was adding a new award to the Oscars for Outstanding Achievement in Popular Film. If you can't remember which flicks have won it, there's a reason for that: the gong was scrapped quickly thanks to a heap of backlash. Across plenty of years since, the reason that that accolade wasn't needed has been proven. Black Panther, Joker, Everything Everywhere All At Once, Oppenheimer and Barbie have all featured heavily among the nominations, for instance — and everything except Barbenheimer so far has notched up wins. Both Christopher Nolan and Greta Gerwig's latest films are among the flicks with the most nominations in 2024, with 13 and eight apiece. They're also massive global box-office hits. So, going into this year's ceremony, you've likely seen at least those two contenders — but if you're wondering where to catch everything else, we've got the rundown. We've predicted who we think will emerge victorious, but the winners will be anointed on Monday, March 11, Down Under time. Right now in Australia, you can catch up with 31 movies that are hoping to score trophies. Some you need to hit the cinema to see. Others you can catch on the couch. With a few, you have the choice of heading out or staying home. From Barbenheimer (of course) and twists on Frankenstein to animated Spider-Man antics and devastating documentaries, here's where to direct your eyeballs. On the Big Screen: Anatomy of a Fall Nominations: Best Picture, Best Director (Justine Triet), Best Actress (Sandra Hüller), Best Original Screenplay, Best Film Editing Our thoughts: A calypso instrumental cover of 50 Cent's 'P.I.M.P.' isn't the only thing that Anatomy of a Fall's audience won't be able to dislodge from their heads after watching 2023's deserving Cannes Film Festival Palme d'Or-winner. A film from writer/director Justine Triet (Sibyl) that's thorny, knotty and defiantly unwilling to give any easy answers, this legal, psychological and emotional thriller about a woman (Sandra Hüller, The Zone of Interest) on trial for her husband's death is unshakeable in as many ways as someone can have doubts about another person: so, a myriad. Where to watch: In Australian cinemas. Read our full review. Four Daughters Nominations: Best Documentary Feature Our thoughts: There's a reason that Four Daughters can't include its entire namesake quartet, with just two appearing on-screen themselves and the other two played by actors. Unlike the younger Eya and Tayssir, the older Rahma and Ghofrane are no longer at home with their mother Olfa; instead, they left their family after becoming radicalised, with Islamic State in Libya their destination. So explores Tunisian filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania (The Man Who Sold His Skin), in a documentary that's as gripping as it is heartbreaking — and uses recreations with a purpose unlike almost any other movie. Where to watch: In Australian cinemas. May December Nominations: Best Original Screenplay Our thoughts: May December takes inspiration from Mary Kay Letourneau, the teacher who had a sexual relationship with her sixth-grade student in the 90s. A simple recreation was never going to be Todd Haynes' (Dark Waters) approach, however. Starring Julianne Moore (Sharper) and Charles Melton (Riverdale) as its central couple decades after the scandal, plus Natalie Portman (Thor: Love and Thunder) as an actor about to feature in a movie about them, this a savvily piercing film that sees the impact on the situation's victim, the story its perpetrator has spun, and the ravenous way that people's lives are consumed by the media and public. Where to watch: In Australian cinemas. Read our full review. The Zone of Interest Nominations: Best Picture, Best Director (Jonathan Glazer), Best International Feature, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Sound Our thoughts: Quotes and observations about evil being mundane, as well as the result when people look the other way, will never stop being relevant. A gripping, unsettling masterpiece, The Zone of Interest is a window into why. The first film by Sexy Beast, Birth and Under the Skin director Jonathan Glazer in more than a decade, the Holocaust-set and BAFTA-winning feature peers on as the unthinkable happens literally just over the fence, but a family goes about its ordinary life. If it seems abhorrent that anything can occur in the shadow of any concentration camp or site of World War II atrocities, that's part of the movie's point. Where to watch: In Australian cinemas. Read our full review. In Cinemas or at Home: The Holdovers Nominations: Best Picture, Best Actor (Paul Giamatti), Best Supporting Actress (Da'Vine Joy Randolph), Best Original Screenplay, Best Film Editing Our thoughts: Melancholy, cantankerousness, angst, hurt and snow all blanket Barton Academy in Alexander Payne's (Nebraska) The Holdovers. It's Christmas 1970 in New England in this thoughtful story that's given room to breathe and build, but festive cheer is in short supply among the students and staff that give the movie its moniker. Soon, there's just three folks left behind: Angus Tully (debutant Dominic Sessa), whose mother wants more time alone with his new stepdad; curmudgeonly professor Paul Hunham (Paul Giamatti, Billions); and grieving cook Mary Lamb (Da'Vine Joy Randolph, Only Murders in the Building). Where to watch: In Australian cinemas, and streaming via YouTube Movies, iTunes and Prime Video. Read our full review. Killers of the Flower Moon Nominations: Best Picture, Best Director (Martin Scorsese), Best Actress (Lily Gladstone), Best Supporting Actor (Robert De Niro), Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Film Editing, Best Original Score, Best Original Song ('Wahzhazhe (A Song For My People)', Scott George), Best Production Design Our thoughts: Death comes to Killers of the Flower Moon quickly. Death comes often, too. While Martin Scorsese will later briefly fill the film's frames with a fiery orange vision, death blazes through his 26th feature from the moment that the picture starts rolling. Adapted from journalist David Grann's 2017 non-fiction novel Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI, this is a masterpiece of a Lily Gladstone (Reservation Dogs)-, Leonardo DiCaprio (Don't Look Up)- and Robert De Niro (Amsterdam)-starring movie about a heartbreakingly horrible spate of deaths sparked by pure and unapologetic greed and persecution a century back. Where to watch: In Australian cinemas, and streaming via Apple TV+, YouTube Movies and Prime Video. Read our full review, and our interview with Martin Scorsese. Poor Things Nominations: Best Picture, Best Director (Yorgos Lanthimos), Best Actress (Emma Stone), Best Supporting Actor (Mark Ruffalo), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Film Editing, Best Makeup and Hairstyling, Best Original Score, Best Production Design Our thoughts: Richly striking feats of cinema by Yorgos Lanthimos aren't scarce, and sublime performances by Emma Stone are hardly infrequent. The Favourite, their first collaboration, ticked both boxes. Screen takes on Mary Shelley's Frankenstein also couldn't be more constant. Combining the three in Poor Things results in a rarity, however: a jewel of a pastel-, jewel- and bodily fluid-toned feminist Frankenstein-esque fairy tale that's a stunning creation, as zapped to life with Lanthimos' inimitable flair, a mischievous air, Stone at her most extraordinary and empowerment blazing like a lightning bolt. Where to watch: In Australian cinemas, and streaming via Disney+, YouTube Movies, iTunes and Prime Video. Read our full review. Via Streaming: American Fiction Nominations: Best Picture, Best Actor (Jeffrey Wright), Best Supporting Actor (Sterling K Brown), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Score Our thoughts: Here's Thelonious 'Monk' Ellison's (Jeffrey Wright, Rustin) predicament when American Fiction begins: on the page, his talents aren't selling books. So, sick of hearing that his work isn't "Black enough", he gets a-typing, pumping out the kind of text that he vehemently hates — but 100-percent fits the stereotype of what the world keeps telling him that Black literature should be. It attracts interest, even more so when Monk adopts a cliched new persona to go with it. Wright is indeed exceptional in this savvy satire of authenticity, US race relations and class chasms, and earns his awards contention for his reactions alone. Where to watch: Streaming via Prime Video. Read our full review. American Symphony Nominations: Best Original Song ('It Never Went Away', Jon Batiste and Dan Wilson) Our thoughts: Jon Batiste has enjoyed a dream career so far, with the musician packing more into his 37 years than most people do in a lifetime. Matthew Heineman's (Retrograde) American Symphony isn't that tale, though. Instead, it spends a year with The Late Show with Stephen Colbert's former bandleader and Soul Oscar-winner — a year where he's nominated for 11 Grammys, and endeavours to compose the symphony that gives this intimate and touching documentary its name. Also shaping the 12 months: in his personal life, grappling with the return of his wife and bestselling author Suleika Jaouad's leukaemia. Where to watch: Streaming via Netflix. Barbie Nominations: Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (Ryan Gosling), Best Supporting Actress (America Ferrera), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Song ('I'm Just Ken', Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt; 'What Was I Made For?', Billie Eilish and Finneas O'Connell), Best Costume Design, Best Production Design Our thoughts: No one plays with a Barbie too hard when the Mattel product is fresh out of the box. The more that the toy is trotted through DreamHouses, though, the more that playing with the plastic fashion model becomes fantastical. Like globally beloved item, like live-action movie bearing its name. Barbie, the film, starts with glowing aesthetic perfection. It's almost instantly a pink-hued paradise for the eyes, and it's also cleverly funny. The longer that it continues, however, the harder and wilder that director Greta Gerwig (Little Women) goes, as does her lead-slash-producer Margot Robbie (Babylon) as Barbie and Ryan Gosling (The Gray Man) as Ken. Where to watch: Streaming via YouTube Movies, iTunes and Prime Video. Read our full review. Bobi Wine: The People's President Nominations: Best Documentary Feature Our thoughts: In western countries where democracy is entrenched, the system of government is too easily taken for granted. Bobi Wine: The People's President shows what the fight for a nation that's free, fair and gives its people a voice looks like, chronicling the plight of its titular figure. Bobi Wine was an Ugandan pop star, and a popular one. Then, in response to the autocratic rule of Yoweri Museveni since 1986, he turned to political activism. Filmmakers Moses Bwayo and Christopher Sharp, both first-time directors, also show how important and difficult his quest is — and there isn't a second of this documentary that isn't riveting. Where to watch: Streaming via Disney+. The Color Purple Nominations: Best Supporting Actress (Danielle Brooks) Our thoughts: On the page, stage and screen, The Color Purple's narrative has mostly remained the same, crushing woe, infuriating prejudice and rampant inequity included. Musicals don't have to be cheery, but how does so much brutality give rise to anything but mournful songs? The answer here: by leaning into the rural Georgia-set tale's embrace of hope, resilience and self-discovery. Ghanaian director Blitz Bazawule follows up co-helming Beyoncé's Black Is King by heroing empowerment and emancipation in his iteration of The Color Purple — and while it's easy to see the meaning behind its striving for a brighter outlook. Where to watch: Streaming via YouTube Movies, iTunes and Prime Video. Read our full review. The Creator Nominations: Best Sound, Best Visual Effects Our thoughts: Science fiction has never been afraid of unfurling its futuristic visions on the third rock from the sun, but the resulting films have rarely been as earthy as The Creator. Set from 2065 onwards after the fiery destruction of Los Angeles, this tale of humanity clashing with artificial intelligence is visibly awash with technology that doesn't currently exist — and yet the latest movie from Rogue One: A Star Wars Story director Gareth Edwards, which focuses on an undercover military operative Joshua (John David Washington, Amsterdam) tasked with saving the world, couldn't look or feel more authentic and grounded. Where to watch: Streaming via Disney+, YouTube Movies, iTunes and Prime Video. Read our full review. El Conde Nominations: Best Cinematography Our thoughts: What if Augusto Pinochet didn't die in 2006? What if the Chilean general and dictator wasn't aged 91 at the time, either? What if his story started long before his official 1915 birthdate, in France prior to the French Revolution? What if he's been living for 250 years because he's a literal monster of the undead, draining and terrifying kind? Trust Chilean filmmaking great Pablo Larraín (Ema, Neruda, The Club, No, Post Mortem and Tony Manero) to ask these questions in El Conde, which translates as The Count and marks the latest exceptional effort in a career that just keeps serving up excellent movies. Where to watch: Streaming via Netflix. Read our full review. Elemental Nominations: Best Animated Feature Our thoughts: With Elemental, Pixar is in familiar territory — so much so that this film feels like something that was always destined to happen. Embracing the the studio's now-standard "what if robots, playthings, rats and the like had feelings?, it anthropomorphises fire, water, air and earth, and ponders these aspects of nature having emotions. The result from filmmaker Pete Sohn (The Good Dinosaur) is just-likeable and sweet-enough, despite vivid animation, plus the noblest of aims to survey the immigrant experience, opposites attracting, breaking down cultural stereotypes and borders, and complicated parent-child relationships. Where to watch: Streaming via Disney+, YouTube Movies, iTunes and Prime Video. Read our full review. The Eternal Memory Nominations: Best Documentary Feature Our thoughts: After The Mole Agent, writer/director Maite Alberdi earns her second Oscar nomination in two successive films for a documentary that's just as layered — but she's no longer telling a caper-esque tale. This time, Augusto Góngora and Paulina Urrutia receive her attention. The former is an ex-former journalist and broadcaster. The latter is an actor and politician. Góngora's diagnosis with Alzheimer's disease sits at the centre of this haunting effort, which focuses on how its central couple endeavour to cope with his memory loss, the role that reflecting on the past has on our present and future, and how love endures. Where to watch: Streaming via DocPlay. Flamin' Hot Nominations: Best Original Song ('The Fire Inside', Diane Warren) Our thoughts: The feature directorial debut of Desperate Housewives actor Eva Longoria, Flamin' Hot is a product film, as Cheetos fans will instantly know. If you've ever wondered how the Frito-Lay-owned brand's spiciest variety came about in the 90s, this energetically made movie provides the answer while itself rolling out a crowd-pleasing formula. Eating the titular snack while you watch is optional, but expect the hankering to arise either way. This story belongs to Richard Montañez (Jesse Garcia, Ambulance) — and it's also an underdog tale, and an account of chasing the American dream, especially when it seems out of reach. Where to watch: Streaming via Disney+. Read our full review. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 Nominations: Best Visual Effects Our thoughts: Arriving to close out a standalone trilogy within the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 zooms into the saga's fifth phase with a difference: it's still a quippy comedy, but it's as much a drama and a tragedy as well. Like most on-screen GotG storylines, it's also heist caper — and as plenty of caped-crusader flicks are, within the MCU or not, it's an origin story. The more that a James Gunn-written and -directed Guardians film gets cosy within the usual Marvel template, however, the more that his branch of Marvel's pop-culture behemoth embraces its own personality. Where to watch: Streaming via Disney+, YouTube Movies, iTunes and Prime Video. Read our full review. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny Nominations: Best Original Score Our thoughts: Old hat, new whip. No, that isn't Dr Henry Walton 'Indiana' Jones' shopping list, but a description of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. While the fifth film about the eponymous archaeologist is as familiar as Indy films come, it's kept somewhat snapping by the returning Harrison Ford's (Shrinking) on-screen partnership with Phoebe Waller-Bridge (Fleabag). If you've seen one Indy outing in the past 42 years, you've seen the underlying mechanics of every other Indy outing. And yet, watching Ford flashing his crooked smile again, plus his bantering with Waller-Bridge, is almost enough to keep this new instalment from Ford v Ferrari filmmaker James Mangold whirring. Where to watch: Streaming via Disney+, YouTube Movies, iTunes and Prime Video. Read our full review. Maestro Nominations: Best Picture, Best Actor (Bradley Cooper), Best Actress (Carey Mulligan), Best Cinematography, Best Original Screenplay, Best Makeup and Hairstyling, Best Sound Our thoughts: When a composer pens music, it's the tune that they want the world to enjoy, not the marks on a page scribbling it into existence. When a conductor oversees an orchestra, the performance echoing rather than their own with baton in hand and arms waving is their gift. In Maestro, Bradley Cooper (Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3) is seen as Leonard Bernstein in both modes. His portrayal is so richly textured that it's a career-best turn. But Cooper as this movie's helmer and co-writer wants Maestro's audience to revel in the end result — and if he wants love showered anyone's way first, it's towards Carey Mulligan (Saltburn) as Felicia Montealegre Bernstein. Where to watch: Netflix. Read our full review. Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One Nominations: Best Sound, Best Visual Effects Our thoughts: Just as its lead actor's gleaming teeth do, Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One, the seventh instalment in the TV-to-film spy series, thoroughly shines. Like Tom Cruise (Top Gun: Maverick) himself, it's committed to giving audiences what they want to see, but never merely exactly what they've already seen. This saga hasn't always chosen to accept that mission, but it's been having a better time of it since 2011's Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, including since writer/director Christopher McQuarrie jumped behind the lens with 2015's Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation. Where to watch: Streaming via YouTube Movies, iTunes and Prime Video. Read our full review. Napoleon Nominations: Best Costume Design, Best Production Design, Best Visual Effects Our thoughts: When is a Ridley Scott (House of Gucci)-directed, Joaquin Phoenix (Beau Is Afraid)-starring trip to the past more than just a historical drama? Twice now, so whenever the filmmaker and actor team up to explore Europe centuries ago. Gladiator was the first; Napoleon follows — and where the Rome-set first was an action film as well, the second leans into comedy. This biopic of the eponymous French military star-turned-emperor can be funny. In the lead, Phoenix repeatedly boasts the line delivery, facial expressions and physical presence of someone actively courting laughs. When he declares "destiny has brought me this lamb chop!", all three coalesce. Where to watch: Streaming via Apple TV+, YouTube Movies and Prime Video. Read our full review. Nimona Nominations: Best Animated Feature Our thoughts: Bounding thoughtfully from the page to the screen — well, from pixels first, initially leaping from the web to print — Nimona goes all in on belonging. Ballister Boldheart (Riz Ahmed, Sound of Metal) wants to fit in desperately, and is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve it in this animated movie's medieval-yet-futuristic world, where there's nothing more important and acclaimed than being part of the Institute for Elite Knights. But when tragedy strikes, then prejudice sets in, he only has one ally. Nimona's namesake (Chloë Grace Moretz, The Peripheral) is a shapeshifter who offers to be his sidekick regardless of his innocence or guilt. Where to watch: Streaming via Netflix. Read our full review. Nyad Nominations: Best Actress (Annette Bening), Best Supporting Actress (Jodie Foster) Our thoughts: Most sports films about real-life exploits piece together the steps it took for a person or a team to achieve the ultimate in their field, or come as close as possible while trying their hardest. Nyad is no different, but it's also a deeply absorbing character study of two people: its namesake Diana Nyad (Annette Bening, Death on the Nile) and her best friend Bonnie Stoll (Jodie Foster, True Detective). The first is the long-distance swimmer whose feats the movie tracks, especially her quest to swim from Cuba to Florida in the 2010s. The second is the former professional racquetball player who became Nyad's coach when she set her sights on making history as a sexagenarian. Where to watch: Netflix. Read our full review. Oppenheimer Nominations: Best Picture, Best Director (Christopher Nolan), Best Actor (Cillian Murphy), Best Supporting Actor (Robert Downey Jr), Best Supporting Actress (Emily Blunt), Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Film Editing, Best Makeup and Hairstyling, Best Original Score, Best Production Design, Best Sound Our thoughts: Cast Cillian Murphy and a filmmaker falls in love. There's an arresting, haunting, seeps-under-your-skin soulfulness about the Irish actor, including when playing "the father of atomic bomb" in Christopher Nolan's (Tenet) epic biopic Oppenheimer. Flirting with the end of the world, or just one person's end, clearly suits Murphy. Here he is in a mind-blower as the destroyer of worlds — almost, perhaps actually — and so much of this can't-look-away three-hour stunner dwells in his expressive eyes, which see purpose, possibility, quantum mechanics' promise and, ultimately, the Manhattan Project's consequences. Where to watch: Streaming via YouTube Movies, iTunes and Prime Video. Read our full review. Past Lives Nominations: Best Picture, Best Original Screenplay Our thoughts: Call it fate, call it destiny, call it feeling like you were always meant to cross paths with someone: in Korean, that sensation is in-yeon. Partway through Past Lives, Nora (Greta Lee, Russian Doll) explains the concept to Arthur (John Magaro, The Many Saints of Newark) like she knows it deep in her bones, because both she and the audience are well-aware that she does. That's what writer/director Celine Song's sublime feature debut is about, in fact. The term also applies to her connection to childhood crush Hae Sung (Teo Yoo, Decision to Leave) in this sensitive, blisteringly honest and intimately complex masterpiece. Where to watch: Streaming via Prime Video. Read our full review, and our interview with Celine Song. Rustin Nominations: Best Actor (Colman Domingo) Our thoughts: After Selma, One Night in Miami and Judas and the Black Messiah arrives Rustin, the latest must-see movie about the minutiae of America's 60s-era civil rights movement. All four hail from Black filmmakers. All four tell vital stories. They each boast phenomenal performances, too, including from Colman Domingo (The Color Purple) as Rustin's eponymous figure. His turn as Bayard Rustin, who conceived and organised the event where Martin Luther King Jr gave his "I Have a Dream" speech, isn't merely powerful; it's a go-for-broke portrayal from a versatile talent at the top of his game while digging into the every inch of his part. Where to watch: Streaming via Netflix. Read our full review. Society of the Snow Nominations: Best International Feature, Best Makeup and Hairstyling Our thoughts: Society of the Snow isn't merely a disaster film detailing the specifics of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571's failed journey, the immediate deaths and those that came afterwards, the lengthy wait to be found — including after authorities called the search off — and the crushing decisions made to get through. JA Bayona (Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom), who also helmed the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami-focused The Impossible, has made a weighty feature that reckons with the emotional, psychological and spiritual toll, and doesn't think of shying away from the most difficult aspects of this real-life situation, including cannibalism. Where to watch: Streaming via Netflix. Read our full review. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse Nominations: Best Animated Feature Our thoughts: When 2018's Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse took pop culture's favourite web-slinger back to its animated roots, it made flesh-and-blood superhero flicks and shows, as well as the expensive special effects behind them, look positively trivial and cartoonish. The end result was a deservedly Academy Award-winning masterpiece — and its first sequel Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, which hails from directors Joaquim Dos Santos (The Legend of Korra), Kemp Powers (Soul) and Justin K Thompson (Into the Spider-Verse's production designer), plasters around the same sensation like a Spidey shooting its silk. Where to watch: Streaming via Binge, Prime Video, YouTube Movies and iTunes. Read our full review. To Kill a Tiger Nominations: Best Documentary Feature Our thoughts: A battle for justice sits at the heart of To Kill a Tiger, a documentary that is as powerful as it is heavy, and is also an essential piece of filmmaking. When his 13-year-old daughter becomes the victim of sexual assault, Ranjit is determined to bring the perpetrators to justice. Not that that's a straightforward feat anywhere, but it isn't the same quest in India as it is in western countries, as writer/director Nisha Pahuja (The World Before Her) examines. Ranjit is dedicated to the fight, even knowing how difficult it is — from the backlash that he receives across his village to the horrifying statistics regarding the frequency of rape in the country and the paltry conviction rate. Where to watch: Streaming via Netflix from Friday, March 8. 20 Days in Mariupol Nominations: Best Documentary Feature Our thoughts: Incompatible with life. No one ever hears those three devastating words — one of the most distressing phrases there is — in positive circumstances. Accordingly, when they're uttered by a doctor in 20 Days in Mariupol, they're deeply shattering. So is everything in this on-the-ground portrait of the first 20 days in the Ukrainian city as Russia began its invasion, as the bleak reality of living in a war zone is documented. Directed by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Mstyslav Chernov, that this film even exists is an achievement. What it shows — what it immerses viewers in, from shelled hospitals and basements-turned-bomb shelters to families torn apart and mass graves — can never be forgotten. Where to watch: Streaming via DocPlay. The 2024 Oscars will be announced on Monday, March 11, Australian time. For further details, head to the awards' website. Wondering who'll win? Check out our predictions.
Visit the largest seafood market in the Southern Hemisphere and hunt down freshly shucked oysters, grilled mornay lobster, sushi doughnuts and giant crabs. Approximately 55 tonnes of the freshest seafood is auctioned each day as this giant market. It's open seven days a week from 7am (except Christmas and New Year's Day) for you to choose the most delicious seafood to take home. If you can't wait to eat, there are plenty of stalls selling ready-to-eat dishes, sunlit tables out the front and a super affordable yum cha restaurant upstairs.
TEDxSydney is back for yet another year, and this time it's bringing you ten speakers at the forefront of thinking in the areas of energy, economic, politics, science and creativity. Each will give you their take on the event's theme, Three Horizons, looking at three aspects of the problem they present – triage (what's happening now), transition (how we're changing) and transformation (what the future might look like). On the program are human rights lawyer and Grata Fund founding Executive Director Isabelle Reinecke, who'll be discussing how law can challenge gridlocks in human rights, climate change and democratic freedoms, as well as climate philanthropist Simon Holmes à Court, who'll dive into how political independents can transform Australian politics. Look out, too, for rewilding adventurer Gina Chick, waxing lyrical on how connecting to nature and each other can improve our future; author and broadcaster Sarah Wilson on "what a former climate activist does in the face of collapse"; and Saibai Seisia Elder Aunty McRose Elu discussing how we can bring Indigenous knowledge lore into our legal system. Other speakers include Bega Group chair Barry Irvin; global ecology professor Corey Bradshaw; singer-songwriter Ruby Rodgers; insect ecologist Tanya Patty; climate finance advocate Tim Buckley; poet and performer Jessica Chapnik Kahn and singer-songwriter Luke O'Shea. Registration is open now.
Whether you're committed to reducing your use of single-use plastics or dedicated to a vegan diet, it's easy to change your consumption habits for the good of the environment — while you're in your own home. Once you venture out, however, there's much that's out of your control. Sure, you've eliminated disposable plastic from your routine, but every business you patronise mightn't have done the same. And you've ordered a vegan meal at your local cafe, but does the place you're eating at use animal products in its decor? On the plastics front, plenty of organisations and brands are starting to do their part, with the likes of IKEA, McDonald's, Melbourne's Crown Casino and Coca-Cola Amatil phasing out single-use items, and one airline pledging to become wholly plastic-free. When it comes to living a vegan lifestyle, Hilton's London Bankside is joining in by opening the world's first entirely vegan luxury hotel suite. Now available for bookings, the room only uses plant-based substances, fibres and surfaces — so you won't find any leather, feathers and wool among its wares. With the suite designed by food artists Bompas & Parr, what you will find is a material created from pineapples. The bed's headboard is made from pineapple leaves, while vegan-friendly fruit leather piñatex features heavily. It's made from the cellulose fibres sourced from pineapples, and is not only used in the upholstered seats, footstools and cushions, but in the room's keycard as well. With no animal products to be found in any of the suite's materials or inclusions, guests will step onto cotton carpets and bamboo floors; sleep on pillows made from organic buckwheat, millet hulls, kapok or bamboo fibres (your choice); grab a snack from the complimentary vegan mini-bar; and use cruelty-free toiletries. When your room is cleaned by housekeeping, they'll also be using vegan products. Even when you're checking in, you'll be doing so at a plant-based counter. And if you're keen to order in, of course the vegan range extends to the in-room menu. Find Hilton London Bankside at 2–8 Great Suffolk Street, London, and visit the hotel website for further details. Images: Hilton London Bankside.
Even if you're not much of a fast food fan, odds are that you've heard about McDonald's Szechuan sauce. It was originally released in 1998 as a tie-in with Disney's original animated Mulan, then became internet famous almost two decades later after being name-dropped in Rick and Morty. In fact, in the animated series, Rick was so determined to get hold of the dipping sauce that he didn't care if it took "nine seasons" or "97 more years". You might've felt the same way, actually, as it hasn't been on the Macca's menu in Australia. Until now, that is. McDonald's is finally bringing the coveted condiment our way — all as part of a new limited-edition four-sauce range. It'll hit the menu at the Golden Arches from Wednesday, July 6–Tuesday, July 19, alongside the return of Macca's Cajun sauce (a blend of Dijon mustard, vinegar, honey and spices). That's two of the four special condiments covered. The other two won't be revealed until sometime in July. But, if you're keen to get a taste before they hit stores, Macca's is also running a sauce quest. What's a sauce quest? It's a three-day sauce hunt, all digital, which'll get you sleuthing to find clues — and win IRL sauce. From 9am on Tuesday, June 28, McDonald's will be putting up hidden sauce splatters online, which you'll need to find to go into the draw to nab a personal stash of its limited-edition sauces. To take part, you'll want to keep an eye on the chain's socials — and follow the hints from there. New to the whole Szechuan sauce frenzy? It's a mix of soy sauce, ginger, garlic and sesame oil. And, the last time that McDonald's re-released the much-hyped McNugget condiment in America, the demand outweighed supply. In the US, fans queued for hours, one person traded their Volkswagen and another paid almost US$15,000 for one measly pottle. Rick and Morty's legion of devotees were clearly keen for a taste — and condiment hysteria took flight. In 2020, it was also made available at the global fast-food brand's stores in New Zealand for a limited time. McDonald's Szechuan sauce will be available nationwide from Wednesday, July 6–Tuesday, July 19, alongside its Cajun sauce. Two more limited-edition sauces will follow, with details revealed in July.
Keeping plants alive is a struggle many of us have experienced — we get swept up in decorating our homes with beautiful greenery, only to find it looking sad and withered a week or two later. Luckily, Forest Life is coming to the rescue by opening Sydney's first terrarium nursery, where you'll be able to stock up on a range of terrarium plants, which, reassuringly, require minimal maintenance. Despite having been founded 18 months ago, this is the first time Forest Life will open its doors to the public, with the official launch of the Terrarium World Nursery set to take place on April 22 and 23 at their Annangrove location. There will be plenty of plants, soil mixes and decorative pieces available to purchase, as well as vegan and vegetarian eats supplied by Mama Linh's. Terrarium enthusiasts will want to get in quick — the Facebook event page has been inundated with expressions of interest. The Terrarium World Nursery Opening Weekend will take place on Saturday, April 22 from 10am to 4pm and Sunday, April 23 from 10am to 3pm.
Stay tuned. More info coming soon.
To celebrate the launch of its new retro-style half-frame digital camera, the X half, Fujifilm is hosting a one-day event in Redfern that combines photography, music and creativity. The Moment Club will run from 2pm – 4pm on Saturday, July 12 at Baptist Street Rec Club, offering attendees the chance to try the new Fujifilm X half in person. [caption id="attachment_1008205" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Ben Savage[/caption] Across the afternoon, attendees will take part in a range of hands-on guided workshops, including how to shoot the ultimate bathroom selfie, how to style the perfect cocktail shot and how to use the camera's new side-by-side images feature. A live DJ set from Alex Hayes, a bespoke cocktail, and Southeast Asian-inspired snacks are also included in the $25 ticket price. Whether you're a content creator or just looking for a fun creative experience, this is the perfect opportunity to meet new people and test-drive the X half with help from Fujifilm's team of experts. RSVP now for Fujifilm's 'The Moment Club' on Saturday, July 12 at Baptist Street Rec Club in Redfern, Sydney. Find out more and book tickets here. By Jacque Kennedy
It's that time again, Sydneysiders: time for movies to compete with Mrs Macquaries Point's stunning view of Sydney Harbour. Every summer, the scenic spot's vista over the water, city, Opera House and Harbour Bridge gets a 350-square-metre screen showing the latest and greatest flicks — all thanks to Westpac OpenAir. There are plenty of outdoor cinema options in Sydney come summertime, but none can hold a candle to the scenery and luxe experience of Westpac OpenAir. Plus, it's a hell of a lot more than just a cinema. Forget popcorn and choc-tops; Westpac OpenAir boasts four equally luxe culinary options for all attendees. Options include The Point with Luke Nguyen, which brings fresh and vibrant Vietnamese flavours to anyone with a general admission ticket. Summer House Dining by acclaimed Sydney chef Danielle Alvarez takes things up a notch with fine Mediterranean feeds for premium ticket holders — and Chandon Garden guests will have exclusive access to a seafood menu and a dedicated oyster bar. No matter the seating and menu, you'll be able to enjoy your feed with live music from top Sydney DJs and one of the best views in Sydney. Then, as dusk settles, the hydraulics whir into action and raise the famous OpenAir screen three stories high for the movie of the evening. But what's on the program? As always, there are choices from every genre. Fancy a full-on big theatre blockbuster? You can grab tickets for F1, Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning, Wicked: For Good, One Battle After Another and Avatar: Fire and Ash. Some of this year's hit indie additions include Marty Supreme, How to Make a Killing, Hamnet, Song Sung Blue, Is This Thing On?, Bugonia and Wuthering Heights. There's also a promise of nostalgic favourites like Dirty Dancing, Mamma Mia, The Devil Wears Prada, How To Lose A Guy in 10 Days and Ten Things I Hate About You. For all that and more, check out the full program here. Westpac OpenAir runs from Friday, January 9 to Tuesday, February 24, 2026. Tickets go on sale from Monday, December 8. For more information or to book tickets, visit the website.
