Latest news with #EnsembleTheatre
The Guardian
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Henri Szeps, film, theatre and TV actor known for the ABC's Mother and Son, dies at 81
Henri Szeps, the actor best known for his role in the ABC sitcom Mother and Son, has died aged 81. Szeps' decline from Alzheimer's was largely peaceful and 'Henri retained his sense of wonder and joie de vivre until the end,' a statement shared by the publicist for Szeps' son, broadcaster Josh Szeps, said. Szeps was the son of Holocaust survivors from Poland. Born in a refugee camp in Switzerland in 1943, he arrived in Australia at the age of eight with his mother and older sister. Szeps told the Refugee Council of Australia that despite children at his school in the Sydney suburb of Greenwich laughing at his 'foreign ways', it was the recognition he received from appearing – and earning more laughs – in school plays that made him realise he wanted to act. Szeps studied electrical engineering at the University of Sydney and also trained at Sydney's Ensemble Theatre in 1962. He moved to London in his 20s where he starred in I, Claudius alongside David Warner and toured in the Prospect Theatre Company with Derek Jacobi, according to the statement. On his return to Australia, Szeps took on the role of older brother Robert to Garry McDonald's Arthur Beare in comedy classic Mother and Son. He played the egocentric dentist – in what the Guardian described as 'the perfect 'love to hate' key' – from 1984 to 1994 He went on to appear in television series A Country Practice, Skippy, All Saints and Palace of Dreams. Szeps played prime minister Harold Holt in the series Vietnam which won a Logie and launched Nicole Kidman's career. He also appeared in Mission: Impossible, South Pacific and was Barry Humphries' choice to play a down-on-his-luck scientist, Charles Herpes, in Les Patterson Saves the World, the statement said. Szeps also had many significant roles on stage and long collaboration with the playwright David Williamson. His wife of 56 years and fellow actress, Mary Ann Severne, was by his side when he died, the statement said.
Sydney Morning Herald
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
Henri Szeps, star of the ABC's Mother and Son, dies aged 81
Henri Szeps, who starred in the original version of classic ABC sitcom Mother and Son, has died. He was 81. Szeps played Robert Beare, a philandering, mustachioed dentist, opposite Garry McDonald and Ruth Cracknell from 1984 to 1994. He also starred in the racy soap opera Number 96; the medical dramas A Country Practice, GP and All Saints; and war drama Vietnam, in which he played prime minister Harold Holt opposite a young Nicole Kidman. Szeps revealed during a 2021 television appearance with his son Josh that he had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. He had lived in a residential care facility since 2023. The actor was beloved by the public and his peers for the intensity, audacity and variety of his performances. Trained in 'the Method' at Sydney's Ensemble Theatre – where a green room is now named in his honour – he made a name of himself in a 1968 production of The Boys in the Band. It was there that he met his future wife, the actress Mary Ann Severne, who was by his side when he died on Wednesday. Aged in their 20s, the pair moved to London, where they became prominent members of the 1970s acting scene. Szeps starred in I, Claudius alongside David Warner and toured in the Prospect Theatre Company with Derek Jacobi. Returning to Australia for his 30th birthday, he became a fixture of Australian stage and television. Geoffrey Atherden's Mother and Son was voted the best Australian television program ever, and Szeps lovingly called his character, Robert, 'the arsehole of the family'. The son of Holocaust survivors from Poland, Szeps was born in a Swiss refugee camp in 1943. His father had already left the family to join the French Resistance and his mother had Henri fostered out to a Swiss couple when he was a baby. He lived with the couple on and off until 1949. He was then reclaimed by his mother, Rose, but due to illness, he spent time in a French orphanage until 1951, when he migrated to Australia with his mother and younger sister Maria.
