The ‘biggest little play festival in the world’ continues with Week 3 heats at the Tom Mann Theatre in Surry Hills Friday 7 to Sunday October 9.
Heat Week Three “Lui” (named for actor-writer and Short+Sweet alumna Nakkiah Lui) opens on Friday 7 October with 12 fabulous short plays.
Among them is the multi-award-winning Rosa & Leo by prolific Sydney-born writer Adam Szudrich.
It’s inspired by the true story of his grandparents’ survival in a Nazi concentration camp… where they fell in love, lost each other then found each other again 50 years later.
Directed by Grant Wilson, it stars Richard Cotter and famous Australian Ballet Company prima ballerina Olga Tamara.
Fresh from his award winning role as Eichmann interrogator, Captain Avner Less in Vir Srinivas’s celebrated film, Orders From Above, Richard returns to a holocaust story, albeit one with a little more romance and humour.
Richard was part of the inaugural Short and Sweet, where he directed Tony Laumberg’s comedy The Great Divide, which was developed into an expanded version which played a critically acclaimed and box office pulling season later that year.
Richard’s return to Short + Sweet was prompted by the exact same reason he got involved the first time – a script he couldn’t refuse.
“Adam’s writing is quite simply beautiful – funny, poignant and human. Tears from laughter one minute, tears from the not-so-joyful the next. He has the skill of leavening bleakest moments, multiply perspectives and create new possibilities, all in ten minutes.
Cream on top is working with Olga as Rosa, a generous and gifted performer, and Grant Wilson, whose direction is smart, supportive and incisive.
ROSA & LEO is a testament of hope triumphing over hopelessness and the power of love to endure.
Featured image: Richard Cotter ad Olga Tamara in ‘Rosa and Leo’