On Steve Zahn's 2020s-era resume, there's no place like Maui resorts and buried silos that house 10,000 souls across 144 underground levels. The actor has been calling both home, or home away from home, in two of the best television series of this decade. In the process, he's also been giving some of the finest performances of his career. An Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited or Anthology Series or Movie Emmy nomination came his way for The White Lotus, an accolade won by his co-star Murray Bartlett (The Last of Us). More awards attention deserves to arrive now that Zahn is among the cast of Apple TV+'s page-to-screen sci-fi dystopian thriller series Silo in its second season. The Minnesota-born and -raised actor has been a screen mainstay since the 90s, when he starred in one of the defining movies of the period: alongside Winona Ryder (Stranger Things), Ethan Hawke (Leave the World Behind), Ben Stiller (Nutcrackers) and Janeane Garofalo (The Apology), he was part of Reality Bites' core quintet. From there, everything from That Thing You Do! and Out of Sight to You've Got Mail and an episode of Friends followed before the 00s even hit — and his Independent Spirit Award-winning performance in Happy, Texas as well. Zahn has since voiced a Stuart Little character, acted for Werner Herzog in Rescue Dawn and played Bad Ape in War for the Planet of the Apes, alongside parts in Riding in Cars with Boys, Dallas Buyers Club, Treme and plenty more. [caption id="attachment_984317" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Mario Perez/HBO[/caption] In The White Lotus, he portrayed a husband (to Dear Edward's Connie Britton) and dad (to Immaculate's Sydney Sweeney and Gladiator II's Fred Hechinger) endeavouring to escape his worries in Hawaii. One such concern: his character's health. Joining Silo sees Zahn go from one extreme to another, then. Instead of opting for the tried-and-tested route of a vacation to avoid your everyday life — not that that ever works out well in The White Lotus, either in the Zahn-starring first season in 2021 or the anthology series' second in 2022 — he's now locked in with his woes. Zahn's Solo dwells in a new setting for the show: Silo 17, where Juliette Nichols (Rebecca Ferguson, Dune: Part Two) ventures after leaving her own. As streaming via Apple TV+ since mid-November 2024, dropping its ten-episode season weekly, Silo opens its second run with a glimpse of how life can go awry drastically and devastatingly when human existence is confined beneath the earth. That's been one of the series' throughlines overall anyway, but the situation in Silo 17 has left Solo alone behind a locked door after a revolution cleared out his fellow residents. He's wary of newcomers, unsurprisingly, but Solo is also curious about the world beyond his vault and empathetic to Juliette's need for help. After the events of season one cast her outside the only walls that she'd ever called home, she's eager to return back to her own silo to stop Silo 17's fate repeating there. So unfurls a season split across two places, and hopping between the aftermath of Juliette being sent out to clean — as being forced outside a silo is dubbed in the series' parlance — and her and Solo's efforts in the other bunker. In one of season two's locations, rebellion festers among the masses. In the other, two people attempt to survive. Chatting with Concrete Playground, Zahn compares his portion of Silo to a play. Since its 2023 debut, this has always been a TV must-see that feels the intimacy of creating societies beneath the ground, but that sensation earns a new dimension when it's just Solo and Juliette in Silo 17. How did Zahn approach portraying someone who is rediscovering what it's like to have company after being on his lonesome, and is clearly traumatised by his experiences while also eager to do the right thing by assisting Juliette? What was he excited about digging into as Solo? And what make he make of his jump from The White Lotus' beaches to Silo's subterranean levels? We talked with Zahn about the above, and also about how shooting their scenes in order helped him and Ferguson build their characters' rapport organically, what excites him about new projects more than three decades into his career and more. On Going From Playing Someone Trying to Escape Their Worries on Holiday in The White Lotus to a Man Locked in with His Traumas in Silo "Lately I've been lucky enough to do the extremes. And this character is definitely — the world is extreme but also the character. I've never played anything quite like this. And it was it was daunting, but it was also quite simple. I think because of Rebecca and the story, I really love it. It's daunting to play a character like this. It's hard. Day one is really difficult, because you're so self-conscious, right, when you play characters like that. Day one of playing Bad Ape in War for the Planet of the Apes was unbelievably hard, because that character that you establish goes to the end, whether it's good or bad, compelling or not. So you just hope your instincts are right. And you get addicted to playing people like this. I'm a proud character actor, put it that way." On Zahn's First Take on Solo in Silo, and What He Was Excited About Bringing to the Character "I found his childlike vulnerability to be fascinating, and I thought that was something that spoke to me and that I could tap into. That was compelling to me. I loved the story under a microscope, compared to the rest of the story. In season two, you've got chaos happening in volume, and then in this world you have water dripping and quiet and calm. And those two worlds together are insane." On Portraying Someone Who Is Dutiful to His Task to Protect His Vault, But Also Curious About the World — and Lonely and Yearning to Connect "It was a constant balancing act. There are times when he's a child — kids wear their emotions on their sleeves, they don't know the boundaries, they haven't learned all these things that we learn from other people. So at times he can be very scary, almost violent, and then in the next breath it turns on a dime and he can be this kid again. So you don't know how he's going to act in any certain situation. I felt like, and Rebecca and I felt like, we were doing a play — like we are doing some Beckett or some Pinter play in the West End. And every day we just got to explore these two individuals. And we shot it into order, which was actually really unique. We had a controlled environment. We had all these sets. And it was just her and I. So we could actually go in order. So the first week of shooting, you didn't see me. It was just really unique. It just doesn't happen." On How Filming in Order Helped Zahn Unpack Solo and Juliette's Relationship with Rebecca Ferguson Basically in Real Time "It absolutely helps, especially when it's incremental like this. It's these tiny steps that they take towards each other — and away from each other, depending. Honestly, if we had to shoot this out of order, it would have been really difficult to track all that. We would have had to spend a lot of time talking about that, where we didn't have to because it was a natural progression. We learned to trust each other as human beings, as actors, at the same time — it paralleled our characters, which was interesting. And so we could actually live in moments and let them breathe, and let that story evolve on its own. And so dialogue changed and intention changed, because of what we were doing, which is really cool. It happened. So much of the time you feel preoccupied with what you're doing that you don't live freely in moments. And when you're an actor and you get lost in a moment, that's the goal. I mean, I always joke like 'god, we were almost acting'. Which is a real compliment to the show, because it's rare when you're really just acting and everything else goes away. Usually it's in a play that you're doing. You get lost in that. This is all heavy actor shit, but you know, it was really fun, man. It was really fun." [caption id="attachment_984315" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Mario Perez/HBO[/caption] On What Gets Zahn Excited About a New Project After More Than Three Decades On-Screen "Story. Being a part of a really cool story. That's what, day one, that's what compelled me. Being in a really good play was awesome, that people liked. And then character and all that stuff, but for me it's the story. And I've been lucky enough to be approached by people that are good storytellers. I've been able to work with so many great, amazing people. And now Graham Yost [Silo's creator], he's a legend. And I worked with him a long time ago on From the Earth to the Moon back in the 90s. It's funny, when I'm walking around, I think of myself as 25. And it's weird to be the guy that people are calling 'sir' on set. It's weird. It's weird, it's bizarre, getting older. Because it's not a bank. We don't have that kind of hierarchy in our business. If I'm working with a 15-year-old, they're my peer. Fred on White Lotus, he's the same age as my son, we're like pals — because we did a show together." Silo streams via Apple TV+. Read our review of season one.
Vampt is the stuff your daydreams of vintage Scandinavian sideboards are made of. These stylish folks describe themselves as "the Sydney specialists in highly collectable and unique pieces of vintage and mid-century modern design." Sourcing their furniture, lighting, wall art and homewares from Denmark, wider Europe and Australia, Vampt believe quality, classic pieces should last you a lifetime. All their pieces are one offs – think 'futuristic' '60s chairs, vintage Danish pendant lights and art deco drink cabinets that'll have you seriously planning extravagant future Gatsby-esque parties in the architectural wonder of a mansion you've just decided you're going to need.
The flavours of Korea and Mexico have formed an unlikely, but delicious allegiance, given equal billing at Canterbury's modern fusion eatery Vecino. It's an uncommon culinary mash-up, but not one you'll forget in a hurry, thanks to a creative menu packed full of big flavours. Co-owners Tony Lee and Eunice Lim play on the similarities between two famously lively cuisines, drawing both on Lee's Korean heritage and his experience working in Mexican kitchens across the world. At Vecino, the lineup is crafty, rather than quirky, with instant hits including the bulgogi tacos (two for $13.50) — the Korean classic reimagined with black beans and guac — and the loaded fries ($14.90), here topped with bulgogi, pico de gallo, kimchi, sour cream and cheese. There's a ripper Korean fried chicken, too —served either original, sweet and spicy, teriyaki, rosemary honey garlic and chimichurri — while the burrito ($16) comes loaded with kimchi fried rice, spicy pork, black beans, guac and hot sauce. Equally vibrant and just as memorable is the funky cocktail selection. Head in for gutsy creations like the Makgeorita, blending tequila with Korean rice wine, alongside a lineup of soju-infused signatures and giant frozen margaritas.
Famous for its 55-minute workouts and worldwide following, Barry's Bootcamp has become a fitness heavyweight since first setting up shop in West Hollywood back in 1998 — and now it's brought its studios to Australia. Since September 2018, Sydneysiders have been putting themselves through Barry's high-intensity interval training sessions in Surry Hills and at its flagship in Martin Place. If you're a gym junkie, celebrity obsessive or just familiar with the term "Barry's body", then you'll have heard of Barry's. Already active in 18 cities around the globe — including Los Angeles, New York, Milan, London and Dubai — it's claimed that the studio's sessions burn over 4000 kilojoules. That's thanks to a regimented program that incorporates 25 minutes of treadmill work, 25 minutes of strength and conditioning with free weights and resistance bands, and then a five-minute cool-down. The focus of each class changes daily across Barry's weekly schedule, with each session targeting a different muscle group. As extra motivation, Barry's classes are held in high-energy red rooms, complete with mood lighting and the kind of music you're more likely to hear in a nightclub. Adding to the vibe, each location features its own bar serving up locally designed shakes and smoothies — and patrons can buy workout outfits onsite. It's a full 'concept gym'. As expected, the world-renowned bootcamp class comes with hefty price tag — $36 a pop. You could, alternatively, purchase a 50-class pack for $1550, which works out at $31 a class.
Melbourne comes alive in summer. Outdoor bars and restaurants fill up with people taking advantage of longer days, parks and gardens are gloriously green and the city's arts and culture venues host a huge range of events. Yes, you can certainly run away to beaches for spectacular nature-filled getaways. But summer is as good a time as any for a city break — and we've curated the ultimate way to do it in Melbourne, whether you're a first-time visitor or you know the Hoddle Grid like the back of your hand. [caption id="attachment_658995" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Stano Murrin[/caption] FRIDAY Begin your Melbourne city break with a sundowner at Bar Triana. Located within the AC Hotel Melbourne Southbank, this sophisticated bar offers up views over the city alongside a truly impressive selection of gin. Melbourne is known for its world-class arts and culture institutions, but we recommend you dive a little deeper into the city's lesser-known haunts like The Butterfly Club. This cosy theatre, bar and welcoming space is hidden down a CBD laneway. Once you find the entrance, head inside for a smorgasbord of weird and wonderful theatre. Get tickets to whatever is on and go along for the ride — you won't regret it. For something a bit more orthodox (but just as intimate), head to Bird's Basement for an evening of live jazz. Like The Butterfly Club, you shouldn't worry yourself with what specific artist is performing — just book a table and let the music sweep over you with a cocktail in hand. SATURDAY If you're one of those mysterious morning people we've heard so much about, we suggest taking a stroll to The Shrine of Remembrance for spectacular sunrise views. Take your time wandering around this incredible space and look out over the city, watching it wake up and come alive. From here, head to the shops and grab your picnic essentials before nabbing what is arguably one of the best barbecue spots in all of Melbourne. On the edge of the Royal Botanic Gardens and right on the Yarra River, you'll find a host of free-to-use barbecues overlooking Melbourne's skyline, and is an ideal spot to soak up some sun. If you're looking escape the sun, you won't need to go far. This spot is conveniently located right by Melbourne's celebrated arts precinct where you'll find all kinds of brilliant things to do. See an exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria or catch a matinee at the Arts Centre, Melbourne Theatre Company or Melbourne Recital Centre. For a pre-dinner drink, make a beeline to The Westin Melbourne's Lobby Lounge. Settle in to a plush club chair in this grand Collins Street space as you indulge in an aperitivo — and maybe a dozen oysters — before dinner. On the menu? Clever and creative Modern Australian at Lollo, a welcoming culinary space with a menu overseen by celebrated chef Adam D'Sylva. Lollo draws inspiration from Melbourne's multicultural heritage to serve up globally inspired dishes that showcase local and seasonal produce. [caption id="attachment_711646" align="aligncenter" width="1920"] Josie Withers for Visit Victoria[/caption] SUNDAY Start your Sunday off by catching the tram to the South Melbourne Market. Grab a coffee from Pieno di Grazia and a freshly baked croissant from Agathé Pâtisserie before browsing the aisles featuring wares from local makers and producers who have made this bustling market a unique destination that highlights the city's diversity. Once you've eaten and shopped your way around the market, hire a bike from the AC Hotel to have one last Melbourne jaunt. Take to The Capital City Trail for a cycling journey that winds past Melbourne's most iconic landmarks. You can attempt the full 30 kilometres or just do a portion of the trail — whether that's Southbank to Burnley Gardens, Moonee Ponds Creek to the Melbourne Exhibition Centre or Abbotsford to Parkville. Whichever you choose, it's the perfect way to end your Melbourne city break. Looking to make the most of your next city break? Find your home away from home with Marriott Bonvoy. Book your stay not at the website. Top image: Dmitry Osipenko (Unsplash)
Paying tribute to great authors and writers is easy. Libraries beckon, as do whatever happens to be on your own bookshelf or Kindle. Getting the chance to celebrate the talents behind some of the greatest works of literature ever committed to paper in a stunning exhibition is far more rare, however. Indeed, Writers Revealed: Treasures From the British Library and National Portrait Gallery, London is a world-first. Clearly, it's a special treat for word nerds — especially if you're a fan of Jane Austen, William Shakespeare, JRR Tolkien, Bram Stoker, the Brontë sisters, Virginia Woolf, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and more. What goes on display at a showcase dedicated to wordsmiths? Featuring at HOTA, Home of the Arts on the Gold Coast from Saturday, April 12–Sunday, August 3, 2025, Writers Revealed spans author portraits, plus rare handwritten manuscripts and first editions. Over 70 pieces of art include the likenesses of the writers responsible for Pride and Prejudice, Romeo and Juliet, The Lord of the Rings, Dracula, Wuthering Heights, Sherlock Holmes and other masterpieces. More than 100 texts are on the lineup, too, with six centuries of literature covered. [caption id="attachment_987065" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Jane Austen by Cassandra Austen, pencil and watercolour, circa 1810. © National Portrait Gallery, London[/caption] As the exhibition's full name states, this is a collaboration between the British Library and the National Portrait Gallery, London. If you're wondering why the two institutions are pairing portraits with texts, one of the showcase's aims to explore how literature and visual expression are linked. Also in the spotlight: the legacy of influential writers, plus digging into their creative processes. Oscar Wilde, Harold Pinter, William Blake, Charles Dickens, Lewis Carroll, Lord Byron, TS Eliot, Thomas Hardy, James Joyce, DH Lawrence, John Keats, William Wordsworth and Rudyard Kipling are some of the other greats earning Writers Revealed's attention, as are AA Milne, Beatrix Potter, Dylan Thomas, Sir Kazuo Ishiguro and Zadie Smith. Among the highlights that's filling 1000 square metres in HOTA's Gallery 1 for 16 weeks: Austen's writing desk, what's thought to be the only Shakespeare portrait to be painted while he was alive, illustrated letters from Tolkien to his grandson, Lewis Carroll's diary entry about Alice in Wonderland and Virginia Woolf's handwritten Mrs Dalloway manuscript. [caption id="attachment_987063" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Charles Dickens by Daniel Maclise, oil on canvas, 1839. © National Portrait Gallery, London[/caption] Top images: William Shakespeare, associated with John Taylor, oil on canvas, feigned oval, circa 1610. © National Portrait Gallery, London. Beatrix Potter by Delmar Harmood Banner, oil on canvas, 1938. © National Portrait Gallery, London. Harold Pinter by Justin Mortimer, oil on canvas, 1992. © National Portrait Gallery, London.