The Age
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Age
Henri Szeps, star of the ABC's Mother and Son, dies aged 81
Henri Szeps, who starred in the original version of classic ABC sitcom Mother and Son, has died. He was 81. Szeps played Robert Beare, a philandering, mustachioed dentist, opposite Garry McDonald and Ruth Cracknell from 1984 to 1994. He also starred in the racy soap opera Number 96; the medical dramas A Country Practice, GP and All Saints; and war drama Vietnam, in which he played prime minister Harold Holt opposite a young Nicole Kidman. Szeps revealed during a 2021 television appearance with his son Josh that he had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. He had lived in a residential care facility since 2023. The actor was beloved by the public and his peers for the intensity, audacity and variety of his performances. Trained in 'the Method' at Sydney's Ensemble Theatre – where a green room is now named in his honour – he made a name of himself in a 1968 production of The Boys in the Band. It was there that he met his wife, the actress Mary Ann Severne, who was by his side when he died on Wednesday. Aged in their 20s, the pair moved to London, where they became prominent members of the 1970s acting scene. Szeps starred in I, Claudius alongside David Warner and toured in the Prospect Theatre Company with Derek Jacobi. Returning to Australia for his 30th birthday, he became a fixture of Australian stage and television. Geoffrey Atherden's Mother and Son was voted the best Australian television program ever, and Szeps lovingly called his character, Robert, 'the arsehole of the family'. The son of Holocaust survivors from Poland, Szeps was born in a Swiss refugee camp in 1943. His father had already left the family to join the French Resistance and his mother had Henri fostered out to a Swiss couple when he was a baby. He lived with the couple on and off until 1949. He was then reclaimed by his mother, Rose, but due to illness, he spent time in a French orphanage until 1951, when he migrated to Australia with his mother and younger sister Maria.
Time Out
22-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
The Half-Life of Marie Curie
On my seven-month-old baby's bookshelf sits a brightly illustrated children's book about Marie Curie. Its pages celebrate her love of science, her marriage to physicist Pierre Curie, and her status as the first woman to win a Nobel Prize. These are the facts most often recited, but women are rarely one-dimensional. Alongside moments of triumph, often lie moments of despair and self-doubt. It is one of those lesser-known chapters that Lauren Gunderson explores in The Half-Life of Marie Curie, a play that premiered off-Broadway at the Minetta Lane Theatre in 2019, and was later released as an audio drama on the Audible platform. The play now makes its Australian premiere at Sydney's Ensemble Theatre under the direction of Liesel Badorrek (The Glass Menagerie). Gunderson, frequently referred to as 'the most produced living playwright in America', has a signature formula across her 20-plus plays: identify a compelling duo, hone in on a pivotal historical moment, inject sharp, rhythmic dialogue, and keep it snappy – 90 minutes or less. The result is a biographical vignette interspersed with theatrical poetry. The plays often just recount history – however, at its best, her formula can thrillingly heighten a core emotional conflict. In this case, it's the friendship between Marie Curie and Hertha Ayrton, and the impact these women had on each other. Though often relegated to a footnote in Curie's story, here Ayrton commands center stage... The narrative begins at Curie's (Gabrielle Scawthorn) home in Paris, shortly after she wins her second Nobel Prize, amid personal scandal. Her affair with fellow scientist Paul Langevin has ignited a media frenzy, threatening to overshadow her legacy and forcing her into self-imposed house arrest. Enter Hertha Ayrton (Rebecca Massey), a mathematician and engineer, who quite literally bursts through the door of Curie's exile and whisks her off to the British seaside. There they frolic, quarrel, and find themselves in each other. Despite its title, The Half-Life of Marie Curie seems more captivated by the woman history barely remembers – Hertha Ayrton –than the woman it promises to center. Though often relegated to a footnote in Curie's story, here Ayrton commands center stage: sassy, witty, progressive, a suffragist, and the persistent voice on Curie's shoulder declaring how extraordinary she is. Massey has all the best lines, crafting a performance that's physical, sharp, and full of warmth and joy. She's the best friend everyone wants – the kind who shows up, speaks truth, and doesn't let you drown. Through Ayrton, Gunderson poses the play's most potent questions: What makes someone become themselves? And what makes them worth saving? These are big, existential inquiries – about art, science, nature – that, while thematically rich, don't always sit