Wonderbabes By Kate McDowell
The Quad, Lismore | Thursday 2 till Saturday 4 August | 7pm | $25-30
Wonderbabes is a powerful and thrilling live storytelling performance by Kate McDowell that exposes the traumas of our young sexual and political lives. Set in Byron Bay on New Years Eve, Wonderbabes is the epic story of one young woman’s journey through the night.
Kate McDowell grew up in Lismore, holds a NIDA Postgraduate Diploma in Writing for Performance, and is trained in dance, puppetry and performance. After many years working in the arts all over Australia and the world she returned to the northern rivers to establish herself as an independent artist. She is an associate artist at NORPA, Dramaturgy mentor to Sprung!! Integrated Dance Theatre, and a member of local dance flashmob group The Cassettes. Wonderbabes developed from her experience of growing up in the northern rivers although the themes are universal.
An extraordinary piece of storytelling, Wonderbabes is both visceral and poetic, moving between brutal reality and a lyrical otherworldliness. Told over two hours, McDowell’s performance is superbly underpinned by an original electronic score that is mixed live onstage by composer James Brown.
Presented by NORPA and The Quad, Wonderbabes will be performed in a large-scale tent in Lismore’s new outdoor precinct complete with open fires and an outdoor bar. Tix on norpa.org.au
Rebel Rebel Girls Choir
Brunswick Heads Anglican Church | Fridays | 4–5pm | $120/term
Rebel Rebel Girls Choir is a singing group for girls between the ages of eight and 12 who really love to sing. The choir is called Rebel Rebel because they are a resilient and powerful group of girls who are learning to say what they want and need to say through singing and song.
Directed by Janet Swain, the group sings a wide variety of songs from simple folk songs and rounds to pop and more challenging contemporary music. Girls are given opportunities to sing solos and arrange some of the songs by themselves, while also developing a bond with other like-minded girls. The group is made up of girls from five different local schools including homeschool, and they look forward to catching up with their singing friends at the end of each week.
The choir meets on Friday afternoons from 4pm till 5pm during the school terms, at St Thomas’s Anglican Church, 21 Fingal Street, Brunswick Heads, and the cost is $120 for an 8-week term.
Contact Janet for more information by email on [email protected]
Friends of the Library & Byron Writers Festival present Alisa Piper and Tony Doherty
Moller Pavilion Bangalow | Thursday 2 August | 2pm | $25
The story of an unlikely friendship.
Alisa Piper and Tony Doherty have an unlikely friendship and their new book The Attachment is all about that. Friends of the Libraries Byron Shire and the Byron Writers Festival present the two friends and writers launching their new book, The Attachment: Letters from a most unlikely friendship.
The circumstances of the start of their friendship were serendipitous. Ailsa Piper wrote a book called Sinning across Spain, a travel journal of her 1,200km walk of the Camino Mozarabe (from Granada to Galicia) as a pilgrim carrying the sins of others. Monsignor Tony Doherty has worked as a priest and educator in Sydney for more than 50 years. He has also walked some of the Camino and was interested to read the book Ailsa had written. Afterwards he wrote her an email to say how much he had enjoyed her book. And thus began an extraordinary collection of correspondence between these two unlikely friends.
Tickets available at the Bangalow Newsagency or online at the www.byronwritersfestival.com
Comedy that Rocks: Dave Eastgate, Jackie Loeb, Mandy Nolan
Mullumbimby Ex-Services | Monday 13 August | 8pm | $20/25
Comedian Mandy Nolan presents two of Australia’s leading rock’n’roll comedians: Jackie Loeb and Dave Eastgate, together for one supercharged double bill that showcases not one but TWO feature comics!
Jackie comes direct from LA where she now lives. Back in 2016 she scored the coveted MO Award for Comedian of the Year – one of Australia’s highest accolades for comedians. You might remember Jackie from Full Frontal, or on the the US Last Comic Standing, where she was a finalist in their international competition. While in LA, Jackie realised her dream of being on a sitcom with a role on NBC’s Superstore! She was award the Best Comedy Show at the LA Fringe Festival and arrives amongst glowing reviews of what reviewers have called ‘mini-masterpieces’. Her musical comedy leaves audiences with sore sides but hugely impressed. You see Jackie has a voice that sits up there with the likes of Adele – huge, magnificent and awe inspiring. When she sings I Who am Nothing she literally blows toupees off bald men. Spiders fly free from their webs.