Imagine if you could see a full lifetime's ageing process happen before your very eyes, sped up just enough that its imperceptible changes became perceptible. But not in an Indiana Jones Nazi uber ageing kind of way; rather, in a tasteful, filmmaker Anthony Cerniello kind of way. In the video below, Danielle, a tiny girl looks at us with a bored-yet-slightly-curious gaze, blinking occasionally. A few seconds later she's changed, only we can't quite tell how — a little broader in the forehead, a little more space between her eyes and eyebrows, maybe? You'll find yourself looking for those minute changes throughout the video. Don't skip through, though — the illusion will be totally ruined. This is because what looks like a lifelong timelapse of one woman's face is actually a very clever and meticulous blending of a whole collection of different portraits, all taken from a single family. Cerniello used faces from the family of his friend Danielle and employed high-tech methods throughout the process: after having photographer Keith Sirchio take shots of all the young cousins and relatives of different generations who looked alike, Cerniello scanned them using a drum scanner and selected those whose bone structure was most similar. Next he enlisted the talents of animators Nathan Meier, Edmund Earle and George Cuddy to meld the shots together, complete with realistic blinking and a convincing suggestion of breathing. Mark Reveley created the musical score, which adds a feeling of depth to the visuals; what we're witnessing, after all, is a whole life passing by. As the signs of ageing appear in faint traces of strain and wrinkles, we can't help but imagine the ups and downs of this virtual person's existence, and sympathise. It's a beautiful short film and a very cool use of technology to assist in making art. Via Colossal
In the 18 years that Gelato Messina has been in business, over 4000 special flavours have made their way through its 20 gelato cabinets around the country. To celebrate some of these oldies but goodies, Messina is dedicating an entire week to its top 40 greatest hits. From June 5–11, lucky Sydneysiders, Melburnians and Brisbanites will be able to treat themselves to an entire freezer-full of limited-edition gelato flavours. While last year's greatest hits were a buy-in-shop-only deal, this year it's all preordered tubs — so you don't have to worry about long queues and empty cabinets. You can preorder 500-millilitre tubs of the 40 flavours (we'll get to those in a minute) from 1pm on Thursday, May 21 and pick up from Sydney's Rosebery, Tramsheds, Bondi and Darlinghurst stores, Melbourne's Fitzroy store and Brisbane's South Brisbane store between the aforementioned dates. Individual tubs can be filled with just one flavour and will set you back $16, or you can get three for $45, six for $85, nine for $125 or — if you have the freezer space — 20 for $260. Now, we'll get to what you're all waiting for: the flavours. Jon Snow (white chocolate gelato with dark chocolate mud cake and almond praline), Fairy Bread (toast and butter gelato with 100s & 1000s), Mango Pancake (mango gelato with vanilla cream and pancake crunch), Old Gregg (Baileys and butterscotch sauce) and the Robert Brownie Jnr (milk chocolate gelato, chocolate brownie and chocolate fudge sauce) are all on the lineup. https://www.instagram.com/p/CAMtFiqA7Mp/ You've got two days to make a list of your favourites before preorders open, so we suggest you start making some hard decisions ASAP. Here's the full lineup: MESSINA'S 40 GREATEST HITS Fairy Bread Montgomery's Goldmine Triple Whammy Super Duper Dulce de Leche Hodor Twixed Gorgeous Dave True Romance Derelicte Cremino Old Gregg The Voicemail Have a Gay Old Time Lady of Winterfell Jon Snow The Hat Trick Drop It Like White Choc Mr Potato Head The Maltster Pavlova Super Flan Number Two Sticken To Me Date NYC Plus Milomiso Robert Brownie Jr Iron Born Just Like a Milkshake Musk Finger Bun Peach Bellini Baklava Oreogasm Duke of Earl The Boss's Wife Mango Pancake Messina's Momofukup Red Velvet Molto Bueno Alfajores Gelato Messina's Greatest Hits are available to preorder from 1pm on Thursday, May 21 with pick up between Friday, June 5 and Thursday, June 11 from Sydney's Rosebery, Tramsheds, Bondi and Darlinghurst stores; Melbourne's Fitzroy store; and Brisbane's South Brisbane store.
Since the arrival of the First Fleet in Warrane in 1788, beer has been a staple of Australian life. However, until relatively recently, the scope of Aussie-made brews had been largely dominated by English-style ales and lagers, leaving a yawning gap in the market for craft brewers to exploit. Marrickville, an area once best known for its industrial parks and manufacturing businesses, has become the epicentre of Sydney's ascendant small brewery scene, thanks to a collective of independent brewers who have made the Inner West a surefire go-to for beer lovers. The first brewery to plant its flag in the area was Batch Brewing Co. in 2013. In the decade since then, a craft beer boom has seen Marrickville become densely populated with specialised breweries that offer as much to the first-time beer taster as they do the seasoned suds seeker. The remnants of Marrickville's industrial past — a handy smattering of empty warehouses dotted throughout a swath of abandoned commercial land — have made the area uniquely primed for breweries in search of ample space for stills and tap houses. Today, the suburb has cemented a reputation as one of the city's coolest drinking destinations. [caption id="attachment_981901" align="alignnone" width="1365"] Batch Brewing Co. founder Andrew Fineran[/caption] "We're far enough away from the city that people can afford to have industrial areas here, but we're close enough to the city that you can be at Central in five minutes" American ex-pat and Batch Brewing co-founder Andrew Fineran says. However, the industry's success here is not just courtesy of Marrickville's convenient location and easily repurposed infrastructure. "We've developed a good relationship with the council to make sure that we're able to create something sustainable," Fineran notes. "Because the council supported and there was a groundwork, [Marrickville has become] a good spot for other people to come and set up their breweries as well." Since Batch Brewing pulled its first pint in 2013, eighteen more independent breweries have opened in Sydney's Inner West, with nine alone in Marrickville itself. "I think the cherry on top was that there was a lot of precedent for breweries in the area. It had become quite a burgeoning community of like-minded businesses that we really admired." says Nathan Lennon, co-founder of Marrickville's newest attraction, The Bob Hawke Beer and Leisure Centre. This popular tap room from Hawke's Brewing is named and themed in honour of former Prime Minister Bob Hawke, who even assisted in co-founding the company. [caption id="attachment_981900" align="alignnone" width="2000"] Hawkes co-founders Nathan Lennon (left) and David Gibson (right) with former PM Bob Hawke (centre).[/caption] "We felt that we could complement that community and bring something unique, and unique to us as a brand within it, to help drive the idea that Marrickville is one of the craft beer capitals of Australia," Lennon adds. Wildflower Brewing and Blending, which opened its Marrickville HQ in 2016, takes the yeast cultures it uses to ferment its brews from NSW wildflowers (hence the name). Co-founder Topher Boehm likens his small-batch ales, which employ diverse and regenerative brewing methods, to the "sourdough" of beer. [caption id="attachment_982274" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Wildflower co-founder Topher Boehm with a bale of hops at his Marrickville brewery[/caption] A longtime friend of Fineran, Boehm believes the variety every local brewery brings to the table creates an "overall vibrant community". But as he and Fineran point out, breweries aren't the only hospitality businesses revitalising the suburb. "It's not just beer that's made in Merrickville. There's such a vibrant community of industry vendors," Boehm explains. "I don't want to overlook the council's support of what we do … they've been overwhelmingly supportive of these industries and hats off to them for that. They've been supportive of business development and economic growth in their local community. And we've been the beneficiaries of that. "It's something in the Australian psyche to be a community person … I'm gonna promote community first, I'm gonna promote my neighborhood first. That's an investment in your locality." Support for the flourishing beer scene comes not just from the council and fellow brewers, but from the locals themselves. "You have a lot of people living here in the Inner West who are more 'think global, act local' kind of people who spend their money on independent businesses," adds Boehm. "That's what I love about Australia. Locals like the sole traders, they like the small business and they're actually somewhat happy to pay for that. "It's something in the Australian psyche to be a community person … I'm gonna promote community first, I'm gonna promote my neighborhood first. That's an investment in your locality." However, despite this enthusiastic local support, Marrickville's breweries have still faced challenges. Like other areas of the hospitality industry hammered by the impacts of the cost-of-living crisis, craft breweries are going under across Sydney and beyond. Malt Shovel Brewery, one of Sydney's oldest craft breweries, was closed by corporate brewer Lion in August of this year, ending decades of proud brewing heritage. [caption id="attachment_781133" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Wildflower Brewing and Blending, Marrickville.[/caption] The rising price tag of making and distributing beer for independent brewers has made it increasingly difficult for independent breweries to keep up with the wide networks and expansive resources of corporate competitors. "It can't be left unsaid that it just is difficult to maintain businesses of smaller sizes because you don't have the economies of scale," says Boehm. However, it seems brewers and employees alike have hope for the industry's future. Indeed, those who pour their love and dedication into Marrickville's craft brewing industry are what truly make it noteworthy. Whether that be carefully brewing a new and somewhat strange beer in the back of a warehouse down or stumbling through the streets and raising pints with your friends in honour of another night well enjoyed. "It was just sort of like that perfect storm really of the industry had enough people within it or outside of it that wanted to build breweries, but also the pathway became a little bit easier economically because of places like Marrickville, which had the infrastructure, had the sites, had the council permit, the council quite supportive of that type of business," Lennon concludes. "And the kind of crowd within the Inner West area is one that would be willing to try new things and really fit with the growth of breweries in the area. "Did we choose Marrickville or did Marrickville choose us is the question. You can discover the best Marrickville breweries, as well as the broader craft beer scene of the surrounding suburbs, on the Inner West Ale Trail. Visit the website for details.
We know there's nothing sweeter than the sound the brown paper bag makes as you whip it off your bottle(s) of grog at a table, and nothing better than the taste of your favourite beer accompanying a delicious meal. But it's not at every restaurant you can do this — and drinking sneakily out of your handbag at non-BYO joints is both illegal and a surefire way to ruin your bag. Let us guide you to the places that allow you to BYO beer in your city to avoid any of that, with the added bonus of being A+ places to eat more than heartily. Winter is for nothing if not overindulging on dumplings or Greek feasts and then waddling home, right? Grab your six-pack and put on your eating pants. SYDNEY: CHINATOWN NOODLE RESTAURANT Before you head to Chinatown Noodle Restaurant in Haymarket, beware: if you're coming for dinner, be prepared to queue for a while and wait for a table — or you can check out the neighbouring Chinese Noodle Restaurant and see if you can grab a seat. Otherwise, set up camp in the line, send a scout out to get beers from a bottle shop (there's one in Market City next door) and wait it out. Once you're in, service is quick, dumplings are countless and spring onion pancakes are hot. Crack open a beer or two to wash down the too-many dumplings that you'll no doubt eat. Haven't you had yourself a night? SYDNEY: THE SULTAN'S TABLE The Sultan's Table in Enmore is the sort of place you want to head to if your feet and nose are numb and you're craving some hot meat. If your hunger has never been greater than consider the banquet option for $38 per head. A very reasonable price delivers plate after plate of dips, pita, kebab, pides, veg stuffed with rice and grilled meats, followed by sweets, tea or coffee. If you're not quite up for such an intense fill, the chargrilled kebabs are obviously where it's at (unless you're a vegetarian and then the ample vego menu is more your vibe). Whether you're in it to win it with the banquet or just grabbing a pide, Sultan's Table serving sizes are good value for money and great fare for cold nights. Sit a while, finish your beers, and don't forget to nab a baklava at the end. MELBOURNE: MAMAK One word: roti. Another three words: get the roti. Mamak is famous for a good reason, and that reason is flaky, buttery, delicious and dipped in curry. The Melbourne branch of the Malaysian restaurant sits in the middle of the CBD on Lonsdale Street, with branches also in Sydney and now, Seminyak in Bali. Obviously, you'll hit up the roti menu (try the roti canai at a breezy $7.50) but don't bypass the satay options — they're just as good. There's also dessert roti FYI, so make sure to try and exercise a minute amount of self-control and leave space. And on top of all that greatness, Mamak is BYO at $2 per person. [caption id="attachment_637824" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Image: Leah Hulst.[/caption] MELBOURNE: JIM'S GREEK TAVERN It's not a proper Greek feast unless you're calling an Uber home because you've eaten too much to be able to exist in a public place such as a tram. Wear your loosest pants (a large poncho might be best) and partake in the delicious roulette that is dining at Jim's; there's no menu as such. The staff will ask you what you feel like eating and then bring out dishes for you. Trust them, they've been doing it for years — just shut up and eat the saganaki (as if you really need your arm twisted for that though). Generally, you'll get whatever is fresh and good on the day you go — fish, lamb and calamari will all probably make an appearance, as well as the homemade galaktoboureko (custard cake). The food is traditional, the vibe is bustling, and your stomach will be happy. Best washed down with a lager or two — corkage is cheap, too. BRISBANE: CHOP CHOP CHANG'S Chop Chop Chang's in Brisbane's West End serves up pan-Asian street food fare, reminiscent of what you'd be eating if you were strolling through the markets and street stalls of Asia. With a focus on fresh and locally sourced produce, Chop Chop Chang's do brunch, lunch and dinner, but also four banquet menus with options increasing in decadence and starting at only $38 a head. If you're just picking from the menu, best give the curry section a good look, and don't go past the green curry chicken dumplings ($10). On the subject of dumplings, the dessert menu is hawking spiced apple dumplings ($14), so there are lots to think about while you leisurely sip your beer and mull things over. BRISBANE: VERVE Verve in the CBD is many things: it's a bar, a restaurant, a cider house, is situated in some cool basement digs and has you sorted for your winter pasta needs. Need even more than that? You can bring your own beer in. Check out the venue, originally Brisbane's first basement bar, below ground level at the Metro Arts building. With more pasta options than you can count on all your fingers and toes, you'll be happily carbing it up here — try the homemade gnocchi for a solid feed that'll probably keep you going until dinner the next night. Verve offers ample gluten-free and vegan options too, so you coeliac carb-fiends need not miss out. There's also something called brandy tortellini ($22.90) which, well, yes, please. Gather some mates and head to one of these top-notch eateries with an appetite and a six-pack of Hahn, too.
