Glam rockers, cabaret icons, gold-medal Olympians, gay-zombie tales, and quiche-eating community meetings will all take to the stage as part of the line-up of the very first MELT: A Celebration of Queer Arts and Culture.
MELT will also umbrella the venue’s long-running and much loved Brisbane Queer Film Festival (BQFF), which returns to celebrate its 16th birthday with 16 film sessions. Comedy, drama, romance and comedy will take to the screen; this year, presented by Brisbane Powerhouse at Palace Centro Cinema for the first time.
Newly appointed Festival Director James Lees says he is excited to present the debut MELT program to Brisbane audiences.
“Our very first MELT: A Celebration of Queer Arts and Culture brings together over 30 queer local, national and international artists. We put the call out to artists and the submissions started flowing in with great fervour and enthusiasm. We found we had shows of every conceivable form to bring together for this very first festival — almost like moving into a brand new, but empty, house and needing to fill it with art, music, furniture and life.
“There are so many highlights in the festival — Matthew Mitcham brings us his cabaret show Twists and Turns, the award-winning play 5 Lesbians Eating A Quiche has a season run, the fabulous Adam Richard unleashes his Gaypocolypse, and the legendary Paul Capsis offers us a gorgeous and intimate cabaret show.
“Opening night will be kick-off with two exclusive exhibitions, shows in the Visy and Powerhouse theatres, followed by our official launch party; which for the first time this year is a free event to welcome the community to MELT.”
Down the road at Palace Centro Cinema, the 16th Brisbane Queer film Festival will present 16 sessions of the best of the current crop of queer cinema from around the world.
“Following the MELT opening night, I encourage you to join us for our BQFF opening night gala, featuring the award-winning The Way He Looks. BQFF curator Shannon King and I will also be sharing the very enjoyable task of personally presenting each session and will also be screening a selection of Australian queer music video clips before each film-reviews,” Lees continued.
“If you want to be entertained, enlightened, shocked and delighted, join us for MELT and the 16th Brisbane Queer film-reviews Festival to celebrate what we do, who we love, all that inspires us and that we aspire to be.”
Check out these events in particular:
- 5 Lesbians Eating A Quiche
- The Sister Sessions: “Lesbian” Is Not A Musical Genre
- Anita’s Last Cha Cha (Ang Huling Cha-Cha Ni Anita)
- Lyle
- The Divine Miss Bette
- The Foxy Merkins
- Appropriate Behaviour
- Ladies Lounge Cabaret
- Ruth: The Musical
- Kristy Apps And The Shotgun Shirleys Featuring Lucinda Shaw
- Reaching For The Moon (Flores Raras)