comfortably within Curie's historical context. As a result, Curie is too often sidelined, reduced to a figure of gloom. She is the catalyst for the audience to hear Ayrton's worldview, rather than the other way around. Gunderson's Marie feels like a faint sketch of the scientific titan that I came to revere during my university physics studies. Here, she is made small. On one hand, there's something refreshing about seeing a woman of such legendary stature portrayed as fallible – torn by heartbreak, plagued by self-doubt, unsure of how to move forward. But this portrayal lingers on it a bit too long. This take on Curie is stuck in a single emotional register: brooding, passive, and more consumed by rejection than inflamed by the institutional sexism that shut her out of her own lab. The result is a character who feels diminished to her worst summer. To her credit, Scawthorn brings depth where she can. She infuses Curie's desperation with stakes that feel novel, nuanced and grounded. But she's let down by this production. The staging relies on ethereal video projections cast onto sheer curtains, encircling a central dais (perhaps a nod to Ayrton's work on arc lamps). But the effect is more clinical than intimate. The bulky wooden platform limits movement and undercuts the unpolished banter of the relationship at the play's heart. Aside from a hilarious, engaging drunken reconciliation atop the dais, the physicality seems cumbersome, and there is very little visual variety to enhance the emotional arc. The lighting by Verity Hampson and video projections by Cameron Smith bring to life the theatrical poetry elements that effectively bridge the show's time jumps, and create visually captivating moments. Is this the first woman to win a Nobel Prize? Or a damsel in distress? The portrayal leans so hard into her mediocrity, it risks erasing her fire altogether. That said, perhaps Gunderson is intent on proving she was just as ordinary as you or I, so that we may feel that we can also do great things. Ultimately, it's Massey's Ayrton who anchors the play. She is the rambunctious spark – jibing, compassionate, insistent – and she transforms Curie's despair into something bigger. Even when the text falters or the staging feels distant, she keeps the light on and the laughs rolling.
Sydney Morning Herald
08-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
This was the best Shakespeare I've seen in Sydney this century. And now it's back
Last year, one play rattled my bones like no other: Sport for Jove's production of Shakespeare's Timon of Athens. My five-star review enthused that it had 'a truth, an energy and a ferocity to make the blood drain from your face', and a 'visceral, raw, compelling and moving' performance from Damien Ryan as Timon. Seldom performed, the play, here retitled I Hate People; Or Timon of Athens, tells of Timon being so profligately generous that he runs himself into bankruptcy, whereupon his 'friends' turn on him, so he renounces Athens and retreats to live in the 'natural' world in abject poverty. Now this production – the best Shakespeare I've seen in Sydney this century – returns. Director Margaret Thanos connected with Ryan, Sport for Jove's artistic director, when, having won the 2023 Sandra Bates Director's Award, she was the assistant director to Ryan on Ensemble Theatre's Mr Bailey's Minder. They found many convergences in their thinking, and Thanos mentioned her love of Timon, pitching her vision as 'Mount Olympus meets the Greek financial crisis', with a strong emphasis on ensemble movement. Ryan was hooked. Despite being the company's artistic director, he had to audition for the lead role. 'That was really important to both of us,' says Thanos, 'because I can say undeniably he was the best choice … His audition for this production is one of the best auditions I've ever had the privilege of witnessing in my life as a director – and I've seen hundreds of auditions in the past few years.' Ryan is also Sydney's finest and most experienced Shakespeare director, so he and Thanos arrived at an arrangement whereby in rehearsals he focused purely on his role, and only outside that room did he discuss the show's ideas with his artistic director's hat on. 'Timon is a story of an extremely wealthy man losing everything,' Thanos explains. 'It's almost a fable in its quality. The imagery of Timon stripping down to wearing nothing but little boxer shorts in that second half is extremely indicative of the destitution that he faces.' Indeed, it is as though Timon's naked soul is being mirrored in his naked body. 'We see,' she continues, 'this extravagant imagery at the beginning – the parties, the orgies, the luxury of it all – and then we move into total destitution… It's inherent in the text that he returns to this so-called natural world to reject mankind, which he perceives as un natural.' The on-site rehearsals before the show opened at Leura Everglades in January 2024 were rained out, so opening night was the first proper run.