The atmosphere of a writer's den, insanely long opening hours, fun and flavorsome food, a drinks menu that will keep even the most inspired drinker guessing, and not even the slightest degree of pretension. In short, Hemingway's must be one of the best spots in town right now. And it's perhaps not where you would expect it to be. A far cry from the back lanes of Darlinghurst or even the fame of King Street, this bar is firmly situated on Manly's main strip, right across from the beach. Despite this, it's about as dissimilar from a tourist trap as you can imagine. For a start, the prices. The house cocktails are $15 and the suggested mixers, almost good enough to be cocktails themselves, are a mere $10. Hemingway's Cup is the ten to one favourite cocktail, spotted in the hands of almost every lady in the place. It's gentle mix of Hendrick's gin, rose and apple tea, sugar, and spice, served in a tea cup and saucer with slices of cucumber alongside. While it's very good, my pick would be the Miffy: house-infused vanilla rum, Falernum, orange, lemon and egg white whisked into a cloud-like dream. On a summer's day, the Creaming Soda might be more your style, with vodka, crème de cassis, home-made lemonade, wild berry foam and a paper cocktail umbrella. As far as mixer ideas go, Aperol and Fanta isn't a bad choice, and neither is Rum, Spicy Bitters and Ginger Beer. Both pack a flavoursome punch. The food, too, picks up on this childhood-made-tastier theme. From the bar menu, the Corn ($6) with lime butter, black salt and finely grated Manchego is reminiscent of one of the Norfolk's best menu items. Of the sliders , we're told that the Beef ($14 for two, $26 for four) is the best pick and it definitely lives up to the hype. With cheese, bacon, barbeque sauce, mayo and pickles, it's the burger you wish fast food joints served. The Chilli Dog ($8), with a smoked frankfurt, chilli con carne, mustard, jalapenos and cheese, rounds the meal off nicely. For two, that is. While dessert might sound like a stretch, these offerings demand to be taken up. We tried a new one, titled simply Milo ($10). It turned out to be a rich chocolate marquise with vanilla ice cream to the side, balanced on a soil of Milo and Coco Pops, alongside a smear of salted caramel, and topped with milk foam. In other words, a stoner's dream. It's worth mentioning that these are only two of the many menus on offer. Hemingway's serves breakfast and lunch and, between Monday and Saturday, offers a full, fancy dinner upstairs. In a place this good, I suspect that I'll be an expert on all of those menus within the month. [nggallery id=117]
Once synonymous with backpackers, ferry rides and the type of seaside fare stuck in an '80s time warp, Manly has suddenly come over all hip and heady. From Merivale's South American-inspired wharf cantina to the profusion of small bars and diners that have mushroomed overnight, Manly is fast shedding its 'insular peninsula' image to become Sydney’s hang-out du jour. Donny’s Bar is the latest addition to the growing culinary set, but chalk it off as just another small bar riding the northern beaches foodie wave and you’d be doing this quiet achiever a huge injustice. Tucked away on a sliver of Market Lane — one of the few places where you can rub shoulders with a real Manly-ite — Donny’s works industrial warehouse chic to the full: think exposed brick walls, glass bottle light fittings and a bar clad with reclaimed train sleepers. A Manhattan loft-style venue, this is the type of place where you can start with drinks and a boogie on the ground floor, then make your way up to fine dining nirvana on the upper level. Pull up a stool at the copper swathe of a bar and ask the bartender to surprise you. And he or she certainly will. Cocktails are divided into classics and more adventurous signatures — don’t miss the Bonsai ($18), a refreshing gin and lime-mint slurp of summer in a jar. If you thought the drinks were good, wait till you try the food. Chef Richi Dia, born in Japan and raised in the US, is at the pulse point of fusion cuisine and the menu, whether it’s the tapas bites or more substantial dishes, bears the hallmarks of his style: uber-fresh ingredients and impeccable presentation. Start with the roasted scallops ($22). Gently seared, the scallops arrive with dollops of earthy beetroot puree, tender asparagus and a sprinkling of crushed pistachios — a textural burst in every fresh bite. There are plump prawns and chorizo ($22) too, the hint of chilli — appearing on the palate only as an aftertaste — adds a kick to the smokey chorizo and juicy prawn. Think you’ve had crispy salmon? You haven’t till you’ve tried Donny’s delectable Tasmanian salmon ($32). If the ingenious sesame and prosciutto crumb combination (like a nutty, healthier take on bacon bits) or the medley of garden-fresh asparagus and jewel-bright baby carrots don’t have you swooning, the perfectly cooked salmon — coral pink and melting on the fork — certainly will. Served with a zesty basil sauce, this is a dish that will have you dreaming of summers by the beach with a glass of chilled white in your hand. For carnivores, try Donny’s interpretation of the surf 'n' turf: roasted rosemary chicken served with moreish garlic king prawns ($27). On the weekend a band gets the crowd grooving on the makeshift dance floor whilst in the loft, Manly-ites are quietly laughing at their good fortune. This is definitely one local secret they won’t be in a hurry to divulge.
Pompeii, the latest exhibition to arrive at the National Museum of Australia in Canberra, offers a rare insight into one of the world's most amazing and catastrophic archaeological wonders. Nearly 2,000 years ago, before the fateful eruption of Mount Vesuvius, Pompeii was a bustling city located in what is now southern Italy. By exploring this exhibition, you can discover what life was like in the city before it was buried under metres of volcanic ash. The exhibition features a multi-sensory, immersive experience that combines a 360-degree recreation of the volcanic eruption with more than 90 objects from the ancient city. For almost 300 years, excavations have revealed what life was like in Pompeii and archaeologists continue to make extraordinary new discoveries to this day. This exhibition features some newly discovered objects which are being seen for the first time outside Europe. The artefacts include frescoes, jewellery, sculptures and pottery alongside copies of casts of some of the victims of the 79 CE eruption. Other exhibition highlights include an immersive re-enactment of the volcanic eruption that destroyed Pompeii almost 2,000 years ago, as well as the 'Statuette of Venus', a marble statue from the 1st century CE from Villa Poppaea, Oplontis, near Pompeii. You'll be transported to Pompeii via a corso stretching more than 35 metres through the exhibition space. There is also an oh-so-important exhibition shop, selling keepsakes and goods inspired by the Italian seaside, food, design and fashion. Please note, the exhibition features loud noises and changing light levels, as the space darkens every 15 minutes for a re-enactment as Mount Vesuvius erupts. Visitors may bring noise-cancelling headphones. Don't miss 'Pompeii', showing exclusively at the National Museum of Australia in Canberra until Sunday, May 4 2025. Book your tickets today. Images: Supplied.
Getting paid to do what you love is the ultimate employment dream. Finding a job doing something that everyone loves? That's a next-level kind of gig. When Gelatissimo turned taste-testing new gelato flavours into an actual position, it fell into that category. When Domino's wanted someone to eat garlic bread for cold hard cash, it did too. And over at hospitality group Australian Venue Co, there's a similar kind of job on offer. Fancy adding 'secret sipper' to your resume? That's the gig that AVC is currently advertising again, with 100 positions available around the country. You'll get assigned to cover some of the company's bars and pubs in your city, and you'll get paid for dining, drinking and then submitting a review once a month. If you've ever worked in retail and heard about mystery shoppers, then you know the drill. That's how these roles work, but in hospitality. So, you'll be posing as a customer and interacting with the venue's staff to scope out their service — and you'll be so discreet that they'll be unaware that you're on AVC's payroll, like they are. Members of the company's Secret Sipper Club, as the lucky wining-and-dining folks are called, will receive a $30 meal allowance for their monthly visit, plus $200 for each review. For that cash — which will make this a side hustle rather than your only gig — you do need to do more than offer a few words, completing a detailed written report after each meal. You don't need to have any experience in the field. Obviously, we're all veterans at eating and drinking, but you don't need to have done this type of job before. There are some pre-requisites, though, such as being over 18; having your own transport and access to a mobile device; being passionate about the industry; attentiveness and impartiality; and having time to do 12 visits each year. And if you're wondering which venues you might be visiting, it could be any in AVC's stable. In Sydney, that includes everywhere from The Winery, Cargo and Kingsleys through to BrewDog South Eveleigh, The Rook and Little Pearl. For Melburnians, you might be hitting up The Espy, The Duke and Sarah Sands Hotel, or BrewDog Pentridge, State of Grace and Trinket. Brisbane's venues include The Wickham, The Regatta, Crown Hotel and Riverland, plus the likes of Burleigh Town Hotel, The Local Tavern and Wallaby Hotel on the Gold Coast. In Adelaide, The Hope Inn, The Unley and The West End Tavern are on the list, while Perth residents could find themselves at Raffles Hotel, Sweetwater Rooftop Bar, The Globe and Wolf Lane. Find out more about AVC's Secret Sipper Club — and apply — by heading to the company's website.
Being an adult Disney fan in Sydney is easy right now. The Mouse House's movies can be watched and rewatched (then rewatched again) thanks to the company's very own streaming service, and there's no shortage of other events — outdoor cinemas, musicals, drinks, exhibitions in other states and more — popping up or on their way. But if you're looking for something special to celebrate a whole century of the company's wares, and you're particularly fond of all the earworm songs its flicks have gotten stuck in your head over the years, then a big 100th-anniversary Disney concert is just the ticket. Disney 100: The Concert hops on a trend that's been popular for a few years now, pairing beloved movies with a live orchestra playing the soundtrack as you watch. This time, though, you'll be seeing clips of the Mouse House's musical hits rather than watching an entire feature. There's just that much to get through, given the company's massive film catalogue. [caption id="attachment_872472" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Daniel Boud[/caption] Making its Australian premiere at the Sydney Opera House's Concert Hall over three shows between Friday, February 24–Saturday, February 25, the concert will bust out tracks from Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, The Little Mermaid, The Lion King, Moana and Encanto, as well as Pocahontas, Aladdin, Tangled, Hercules and Frozen. The Sydney Symphony Orchestra and maestra Jessica Gethin will be in charge of the tunes — and a yet-to-be-announced a lineup of Australian musical theatre stars will be lending their voices to the production, which focuses on Disney's animated favourites. Also featuring: performers Genevieve McCarthy (Mythic, Les Misérables) and Amy Manford (The Phantom of the Opera) from MM Creative Productions, which is behind the production. If Disney's music soundtracked your childhood — and still does your adulthood — being this show's guest is a delightfully easy decision. Disney 100: The Concert will play Sydney Opera House's Concert Hall on Friday, February 24–Saturday, February 25, 2023. Pre-sale tickets are available now, with general public tickets on sale from 10am AEDT on Tuesday, October 11.
Earlier this year, we wrote about how Elon Musk's high-speed vacuum tube transport system could be a reality by 2018. Well, because it's Elon Musk, the whole thing looks like it's actually running on schedule — and potentially coming to Australia. What, here? Where everything comes last? Yep. According to The Australian, Los Angeles-based firm Hyperloop One — who Musk has given the task of bringing this thing to life — are looking for a place to test the technology, and they have the Sydney to Melbourne corridor firmly on their radar. "We're very keen to explore the potential for doing proof of operations in Australia and the reason for that is there's a clear long-term need for ultra-fast transport on the Australian east coast," Hyperloop One's vice president of global business development Alan James told The Australian. "So we would be looking, either in NSW or Victoria, or possibly in ACT, to develop the first section of that route, to prove the operation of Hyperloop, to get regulatory approval." Described by Musk as a "cross between a Concorde and a railgun and an air hockey table" the proposed Hyperloop system — which is almost cartoonish in design — would consist of a long route of elevated vacuum-sealed steel tubes, through which pressurised capsules ride cushions of air at speeds of up to 1220 kilometres per hour. Hyperloop One claims it can have you travelling from inner-city Melbourne to inner-city Sydney in only 55 minutes. 55 minutes. (Do you hear that? It's the sound of Tiger and Jetstar quaking in their boots.) To drive between Melbourne and Sydney would set you back about nine hours; currently, to get the train, it takes 11.5 hours. Australia — and particularly the Sydney-Melbourne corridor — is the perfect candidate for high speed rail transport because the track could slip nicely along the Hume Highway. There has, of course, been much talk and debate over a high-speed rail system connecting the two cities, but so far no government has been willing to commit to the project. The Hyperloop One team seem to have made rapid progress since they started testing in LA last year. They recently revealed the first prototype will be up and running in the Nevada desert early in 2017 before (potentially, hopefully) kicking off the large scale trial in Australia in 2018. Can it be the future already? For too long we've been at the mercy of Tiger's delays, expensive terrible airport coffee and the drive down the Hume with only Maccas to break up the monotony. We, for one, welcome Musk and his terrifying pneumatic tubes. Via The Australian.
Sure you've had plenty of time to see the Art Gallery of New South Wales's blockbuster exhibition Japan Supernatural, but have you been yet? We get it, there aren't enough hours in a day. Luckily, if you're yet to see the exhibition, or you're keen to see the 200 works again before it closes, the gallery is extending its opening hours for its final weekend. From Friday, March 6 to Sunday, March 8, the gallery will stay open till 10pm — so you really have no excuse not to visit. The exhibition explores the spirit world in Japanese art — from paintings and sculpture to prints, film, animation, comics and games. Wander through the gallery after dark and see contemporary artist Takashi Murakami's huge mural; Utagawa Kuniyoshi's work Mitsukuni defies the skeleton spectre conjured up by Princess Takiyasha (1845–46); and the painted handscroll Night procession of the Hundred Demons (1772–81) by Toriyama Sekien. Need more inspiration? Check out five must-see works here and the haunting characters to look out for here. On top of staying up late, the gallery is also hosting a series of mini events. Drop into an origami workshop led by Japanese-born, Sydney-based contemporary artist Midori Furze. Taking place in the gallery's cafe on Friday, from 6–8pm, and Sunday, from 5–7pm, this art class will teach you how to create paper Japanese spirits, known as yōkai. You can also catch a free live gig on the exhibition's closing night. Sydney-based singer-songwriter Morgana Osaki will be performing her experimental electronic tunes on Sunday, from 5–8pm. Japan Supernatural is open from 10am–10pm on Friday, March 6, Saturday, March 7 and Sunday, March 8. For more information, head here. Images: 'Japan Supernatural' at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, November 2, 2019 until March 8, 2020. Photo: AGNSW/Jenni Carter.
After a long hard day's work in this busy city of ours, nothing beats a cold hard cocktail and a spot o' Frank Sinatra. Or Sammy Davis Jr. Or Dean Martin. It's the closest we'll get to time travelling to early 1960s New York, where the bands were big and the drinks were stiff. The original Rat Pack leader, Humphrey Bogart, had left this world in 1957, and a new crew of sharp young whippersnappers were settling into the throne: Sinatra, Martin and Davis, Jr. along with less-known folks Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop. But this ragtag gang weren't alone in their late night jams, with the likes of Peggy Lee, Nina Simone, Ray Charles, Nat King Cole and Ella Fitzgerald fuelling the fire. But what were these legendary gallivanters drinking, having late night chats in a dimly lit NYC saloon long after the audience had gone home? According to various accounts, classic Drambuie cocktail The Rusty Nail was a favourite for the Rat Pack boys in the '60s. It's a combo of Scotch whisky and spicy, syrupy Drambuie (which is made with herbs, honey and scotch) served with a twist of lemon (check out our more in-depth history of the cocktail). Now, bartenders all over Sydney are getting creative and giving the whisky-based liqueur screen time in their contemporary cocktails, shaking and stirring it into popularity once again. Sydney jazz club The Swinging Cat is celebrating the notorious liqueur with A Night With The Nail, a series celebrating the Rat Pack era every Thursday night throughout October and November. So we thought we'd put together a little audio time warp before you get there, with a playlist perfect for your next cocktail hour. Loosen your tie, kick up your heels, make yourself a Rusty Nail and dig into a specially-made playlist of our favourite Rat Pack-era tunes. Image: Wiki.
No plans for Valentine's Day and no interest in making any? You're in luck. Go about your usual business next Thursday — that is, as far as humanly possible away from red roses, schmultzy songs and pashing pairs — and you could still be in for a nice little surprise. That's because Penguin Random House is planning on helping you to escape — by setting you up with a book, instead of a person. After all, books can't talk back and, if they end up being not what you thought they were, you can always put them back on the shelf. Said books will be dropped in bundles on trains and street libraries all over Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane Adelaide, Perth, Canberra, Darwin and Launceston this Valentine's Day. The books will be wrapped in nondescript orange paper so there's no way of knowing if you've picked up a new release or a modern classic. The idea is to do away with pre-conceived ideas, promoted by particular genres, authors and cover art. The publishing house is scattering the books in partnership with Street Libraries Australia, Sydney, and Books on the Rail, which launched in Melbourne in early 2016 and regularly circulates books on Melbourne's public transport. If you find one, take it home and read it — just remember to pop it back on the train when you're done.