Sydney-based Dave Eastgate is an actor, standup comedian, writer and musician. In 2017 he starred in the ABC/BBC/Comedy Central US smash hit Ronnie Chieng: International Student, and was nominated for a Logie award for his portrayal of a cancer patient in Channel 9’s critically acclaimed drama series Doctor Doctor. In 2015, Dave starred alongside his comedy idols, Glenn Robbins, Magda Szubanski, Gina Riley and Jane Turner in the Comedy Channel’s flagship sketch-comedy series Open Slather. The series ran for 20 episodes and featured Dave in sketches alongside UFC Champ Ronda Rousey and Grammy Award winner Sting.
In 2012 Dave shared the stage with Academy Award winner Robin Williams during his Australian tour and considers it a career highlight. Other highlights include playing sold-out shows at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2011 and 2012, and performing at the UK’s biggest heavy metal festival Download in 2012. In addition to this Dave has supported touring international comics such as Arj Barker, Rich Fulcher, Jim Jefferies, Jeff Ross and Ross Noble.Dave has appeared as a standup comedian on Channel 9’s Mornings, SBS’s The Full Brazilian, Channel 10’s Thursday Night Live and the Comedy Channel’s Stand Up Australia and Just for Laughs at The Sydney Opera House.
Dave has truly cemented himself as one of the best live comedy acts in the country. It’s this reputation that landed him gigs as the audience warm-up for Big Brother, Australian Idol, So You Think You Can Dance, Dancing with the Stars, Australia’s Got Talent, The X-Factor and The Voice.
Doors at 7pm. Available at the club or www.mandynolan.com.au
Screenworks present Vitamania with Q&A with Sonya Pemberton
Mullumbimby Civic Hall | Wednesday 8 August | 7pm
This year the world will spend more than $100 billion on vitamins and supplements. Almost one billion of us take one regularly – or give one to our children. Every week, a new benefit is claimed. Some doctors point to research that shows they can be life savers. Many others claim that most vitamin products are useless, and some are downright dangerous. All of this provokes confusion. In a world where even the scientists disagree, how do we decide whether to take them or not? How do we separate the sense from the nonsense? In Vitamania, the latest documentary made by Emmy Award-winning Australian filmmakers Genepool Productions, Dr Derek Muller takes us on an epic journey, a world-spanning investigation of vitamin science and history. What he uncovers will confound opinions on all sides.
Film at 7pm followed by a Q&A with director, writer and producer Sonya Pemberton. Tix at www.screenworks.com.au
Cheeky Cabaret
Brunswick Picture House | Friday & Saturday | 7pm | $35-45
Two years in, people continue to talk about the Cheeky Cabaret and they should. What other country village features the most incredible international artists from around the world? Bold, brash, sexy, and dangerous, with tongue laced firmly in cheek, this is where vaudeville is smashed with circus, comedy is drizzled over everything and spectacle is all in a night’s work. Cheeky Cabaret has rightfully become the talk of the town.
The cabaret features a different cast of troubadours, miscreants, delectable divas and cabaret queens every month, so no two shows are ever the same! You’ll leave spellbound, titillated and amazed. As always, bring Grandma but leave the little ones at home.
Tix on www.brunswickpicturehouse.com
Dangerously Poetic Press
Brunswick Heads Primary School Hall | Friday | 7.30 | FREE
This Friday Dangerously Poetic Press launches their 14th publication, Furiously Knocking, Poems about Truth & Lies from Byron Bay and Beyond. The anthology features 24 local poets including the winners of the 2017 DP Byron Writers Festival Poetry Prize. A truly north coast co-creation, the cover art is by Turiya Bruce.
Everyone is invited to celebrate this achievement at a free evening of poetry and music. Lively music will be provided by Miss Amber and Stukulele, and launching the collection is Riddhi of Bay FM’s Bohemian Beat.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
