Theatre

  • Fringe Festival

Running Into The Sun

10 musicians, dancers and actors come together from far and wide for this high energy collaboration.

The image features chaotic snapshot of 4 people in a cluttered garage at night time, with several props featuring. A man dressed in an oversized blue-denim jacket, thick yellow scarf and a yellow hat stares intensely into the camera. He is holding a bright orange kite with black print of a bird with it's wings spread. Around him are three other people shouting at each other and at the camera with their mouths wide open. There's table with a lit green candle, a washing machine and an inflated ball with blue, black and yellow panel around these characters.
In the middle of the picture a young white man with short brown hair and a moustache sits in a living room on a white chair staring at a young woman dancing who is in the very foreground of the image. Behind the young man are two musicians, a tall keyboard player with long hair and a bass player. You can also just see the arm of another dancer entering from the doorway at the back.
Past Event

Image Credit: Alec Katsourakis

The image features chaotic snapshot of 4 people in a cluttered garage at night time, with several props featuring. A man dressed in an oversized blue-denim jacket, thick yellow scarf and a yellow hat stares intensely into the camera. He is holding a bright orange kite with black print of a bird with it's wings spread. Around him are three other people shouting at each other and at the camera with their mouths wide open. There's table with a lit green candle, a washing machine and an inflated ball with blue, black and yellow panel around these characters.
In the middle of the picture a young white man with short brown hair and a moustache sits in a living room on a white chair staring at a young woman dancing who is in the very foreground of the image. Behind the young man are two musicians, a tall keyboard player with long hair and a bass player. You can also just see the arm of another dancer entering from the doorway at the back.

  • Written and Directed by: Ben Ashby

  • Choreographed by: Nadiyah Akbar

  • Music by: Davin Ojala and Toby Leman

If you've thought about your future and the future of the world and come to the conclusion "This looks f*cked" then this show is for you.

Ash and Mary are having a baby, they weren't trying to. Morris is getting dumped. They are all graduating university and throwing a party. There is a catastrophic flood in their hometown. The war crimes overseas accelerate and become more horrifying.

This show is a love letter to activists.

Saxophone, bass, drums and synths score passionate, athletic movement, searing dialogue and poetic text. This is a2 Company's Melbourne debut and their most ambitious project to date. They have gathered a powerful ensemble of emerging creatives hailing from all over Aotearoa and so-called Australia to reflect how it feels to live at the bottom of the world but still care deeply about it.

A massive thanks to Long Cloud Youth Theatre Company and Pōneke Classical Sessions Ensemble who devised the original version of Running into the Sun in 2021 in Wellington, Aotearoa which was also directed by Ben Ashby and choreographed by Nadiyah Akbar.

Another huge thanks is owed to The Greenhouse Residency in Albury Wodonga and hillsceneLIVE in Dandenong for giving space, time and resources to support the re-imagining and development of this project in 2024.

Creatives:
Actors: Ben Ashby, Ethan Morse
Dancers: Nadiyah Akbar, Jasmine Susic, Alec Katsourakis, Luke Romero
Musicians: Toby Leman, Davin Ojala, Lennox Grootjans
Climate Consultant: Professor Bronwyn Hayward
AV and Stage Design: Asha Barr
Graphic Design: Cleo Copplestone
Lighting Design: Dany Akbar
Project Management: Mikaela Marsh