Big changes have come to The Newington on Stanmore Road, with the familiar local set reopening under a new moniker after extensive renovations. To be henceforth known as Public House Petersham, the venue has overhauled its traditional pub decor, transforming the space into a 'local cultural hub', inspired by the vibe of Bushwick, Brooklyn. The rebranding is the idea of hospitality group Solotel, who purchased the venue and also operates the likes of Opera Bar, Paddington Inn and Goros. The venue features two unique street art designs by Sydney artists Phibs and Numskull, new booth seating, a community herb garden made from repurposed pallets and a shipping container beer garden. Under newly appointed head chef, Martin Cerny, the menu and drinks list has also had a facelift with a focus on craft beers, fresh produce seasoned with plants from the herb garden, wine and share food (including gingerbread men-topped desserts), as well as pizzas cooked in a brand new wood-fire oven. The owners will also be encouraging local community groups and clubs to use the venue as a place to meet and host activities. Licensee Amanda Veratti said in a statement that the owners "are thrilled to be able to give the old Hotel a new lease of life, where people can meet and socialise over a fantastic range of beverages and food that is made to be shared". Images: Nikki To.
The Australian-premiere season of Jean Paul Gaultier's Fashion Freak Show. Trent Dalton's Love Stories making the world-debuting leap from the page to the stage. A serialised live blend of dance and theatre that asks you to binge-watch in person. The return of both Lightscape to make the Brisbane City Botanic Gardens shine and The Art Boat sailing down the Brisbane River. You'll find them all at one place and one place only in 2024: Brisbane Festival, which has just unveiled its full lineup for this year. As fans of the Boy Swallows Universe author will already know, Dalton's Love Stories was announced in advance of the complete program — and now it has excellent company. Securing the only Australian run of Jean Paul Gaultier's Fashion Freak Show, a fashion show-meets-musical revue stage production that features more than 200 original Gaultier couture pieces and celebrates the designer's 50-year career, is an incredible coup for Brisbane Festival Artistic Director Louise Bezzina in her fifth year at the helm. Also huge as part of the performance, which is headed to South Bank Piazza: a couture piece by Queensland Indigenous designer Grace Lillian Lee, as chosen by Gaultier, will feature in the Brisbane season. Lee will also unveil her first solo exhibition The Dream Weaver: Guardians of Grace at this year's fest. The overall Brisbane Festival dates for your diary: Friday, August 30–Saturday, September 21. For that three-week period, almost every corner of Brissie will play host to the fest, as 1000-plus performances — more than 320 of which will be free, and with 13 enjoying their world debuts — fill the city. Some aspects of the program will get you seated in theatres around town, of course, but Brisbane Festival has always adored taking its roster of performances, gigs, installations and parties well beyond the usual venues. Hailing from Ireland, Volcano might be among the shows popping up in expected digs — at Brisbane Powerhouse — but it's anything but standard. Watching this performance means making a date with four 45-minute episodes, complete with intermissions, in a piece that riffs on a TV sci-fi thriller. Lightscape and The Art Boat are no strangers to Brisbane, with both making a 2024 comeback to dazzle iconic areas of the city with light and colour. On the latter, DJ sets will provide the soundtrack, while Briefs Factory and a range of other artists will be in the hot seat with burlesque, drag and circus performances. Firmly new not just to the Queensland capital or Brisbane Festival but to the world is opera Straight from the Strait, which is about the seven kilometres of railway track put down in a single 1968 day by Torres Strait Islander workers — and yes, it's a true story. Also enjoying its global debut is Lighting the Dark by Dancenorth Australia, in collaboration with Chris Dyke. The latter, a performer and choreographer living with Down Syndrome, has weaved his love of Banksy, David Bowie and Freddie Mercury into what promises to be a heartfelt presentation. Kitchen Studio from artist Elizabeth Winning is yet another certain highlight, acting as an installation by day and hosting small guests for a sensory experience by evening. Still getting interactive, Adrift tasks its audience with playing a role in a participatory theatre work — following instructions received via headsets — that's a mix of a mystery and a game. The standouts keep coming, including Big Name, No Blankets, which celebrates Warumpi Band across two nights of concerts, as inspired by founding member Sammy Tjapanangka Butcher's stories; Skylore — The Rainbow Serpent, as featuring 400-plus drones to tell a First Nations story above the city; GRIMM, with Shake & Stir switching from 2023's stage iteration of Frankenstein to a show that weaves in Snow White, Cinderella and Little Red Riding Hood; and this year's round of Brisbane Serenades, complete with events in Moorooka, Northshore Brisbane, St Lucia, Kuraby and Victoria Park. Or, there's the Queensland premieres of Eucalyptus and Private View and — the first turning Murray Bail's Miles Franklin Award-winning novel into an opera, and the second exploring the intersection of disability and sexual desire across a four-room setup. Riverfire, Sweet Relief!'s return headlined by Kelis, the tradition that is the Common People Dance Eisteddfod, Cirque Bon Bon bring Le Retour back to Brisbane: they're all a part of the festival as well, as is plenty more — so whether you're a Brisbanite keen to hop around your home town or an interstater planning a visit, no one will be short on things to do across Brisbane Festival's 23 days. "Brisbane Festival believes in the transformative power of the arts to unite, inspire and empower and my fifth festival program is a creative celebration of this power on both a global and a local scale," said Bezzina about the 2024 lineup. "I am delighted this year to bring leading international artists as well as creatively significant, profoundly inspiring and wholly entertaining works from across the world to our city." "Brisbane Festival remains a celebration by and for Brisbane so when we bring these global works to our city, we create opportunities to spotlight the extraordinary talents of our local artists on the world stage." Brisbane Festival 2024 runs from Friday, August 30–Saturday, September 21 at various venues around Brisbane. Head to the festival's website for tickets and further details.
When Twin Peaks wrapped up its original two-season run back in 1991, it left audiences with a damn huge cliffhanger. David Lynch revisited the series' distinctive world on the big screen the following year; however Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me was a prequel rather than a sequel, so the show's mysteries remained just that for more than a quarter-century. Then, in 2017, came Twin Peaks: The Return. The long-awaited 18-episode third season of the show continued the tale of FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) and murdered Twin Peaks homecoming queen Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee) — but, with Lynch directing every episode and co-writing the whole thing with fellow series creator Mark Frost, it did so in a very Lynchian way. In the words of Coop himself, it took you to a place both wonderful and strange, exceeding what even the most feverish Peaks fans expected. Eighteen hours of Lynch and Frost's unfiltered weirdness will do that. Indeed, Twin Peaks: The Return felt like stepping straight into Lynch's brain. That said, the next Twin Peaks project just might have that beat. While it's unlikely to deliver anything as mind-blowing as the third season's acclaimed eighth episode, Twin Peaks VR will let you wander around the show's famous settings — and solve puzzles while you're there. Created by Collider Games and Showtime, and available now — via Steam and Oculus for Oculus Rift, Oculus Rift-S, HTC Vive and HTC Vive Cosmos, with versions for Oculus Quest and PlayStationVR coming at a yet-to-be-revealed date — Twin Peaks VR takes players on a first-person journey through everywhere from the Red Room and Glastonbury Grove to the Sheriff's Department and the Glass Box Observation. Yes, that means that you can virtually walk past the iconic crimson curtains and along the zigzagging floors, rifle through Sheriff Truman's desk and watch out for Bob. Based on the trailer, you can also see the kettle-like machine that David Bowie's Fire Walk With Me character became in The Return as well. While escape room-type puzzles keep the game moving forward, it's really an excuse to hang out in the Twin Peaks realm in the most immersive way yet. And, if you've watched and rewatched the show's 48 episodes (and the movie) more times than you can count — and read the various books related to it, too — it's your next chance to scratch your Twin Peaks itch. Best grab yourself some coffee, cherry pie and doughnuts to enjoy while you're playing, obviously. Check out the trailer below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHRXHvPRrJY Twin Peaks VR is now available via Steam and Oculus. For further information, visit the game's website.
"Why can't you enjoy life?": when that line arrives in Hard Truths, it's not only a haunting moment within the latest film from British writer/director Mike Leigh, but the same from any movie in the past few years. First, the perennially depressed, angry and disillusioned — and also agoraphobic, paranoid, confrontational and hypochondriac — Pansy (Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Surface) utters it, giving voice to the accusations that she felt were directed her way by her late mother. Pansy's sister Chantelle (Michele Austin, Boat Story) then repeats it back, but as her own question, asking someone so clearly always in pain why such hurt, unhappiness and fury is her default status. "It was the combination of a lot of improvisations and preparation. It just came out of the blue," Jean-Baptiste tells Concrete Playground about that piece of dialogue. "It was obviously months of rehearsing and developing the characters that led up to it." She continues: "it just summed up the frustration that Chantelle has with her sister Pansy, but also I think something releases for Pansy when she actually answers truthfully." Leigh sees it as "part of the investigation of the relationship", he advises. "The moment, like all the moments — and all the action and all the dialogue and everything else — came out of the whole exploratory process of making the film by finding out what the film is on the journey of making it." As all projects by the iconic filmmaker are — across an on-screen resume that started with 1971's Bleak Moments; saw Jean-Baptiste nominated for a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for Leigh's Secrets & Lies in 1996; and also covers Life Is Sweet, Naked, Career Girls, Vera Drake, Happy-Go-Lucky, Another Year, Mr Turner, Peterloo and more — the London-set Hard Truths was built from the ground up with his collaborators. His famed method of working involves casting first, constructing characters one on one with his actors sans script, tasking them with improvising the dialogue and, along the way, finding the storyline while only telling the members of his ensemble what they each need to know to play their parts. Here, the result is a two-time BAFTA nominee, including for Best Actress for its lead, who won the same category at the British Independent Film Awards. Alongside standing out as a portrait of the daily lives of a Black British family, a rarity in cinemas, Hard Truths is also a stunning study of a character who holds onto her agony, fears, rage and exasperation so tightly inside, and unleashes it so frequently at anyone and everyone in her vicinity. Pansy's contented salon-owner sister — a single mother with two daughters, one training to be a lawyer (Sophia Brown, Dead Shot) and the other in cosmetics (Ani Nelson, One Day) — isn't the only target of her distress. Hard Truths' protagnist's husband Curtley (David Webber, My Lady Jane) and adult son Moses (Tuwaine Barrett, Back to Black) are as visibly weary from attempting to cope as Pansy clearly is. Jean-Baptiste describes the character as "somebody who is in a lot of pain, but doesn't quite know where it's coming from. There's a lot of fear as well. It's 'attack before I'm attacked'. She's petrified of life and it manifests itself in a very aggressive way". If her performance hardly feels like one — not that she's Pansy IRL for a second — that's again a result of Leigh's process. "Michele Austin and I, obviously we've worked together before with Mike, but we would get into a room and Mike would talk to us about the girls. And so we had to build their parallel history," she explains, offering one example of how such fully realised characters came about. "Their parents, their grandparents, where they lived in London, what schools they went to, the bus route to their schools. How did they get there? Did they walk? Did they have to go past the park? And then we go and find that in London. So located it, so there's a visual memory of what that would have looked like, and that continues and continues until we get to a point — we do birthdays, parties, holidays, all that information. So imagine when you're in an improvisation a month and a half later, you've got all this stuff, all this wonderful history, all these experiences, that you can pull on at any given point within the improvs. So that's how that works." And yes, across a resume that also spans The Cell, City of Ember, the RoboCop remake, In Fabric, seven seasons of Without a Trace, Broadchurch, Blindspot, Homecoming and much more, Jean-Baptiste advises that she's benefited from Leigh's approach even when he's not her director. What appeals to Leigh, one of cinema's great excavators of life's complexities — struggles, joys and everything in-between — about investigating humanity through his work, and collaborating with his cast to create characters that feel like they could've walked off the street and into his movies? And what has driven him to do so for more than half a century? "It comes naturally to me. As a little kid, I was drawing caricatures of the grown-ups," he notes. "I don't make movies about movies. I love watching movies, but that's separate from the films that I make. I am not interested in received notions of plot and structure or anything else. For me, film — and indeed theatre, when I do stage plays, including in Australia — it's about a way to look at real life. People say to me 'where do your ideas come from?'. Well, I've only got to walk down the street and there are ten, 12, 20, 50, 100 films, because it's people, and that's really what it's about for me, basically." With Leigh and Jean-Baptiste reuniting for Hard Truths not only after Secrets & Lies and collaborating for the stage, but after Jean-Baptiste composed the score for Leigh's Career Girls, too, we also chatted with the pair about their working relationship, Leigh's starting point with each project, getting into and out of character, and the challenges and freedoms of his process, among other topics. What continues to inspire them and what they make of their respective careers: we spoke with the two about that as well. On Building Pansy as a Character Over Months and Months Marianne: "Mike asks you to come to the first session, where he works with you one on one, and to have a list of people from real life, real-life people that you know. And you start talking about all of these people and a list is formed, and the list gets smaller and smaller and smaller. So it's important to ground the characters in reality. And from that point, it's a stepping off point, because the character changes. For example, if you have three people, you've taken characteristics from those three people and you've merged them, what you would then do is start from scratch and build a new character — from their first memory to the age they're going to play when you actually see them in the film. In that process, you start to, with Mike always — he takes the position of god, he makes the decisions that none of us can make for ourselves — so with Mike, there's a collaboration whereby he asks lots of questions and you start filling in answers to who this person is. And then things that you wouldn't be able to decide, he makes those decisions. And in doing so, the disappointments, the heartbreaks and things like that, start to build in that person's life. So on a simplistic level, you could say that she is a combination of all of the bad experiences she's had — some real, some imaginary." Mike: "It's a difficult question to answer, really. Because obviously at one level, such people resonate for me — just as for everybody else, no doubt, including you — with experiences that you've had. What we do on my films, and this film is absolutely no exception, is I collaborate with each actor to give birth to a character. And drawing on various things, including some people that Marianne Jean-Baptiste actually knows, we evolved the basis of the character, which then grew." Marianne: "My experience in life. Observation. Being fascinated by human beings. That's the sort of thing that I generally draw on. And just knowing that — it's like being a kid again, almost — knowing that I'm absolutely free to imagine and create. One of my first jobs out of drama school, actually, was doing a Mike Leigh play — and it's exactly the same process, but it was early enough in my career to influence the way that I approached my work and almost approach life in that sort of people-watching way, and just being fascinated. So I think that just being in a safe environment where that was okay to make stuff up, and to pull stuff from my imagination is acceptable. I think you're just in-character in this process. We warm up into character and we snap out of it quite quickly. But as I said, it really is the culmination of months and months of working. We rehearsed for three and a half months — and that's a short rehearsal process for Mike. So if you can imagine, that's months of building layers and layers and layers. So there's every disappointment she's had. There's everything that she hoped for but didn't achieve. There's every slight or perceived slight that she's had. There's that idea that nobody listens to her, nobody values her, nobody likes her. So that's going on for three and a half bloody months. So by the time you get to those sort of scenes, it's like it's all there — it's all there already." On Reteaming Not Only After Secrets & Lies, But After Stage Collaborations and Jean-Baptiste Composing the Score for Leigh's Career Girls Mike: "We did work together 30 years, 31 years ago, in a stage play. And then of course, she was famously in Secrets & Lies, in which, incidentally, in both of those projects she paired with Michele Austin, who plays her sister in this film. It's a long time since Secrets and Lies, and I wanted to work with her — and she with me — for a long time. Often it's the case that you want to work with an actor and they're actually very busy doing other things. Finally we said 'well, let's go for it. Let's do it'. We were going to make the film sooner, but the pandemic put paid to that." Marianne: "I think he's very bold. He's a bold storyteller. He loves people and he loves actors. And I think, as an actor you have more agency working with him than you do with most other types of work. It's truly collaborative — and collaborative all round with production design, with hair and makeup. Everybody works together and everybody's on the same page about the way that they're going to approach the work. I think we've got a very similar sense of humour, so that really helps as well." On Leigh's Starting Point with His Actors on Each Film Mike: "I work individually, separately and privately with each actor. And part of the deal with these films is that the actors take part, agree to take part, and the deal is you'll never know anything about the rest of it, except what your character knows. So they're all working, as it were, in isolation from each other. And I sit down at some length, with quite a lot of sessions, with each actor, and we talk about real people and gradually we talk into existence the basis of the character. So that's the starting point. Then it's about putting them together and exploring relationships, and building up the world and doing any research that needs to be done — into activities or work or whatever it is. To arrive at something that is completely organic and three-dimensional, and is also thus the basis of a film, which then, during the shooting period, we construct as we go along scene by scene, sequence by sequence, location by location, arriving at the end." On Ensuring That Leigh's Cast Can Step Out of Their Characters, Especially Someone as Complicated as Pansy, When Each Scene and Day Ends Marianne: "It's hard to shake in that you still keep, it's still there in your head working. Mike's very, very strict about coming out of character. So there's a whole protocol on-set about warming up into character and warming down. But with Pansy, because of the intrusive thoughts that the character had, obviously you have to create that thought process for yourself in order to play it. So it took a while for me to shut her up." Mike: "As soon as we start to get the characters on the go, I'm very strict, right from the beginning. But actors should warm up and get into character, be absolutely in-character when they're in-character, but as soon as we stop — which is to say not at the end of the day, but each improvisation or whatever it is — to come out of character. So the actor is then able to be objective about what happened in the improvisation or about the character. I'm also very strict that the actor, when talking about the character, refers to the character as 'him' or 'her, not 'I' — which a lot of actors, as you know, do, they talk about 'I' and there's a crossing of wires. So that's really a discipline. And that's what you're talking about, to be sure the actor can be totally in it when in it, but totally comfortable and not screwed up when not in it." On the Challenges and Freedoms of Leigh's Approach Marianne: "It's exhilarating, terrifying and freeing — all those wonderful things. There's nothing else like it, being able to work in this way. There were times when you feel like crying, because you're like 'what on earth am I doing? What is this?'