Alice In The Madhouse

It takes a lot of darkness for a Tim Burton film to seem light by comparison, but Alice in the Madhouse marches purposefully in this direction. Stripped of the frothiness that bubbles through earlier Alice incarnations, it’s a circus noir reinvigoration of the story devised by students from the National Institute of Circus Arts.

Alice, in this version, wanders through the outlandish world of a madhouse, encountering an increasingly disturbing mix of patients, family members, and alarming recreations of the Wonderland characters. Given life by these impressive performers, the circus arts seem perfectly suited to conveying the strangeness of Lewis Carrol’s original vision: an embodied expression of the surrealness of Wonderland and its inhabitants.

It’s a strange romp through an alien world, at Red Bennies as part of the Melbourne Fringe.

WHEN: Wednesday 3 October – Saturday 6 October, 7pm
WHERE: Red Bennies, Level 1, 373 Chapel Street, South Yarra
WEB: melbournefringe.com.au/fringe-festival/show/alice-in-the-madhouse/