. And then you see it, you see the result and you go 'oh my god'. Because obviously, because everybody's working individually on their characters, you don't know what's happening. The first time I saw the film, I was able to see what happened in the beauty salon, and what Curtley did at work and where Moses went, and what the nieces were like. So it's like, for us, it's like discovering the film for the first time. It's wonderful is all I can say." Mike: "It's totally a combination of the two. It's certainly challenging. Here's the thing: if they say 'okay, here's five or six million pounds and you've got to deliver a film', that is quite a lot of responsibility on your shoulders, of course. It's challenging, but it's highly stimulating. And the freedom of there being no preconceptions or interference or prescriptions from the streamers or the producers or anybody — the backers or the whoever — it's very liberating. Frightening, yes, but then the creative process is dangerous in any context. But liberating. It's wonderful. If I were to ever — many times over the years, the opportunity has come to make a film with certain provisos. 'You have to have a Hollywood star in it.' 'We have to be able to monitor it.' 'You can't have final cut.' All that stuff. Well, I'll just walk away. It just doesn't happen, basically. Which then liberates the freedom to do what artists should do." On How Leigh Works with His Cast to Ensure That Whether or Not the Audience Has Lived a Character's Life, They Feel Recognisable Mike: "You can't underestimate the contribution of the actor. The actor's intelligence, sensitivity, perception, talent. I only work with character actors, which is to say people that don't just play themselves in a narcissistic way, but actually are up for and want to detect, depict and portray real people out on the street. And so my job is to facilitate and to contribute in terms of the narrative ideas — but in the end, what you're asking about relies primarily on her ability to to act, create, empathise, project, distill and investigate all those aspects of the character. There are actors who are, on the whole, good actors, but are not very intelligent. There are actors who are fine actors that have no sense of humour. There are actors who, as I've already said, are not character actors. Marianne Jean-Baptiste, like all the actors in this film, has all of those qualities, not least a sense of character and a sense of humour, and therefore has the ability to get inside different sorts of people and really, really bring it to life." On How Cognisant That Jean-Baptiste and Leigh Were About Hard Truths Standing Out as a Portrait of the Daily Lives of a Black British Family Marianne: "No, we were not aware of it while we were making it. We were aware that there's a predominantly all-black cast, but you obviously don't know what the story is. So you know it's going to be something to do with family and stuff, but yeah, it's a bonus that it's something that people can be proud of and say 'yeah, great, so refreshing'." Mike: "That was a deliberate decision. It wasn't, in no way, a difficult decision, because I just approached the characters and the world and the issues and the emotions and the relationships in this film just as I have every other film I've made, including the period films — which is to say these are people and we're looking at them as people in a real way. However, I was very definitely consciously aware that we were not going to deal in all those cliche tropes that films about Black people on the whole deal with, because that's not what it's about as far as I'm concerned. For me, I would say — and you're no doubt familiar with other films of mine — across all of my films, it's a collection of different aspects of society, but all looking at people as individual, real people. And this film is, if you like, the mere continuation of that ongoing investigation." On Reflecting the Reality of Life by Making a Film That's Both Deeply Moving and Has a Sense of Humour Mike: "It's not a balancing act at all. Life is comic and tragic. Whatever you do, whether you like it or not — how many times have you not laughed at a funeral? Life just comes out of the soil, ready-made comic and tragic. So for me, I don't sit around thinking 'oh, maybe there should be a comic moment' or 'maybe this should be a tragic moment'. That looks after itself, and it certainly looks after itself in this film. It's a barrel of laughs, hopefully, for a good section, a good chunk of the film. And then — and we've had quite a number of public screenings of the film, and you could absolutely chart precisely where the laughter dies away, and it's obvious why that is. It's not a question of balance. It's a question of the truth of what you're depicting and what you're investigating, what you're sharing with the audience and what the audience experiences." On What Inspires Jean-Baptiste and Leigh About a New Project Marianne: "At this point in my life, I'm looking for challenges. I'm looking for something that I can transform myself — something that's going to be fun. For me, that's it. Are they good people? Will it be fun? Will it be challenging in a good way, you know?" Mike: "To me, it's always exciting. It's partly, to be honest, because I don't know what we're going to do and therefore there are all sorts of possibilities. And my head is buzzing with all sorts of possibilities and ideas — 'maybe we'll get him', 'maybe we'll get her to the party'. Then, of course, it's the anticipation and the enjoyment of actually working with people, and making it and making the thing happen. And shooting and working with the actors, all that's just, to me, a joy. Here's the thing that's important: the way I make films is the same way but is parallel to people writing novels, painting pictures, making music, making sculpture, writing poetry, et cetera — which is to say that the artist embarks on a journey of investigation, and discovers what the piece is on the journey of making it. They interact with the material. How many novelists have you heard say 'well, I didn't know what was going to happen, and then somehow the character told me what needed to happen next'? That's really what I do. The privilege I feel I have that painters and novelists, et cetera, don't have, is that I'm not stuck in a room by myself. It's a collaborative, socially pleasurable activity." [caption id="attachment_782569" align="alignnone" width="1920"] In Fabric[/caption] On What Jean-Baptiste and Leigh Each Make of Their Careers So Far Marianne: "I think it's interesting. I think I've had quite an interesting career. I've forgotten some stuff that I've done — it's gotten to that stage where people go 'oh that film' and I go 'oh yeah'. Yes, I think it's been a bit of an interesting one, mine, that's taken me to a few different places. I've been able to be quite selective in the last say five or ten years, which is good." [caption id="attachment_722535" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Peterloo[/caption] Mike: "Well, on the whole, if I was to sum it all up, I think I've been very lucky, actually, really. There've been breaks at times, which made it possible to do the crazy thing I do, which is to say to backers or theatre managers: 'I have no idea what we're going to do. I will not discuss casting. And please don't interfere with it while we're doing it at any stage'. And one could be forgiven for imagining that on that basis, I might never have done anything. So I've been lucky in that sense, and I guess the honest answer to your question is that, really — that I've found it remarkable that I've kind of got away with it." Hard Truths opened in Australian cinemas on Thursday, March 6, 2025 and New Zealand cinemas on Thursday, March 13, 2025.
Fire up the group chat to get your mates together at one of Sydney's parks this summer, where you can cook up a grilled feast and laze the day away in the sun. In Sydney, we're lucky to have an abundance of parklands, many of which have public barbecues and waterside views. And, in some cases, you can also crack open a cold one to enjoy with your barbecue. Together with Jim Beam, we've compiled a list of ideal barbecue spots where you can also bring your own drinks. [caption id="attachment_731570" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Alexandria Velovotee; Flickr[/caption] SYDNEY PARK Whether you want to explore this park on two wheels, with your four-legged friends or flying solo, Sydney Park is a dynamic patch of parklands to settle in to for a day of adventures. It's home to a winding cycling track where young and old can stretch their legs. There's also plenty of off-leash areas for pooches, and a paddling pool designed especially for dogs. Once you've pedaled and run around, locate one of the several barbecue spots in the park and enjoy a fast feast. Afterwards, take a stroll around the wetlands or check out the public artworks located throughout the park. If you're bringing booze to the park, make sure you're all packed up by 6pm, which is the cut off time for drinking alcohol in Sydney Park. LANE COVE NATIONAL PARK This sprawling national parkland is home to calm rivers, boat sheds, an abundance of native trees and plenty of barbecue areas. Perched between the suburbs of Lane Cove, North Ryde, Chatswood, Macquarie Park and Linfield, Lane Cove National Park is a good place for an al fresco feed thanks to the sheer number of different gas and wood barbecues. Many of these areas — including Carter Creek, Cottonwood Glen, Commandment Rock, Haynes Flat and Casuarina Point — are available to pre-book for a fee, so you can guarantee a grill. There are also plenty of parking areas available. As it's a national park, it's also home to an abundance of wildlife, so just be sure to guard your food supplies from cheeky kookaburras and curious brush turkeys. [caption id="attachment_793721" align="alignnone" width="1920"] James Horan; Destination NSW[/caption] MORT BAY PARK Built in 1854, this historic park served as Australia's first large-scale dry dock. These days, Mort Bay Park is home to sweeping green areas, basketball courts and water views stretching out to the city skyline. There is plenty of on-street parking here, and the quaint Balmain Ferry Wharf is also worth checking out. You'll find several barbecues, prime for grilling and enjoying a feast with your mates. You can drink alcohol here, so long as it's in responsible quantities and you leave any glass at home. DAVIDSON PARK This Forestville parkland is the perfect spot to sizzle up some snags with family and friends against the backdrop of Middle Harbour Creek. Located within Garigal National Park, Davidson Park also has access to a range of easy walks, including the Lyrebird track, which includes strolling along the banks of Carroll Creek and a stepping stone crossing. It also has a boat ramp and canoe access points, so you can take to the water after your barbecue. Make sure you're packed up and out of the park before 8pm and take all rubbish with you. [caption id="attachment_753757" align="alignnone" width="1920"] James Horan via Destination NSW[/caption] PIRRAMA PARK This harbourside park is a hit with folks of all ages, thanks to its expansive playgrounds, fitness stations and excellent views. Pirrama Park is ideal for settling in for a long day with family and friends. There are two separate barbecue areas with four electric barbecues each, meaning it's usually pretty easy to secure one. It's closest to the Light Rail stops John Street Square and The Star, and you can pick up food at Pyrmont's cafes and supermarkets. Along with the City of Sydney's other timed alcohol areas, you can drink here until 10pm and not before 10am. [caption id="attachment_781770" align="alignnone" width="1920"] James Horan via Destination NSW[/caption] BLACKWATTLE BAY Along Glebe's foreshore you'll find open space overlooking the ANZAC Bridge, the Fish Markets and Rozelle Bay. The 1.8-hectare spot has several separate green patches and a walking track linking everything together. As Tramsheds is also located minutes away, you can shop for your barbecue feast and then hop on over to one of the public barbecues with your supplies. You can drink alcohol here until 10pm, which means it's perfect for a golden-hour picnic. Top image: James Horan; Destination NSW
The Oxford Tavern, one of the Inner West's best pubs, will close its doors this Sunday, April 2, with its current custodians Odd Culture Group stepping away from the Stanmore Road spot. Known for its Sunday roasts, inclusive dance parties and greenery-filled beer garden, the venue has sat under the guidance of the Odd Culture crew since 2019. Following last drinks on Sunday, when the team will be running the kegs and spirits dry, the hospitality group's lease will expire — with Odd Culture unaware of any incoming or prospective tenants at this stage. "It's with a heavy heart that we announce our lease is up at the Oxford Tavern," a statement from the group reads. "This pub has always held a special place in our heart — a space for our people to march to the beat of their own drum, and create the wild and wonderful, queer-coloured programming that resonated with the Inner West." "It was a saving grace for us, and a lot of people in the industry, through two (or three?) lockdowns, with our Tav Delivers stint, and a lot of that drew us even closer to the community. The pub has a rich history and we are grateful to have operated the place as an inclusive Petersham local and a queer institution. We're proud of everything we've put into The Tav. It's been a wild ride, but the time has come to end this chapter." The announcement comes as Odd Culture shifts its attention elsewhere, with several exciting announcements from the hospo team in the last few months, including a new live music venue on King Street with a 4am license and its first foray into the Melbourne hospitality scene with a wine bar and bottle shop in Fitzroy. If you want to head in for a last beer or a sample of the recently revamped menu before The Tav closes, the pub will be open midday–midnight Thursday and Friday, midday–3am Saturday and midday–10pm for its last day on Sunday. View this post on Instagram A post shared by The Oxford Tavern (@theoxfordtavern) The Oxford Tavern is located at 1 New Canterbury Road, Petersham. Its last day of operations under the Odd Culture group will be on Sunday, April 2. Top image: Kitti Gould
When international art collective teamLab launched Borderless, its Tokyo-based permanent digital-only art museum, the dazzling space became the most-visited single-artist site in the world in just its first year of operation. Wherever the outfit pops up — be it in Shanghai oil tanks, Japanese hot springs or Melbourne — its installations are always hugely popular. So it's no wonder that the group is expanding its footprint by opening more permanent locations. Late in 2019, teamLab launched a new venue in Shanghai, which is also called Borderless. Come this March, it's also opening a museum called SuperNature in Macao. Located at The Venetian Macao, the latter site will sprawl over 5000 square metres, filling the space with the kind of immersive, interactive installations that have gathered the collective of artists, programmers, engineers, animators, mathematicians and architects such a devoted following. [caption id="attachment_758086" align="aligncenter" width="1920"] teamLab. Expanding Three-Dimensional Existence in Transforming Space - Flattening 3 Colors and 9 Blurred Colors, Free Floating, 2018, Interactive Installation, Endless, Sound: Hideaki Takahashi © teamLab[/caption] In good news for anyone who has visited a teamLab venue or installation previously, SuperNature will also include a selection of brand new works — although, even if you're a seasoned teamLab visitor, these are the types of pieces that you can visit over and over and never get bored. Much will look familiar, playing with concepts and designs that the collective is clearly drawn to, such as floating balls, projected flowers and animals, and other kaleidoscopic imagery Chief among the highlights is The Infinite Crystal Universe, which uses light points, pointillism-style, to create three-dimensional objects. While you're interacting with the piece, you can use your phone to select the elements that make up the universe. The artwork will also response to the presence of people, as most of teamLab's installations do. [caption id="attachment_758090" align="aligncenter" width="1920"] teamLab. The Clouds that Self-Organize, 2019, experimental photo of the new artwork © teamLab[/caption] Then there's Massless Clouds Between Sculpture and Life, which plays out just as its title suggests. In this installation, giant clouds will float between the floor and the ceiling — and even when you walk through them, breaking them up, they'll form back into shape. Also on the bill: Mountain of Flowers and People: Lost, Immersed and Reborn, which'll let digital flowers bloom and change with the seasons, and Expanding Three-Dimensional Existence in Transforming Space — Flattening 3 Colors and 9 Blurred Colors, Free Floating, where bouncing spheres float above visitors, changing colour when they're touched. Like Borderless, SuperNature will also feature an Athletics Park, where you'll really get physical traversing graffiti-covered valleys, climbing a ropes course, scaling a light forest, jumping or playing hopscotch, as well as an educational, kid-focused Future Park. Located in the resort hotel's Cotai Expo Hall F, and set up like a labyrinth — making you wander around and around to find all of its nooks and crannies — SuperNature will welcome visitors through the doors from January 21 for previews ahead of its official opening date. Find teamLab SuperNature at Cotai Expo Hall F, The Venetian Macao Resort Hotel, Estrada da Baía de N. Senhora da Esperança, s/n, Taipa, Macao SAR, P.R. China from a yet-to-be-revealed date in March. It'll be open from 10am–10pm daily. Images: teamLab. teamLab is represented by Pace Gallery.
Resting on the shores of the always-iconic Bondi Beach is a looming structure. Earthy colours and openair designs help it blend into its breezy surroundings, but locals know the weight carried by the so-called 'pav'. Bondi Pavilion is, in fact, a piece of local history. For over 90 years, it's stood proud on the shoreline as a hub of local culture and activity, welcoming visitors through its doors for almost every activity you could think of. And now, after a lengthy seven-year facelift, it's better than ever. The Pav continues its vision of being a home for community, arts and culture in Bondi and is now better equipped to do so. The building boasts 15 indoor and two outdoor creative spaces — including a pottery studio, art gallery, theatre, radio studio and interactive exhibition room. You'll also have plenty of chances to feed your stomach, not just your mind. Several hospitality venues line the walls of the Pav for any hungry passerby. During daylight hours, you can grab a meal at Glory Days (and Surfish cafe, which is due to open soon), and after-dark diners can get their fix at Promenade Bondi Beach or Upstairs by Glory Days a few floors above. The icing on the proverbial cake of Bondi Pavilion comes in the form of the beloved local label Between the Flags, which has been dishing out SLSC-inspired clothing wear for beachgoers for the better part of 29 years. The building's many rooms and creative spaces are also available to hire for events and community groups. Just visit the website to find out how.
When you make tracks to Coogee Beach this summer, you'll find more happening than just waves, sun and sand. Head over to Coogee Pavilion Rooftop to discover See Sound, a season-long free music program, presented by Merivale in collaboration with Furphy. Run across three venues (the other two being Bondi's Royal Hotel and Marrickville's Vic on the Park), this series is all about warm weather and good tunes. Music will kick off at 2pm every Sunday on the Coogee Pavilion Rooftop. Each week will bring you a different DJ, but there are a few special dates you're going to want to clear your calendar for now. Head there on January 13, grab a Furphy and wait for the surprise act to turn up for their jam sesh. We don't want to give the game away, but we can tell you this artist's got a big month ahead, including several mammoth festival appearances. On February 17, you can expect an exclusive DJ set from a local funk group. Then, on March 17, look out for a well-known electronica duo, whose most well-known song you've no doubt grooved to on many a dance floor. The rest of the See Sound program is over here. Updates on the lineup will happen throughout summer, so keep checking in.
In The Guest Edit we hand the reins over to some of Sydney's most interesting, tasteful and entertaining people. For this instalment we have enlisted the guidance of Claire Perini, an interior architect who is founder and curator of the beautiful Avalon-based interiors studio and store Composition. Here, Claire divulges some of her favourite spots in her pocket of the Northern Beaches, a suburb once primarily known as a haven for surfers that is now home to a burgeoning creative community and growing food and drink scene. [caption id="attachment_812163" align="alignnone" width="1920"] Bar Elvina interior, photographed by Steven Woodburn[/caption] Dining & Drinking Bar Elvina "Whether mid-week or mid-weekend, Elvina is always serving up good times. Specialising in Mediterranean food with seafood expertly cooked on charcoal and a focus on pasta and grains — my personal favourite being their vongole which I could eat breakfast, lunch and dinner. They also boast a beautiful outdoor terrace nestled in an edible kitchen garden that is available for hire and makes the perfect backdrop for any celebration. On the weekends Elvina also has a bottomless banquet, tantalising menu and includes open wine and Aperol spritz's (I'll have 3 please). Menu designed and beautifully executed by Andy Emerson (formerly of Acme)." Find it at: Level 1, 50 Old Barrenjoey Road Book here. Randy's "A casual street bar you'd expect to find hidden within the streets of New York. With a focus on delicious snacks designed to be shared and daily oyster happy hour (serving only the best Australian rock oysters) Randy's is a keeper. Weekends are lively and you're bound to find a local to dine with on a Friday afternoon. Chef Zac serves up a series of different pickled foods that I frequently request jars of to take home." Find it at: 50 Old Barrenjoey Road Text or call to book: +61474 945 431 Graze n' Cakes "Mine and most of Avalon's favourite hole-in-the-wall dining spot, this patisserie/Vietnamese haven is undoubtedly my favourite lunch spot. When you can get a banh mi and the best chocolate chip cookie in one spot, why would you go anywhere else? Sandy who runs it, is also one of the nicest people on earth which is an added bonus when visiting!" Find it at: 3/38 Burrawong Road Call: (02) 8919 0058 Other local dining spots that Claire recommends: Pocket Pizza, Oceana Traders and La Banette patisserie. [caption id="attachment_944544" align="alignnone" width="1920"] The collection at Composition, photographed by Sage Hammond[/caption] Shopping Composition Naturally this guide needs to include Claire Perini's own studio, showroom and store which we have previously described as "achingly tasteful". Her meticulously curated selection of Modern-period antiques and contemporary brands all fall within one of three categories: Artefact (unique vintage), Object (new product) and Print (design literature both vintage and new, and lithographic works). The latest collection dubbed 'La Dolce Villa' has a focus on smaller items and little moments to admire that bring sweetness and connection into interior spaces. Find it at: 45a Avalon Parade Browse the website here. Bassike "The prominent Australian brand that needs no introduction has their stunning flagship store (designed by Akin Atelier) within the heart of Avalon. With not only their stunning own range of designs, but I love the way the brand threads through beautiful Australian brands that compliment the company's ethos." Find it at: 41 Avalon Parade Browse the website here. Lee Matthews "A new addition to the offerings in Avalon is the introduction of Lee Mathews' beautiful showroom." Find it at: 4o Avalon Parade Browse the website here. Peggy Concept Store "Named after Peggy Guggenheim, this store does not disappoint. Offering a curated collection of Australian and international ready-to-wear brands including some of my favourites: Matteau, Silk Laundry, Oséree and Muma World." Find it at: 62 Old Barrenjoey Road Browse the website here. Lifestyle Sauna Amalfi "A new addition to Avalon is this modern take on a Swedish sauna, Sauna Amalfi. Services include state of the art clear light infrared saunas, a traditional sauna, and a UV-Filtered and temperature controlled cold plunge." Find it at: 62 Old Barrenjoey Road Browse the website here. Feels Pilates "When you're done eating and drinking your way through Avalon, nothing like a little reformer session to sweat away the guilt. The Feels Pilates instructors will leave you feeling like every muscle has been activated with their dynamic classes that focus on form." Find it at: Rear shop at 46 Old Barrenjoey Road Learn more here. [caption id="attachment_536619" align="alignnone" width="1280"] Avalon Beach[/caption] Nature "My absolute favourite part of living in the Northern Beaches, and specifically 'past the bends', is the nature. The proximity to the national park, the views of the Pittwater, the sounds of wildlife and the community constantly activating the different elements... A few of my favourite spots would be, Paradise Beach a little beach on the Pittwater side; Angophora Reserve a little hour's walk through the bushland but nestled just behind the village shops and for some more dramatic scenery; Bangalley Head walk which boasts views of the ocean and the natural sandstone cliffs." Discover more spots in and around Avalon Beach here.
When a TV show or movie franchise returns years and years after its last instalment, there's no longer any point being surprised. It happens that often these days, with Veronica Mars, Twin Peaks, Star Wars and Jurassic Park just a few recent examples. The latest past pop culture hit set to make a comeback: Sex and the City. Thankfully, as anyone who sat through the terrible 2008 and 2010 movies of the same name will be hoping, the Sarah Jessica Parker-starring series is returning to the small screen this time around. Parker is back, as are her co-stars Kristin Davis and Cynthia Nixon, all starring in a new HBO show called And Just Like That.... The new ten-episode series is a spinoff, rather than an additional season of the existing 1998–2004 program — and there's one big difference. As revealed in the official announcement, the show will follow Carrie (Parker), Miranda (Nixon) and Charlotte (Davis). That means that the character of Samantha isn't part of the revival, and neither is actor Kim Cattrall, who played her. Parker, Davis and Nixon are also named as producers on And Just Like That..., alongside Michael Patrick King, who worked as a writer, director and executive producer on the original (and on the two movies). HBO hasn't released too many other details; however the US network has advised that the series will follow its three main characters "as they navigate the journey from the complicated reality of life and friendship in their 30s to the even more complicated reality of life and friendship in their 50s". In America, And Just Like That... is headed to HBO Max, the network's streaming platform. Just when the program will hit and where it'll be available elsewhere (including Down Under) haven't yet been revealed. While you're waiting for the new series, you can check out a clip from the original below — or, in Australia, you can stream Sex and the City's six seasons via Binge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fFNOGU_QRU And Just Like That... doesn't currently have an airdate, either in the US or Down Under, but we'll update you when one is announced.
After the Sydney Opera House replaced its Festival of Dangerous Ideas with Antidote last year, we didn't think we'd see it again. But the festival is about to rear its head for its ninth iteration, this time trading in its Bennelong Point digs for a space at Cockatoo Island. Co-founded by The Ethics Centre (TEC) and the Sydney Opera House back in 2009, FODI 2018 won't just have a new venue, but a new partner as well — teaming up with the UNSW Centre for Ideas for the first time. But the concept will remain the same, again bringing together thought leaders and creative thinkers for a weekend of critical discussion around the most important global issues of today. This year's festival, curated by Festival Director Danielle Harvey and UNSW Centre for Ideas Director Ann Mossop, will examine the theme of Trust and Truth, and will aim to incite debate, push boundaries and inspire intellectual freedom. And it has some big names on its bill. Stephen Fry — the Englishman with many hats: writer, comedian, actor, activist — will be holding a talk on the art of furious oration at Sydney Town Hall, entitled The Hitch after the festival's inaugural speaker: the controversial author and critic Christopher Hitchens. On the topic of controversy, activist Megan Phelps-Roper will be taking the stage to discuss her time at the Westboro Baptist Church. The festival's international lineup also includes Israeli-American writer Ayelet Waldman discussing the benefits of microdosing LSD, and Angela Nagle, author of Kill All Normies, exploring the culture clash between the alt-right and the left. Locally, feminist and author Germaine Greer, who's latest novel On Rape just hit the stands, will chat about outrage, while activist Mick Dodson argues the existence of modern-day European colonialism. A heap of thought-provoking panels are also on the program, including discussions on sex robots, the Australian media, nationalism and whether or not inequality is always bad. Those wanting to experience something a bit different can head to a part monologue, part striptease with artist Betty Grumble — called Sex Clowns Save the World — philosophy workshops and a Counterstrike LAN party (basically, a gaming party), where an electronic sculpture shoots "blood" at gamers. As this year's festival is located on an island, you'll need to catch a ferry across to the insightful talks. Thankfully, festival passes include ferry transport to Cockatoo Island — and start at $89. The 2018 Festival of Dangerous Ideas is coming to Cockatoo Island, with Stephen Fry's The Hitch taking place at Sydney Town Hall, on November 3 and 4. Tickets will go on sale at midday, Tuesday, September 4. You can buy tickets and check out the full lineup at festivalofdangerousideas.com. Images: Yaya Stempler
A good musical should have a lasting impact on the industry and its audiences for years to come. So the fact that Miss Saigon has been hitting stages and receiving awards since its debut in 1989 is a clear indication of quality. The show takes inspiration from the even older (but just as popular) Madama Butterfly — they're both tales of women in Asia falling in love with men from America only to have their hearts broken. The key difference between the two is the setting. Madama Butterfly is set in Japan, while Miss Saigon (as you might be able to guess from the title) is set in Vietnam, specifically during the end and lasting aftermath of the devastating Vietnam War. This production of the musical is from Cameron Mackintosh, who was also behind on other world-famous musicals like Cats, The Phantom of the Opera, Les Misérables and Mary Poppins. Coming to the Sydney Opera House on Thursday, August 17 and running until Friday, October 13 — the Australian cast includes the debut of Abigail Adriano as Kim alongside Nigel Huckle (Les Misérables, West Side Story) as Chris, Sean Miley Moore (The Voice) as The Engineer, Kerrie Anne Greenland (Les Misérables) as Ellen, Nick Afoa (The Lion King) as John and the Australian debut of Laurence Mossman as Thuy. Miss Saigon runs from Thursday, August 17 to Friday, October 13 at the Sydney Opera House, for more information and to book tickets, visit the website. Images: Johan Persson
If you thought Africa's first underwater hotel room was impressive, how about an upgrade? For an additional US$283,500, you can stay in your very own submarine hotel. Titled 'Lovers Deep', it's the latest offering from luxury travel company Oliver's Travels, whose motto is 'Why Do Ordinary?' Indeed. Why put up with terrestrial limitations, when you could be floating 650 feet deep off a Caribbean island of your choice? Making demands on a dedicated butler? Performing ablutions in company in a dual shower? Watching schools of fish swim by while eating their aphrodisiac friends? You can ask Oliver’s to customise an overnight package according to your desires. Options include sunset beach walks, a petal-scattering service, champagne breakfasts-in-bed and fine dining feasts involving caviar, oysters and chocolate fondant. "All of our hand-picked, luxury properties have something unique and quirky about them," says Oliver Bell, the company's co-founder. "But Lovers Deep really stands out as one of our quirkiest yet." Oliver’s, a UK-based company, specialises in highly unusual, once-in-a-lifetime travel experiences. Their stable includes remote, romantic lighthouses, abandoned windmills-turned-hotels, French chateaus and British country mansions surrounded by rolling hills. Via PSFK.
If you find yourself in the centre of the natural wine, Australiana-kitsch, retro-inspired cocktail Venn diagram, you'd be hard-pressed to find a better Sydney spot to wile away a few hours than Enmore Country Club. The good-times neighbourhood bar brings throwback 70s nostalgia and an accomplished crew of hospitality mainstays to the former digs of Cottonmouth Records at 182 Enmore Road. At the helm you'll find hospo duo Dan McBride and Dynn Szmulewicz, who've embedded beloved Sydney venues like Redfern's The Sunshine Inn or Glebe's The Little Guy into the ever-growing scene of character-filled Inner West boozers. Adding to the firepower behind Enmore Country Club is natty winemaker DOOM JUICE's Creative Director Zachary Godbolt. The mastermind behind the wine brand's unmistakably manic visuals has come on board as the head designer for the new Enmore spot, leading the charge with its retro dive-bar aesthetic. The space has undergone a full revamp featuring fresh wood cladding, brass finishes, custom tablecloths from Defy Designs and a custom resin bar top. All of the little touches harken back to a bygone era of bowling shirts and cigarette commercials. On entry, you'll be greeted by a brown checked floor mat, and once inside you'll find retro posters on the walls, old motor magazines on the bench tops and a guest book to sign. As you would expect from a venue associated with The Sunshine Inn, you'll find plenty of low-intervention vino on the drinks list. The ever-evolving lineup of wines is projected onto the walls in order to facilitate quick changes for any exciting new drops that the team may get in. There's also a selection of local beers and a seasonal cocktail list, the latest of which features the El Bruiser, a twist on a classic championing quality tequila, fresh citrus and house-made stout syrup; The Don which is a nod to the old-school fluffy duck, using Australian gin, Campari and Imbroglio Marrickville's own Poor Toms, topped with some DOOM JUICE pét-nat; and The Melon Dew, a bright tropical slushie inspired by a classic Midori illusion. Images: Angus Bell Young
