Photo credit: Tristram Kenton
The Adelaide Festival has unveiled the first three productions for its highly anticipated 2025 season: the opera Innocence (pictured above), Club Amour performed by Tanztheater Wuppertal, and the Australian Dance Theatre’s 60th anniversary show, A Quiet Language.
The opera Innocence, directed by acclaimed Australian director Simon Stone, marks a significant element of the festival’s programme. It features a musical score by Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho and displays an engaging narrative by Finnish novelist Sofi Oksanen. Set in Helsinki, the opera unfolds over a wedding reception, gradually revealing long-held secrets that intertwine the lives of its characters, including a haunting link to a past school shooting. Simon Stone, who last participated in the Adelaide Festival in 2018 with Thyestes, brings this thought-provoking story to the Australian audience after successful seasons across Europe and at the San Francisco Opera. Innocence is set to debut in Australia exclusively at the Adelaide Festival before heading to New York for its premiere at the Metropolitan Opera.
Artistic Director Brett Sheehy AO praised the upcoming productions, highlighting their significant artistic value and the international acclaim of the creators involved. He acknowledged the efforts of his predecessors in bringing these performances to the Adelaide Festival, providing local audiences with a rare opportunity to experience performances of international repute.
Brett shared, “The three productions in our avant-launch are each extraordinary artistic achievements. I want to thank former artistic directors Neil Armfield AO and Rachel Healy for securing Innocence. I remember with awe Simon’s brilliant, genre-breaking realisation of The Cherry Orchard for my 2014 Melbourne Theatre Company season, before he began his stellar international career, and my own introduction to Pina Bausch and Tanztheater Wuppertal was at the 1982 Adelaide Festival. Considered by many to be Pina’s masterwork, Café Müller is a pivotal creation in dance history, and to have it accompanied by two of the finest works by Boris Charmatz gives us an holistic dance experience as outstanding as any previously seen at an Australian festival, and I thank my predecessor Ruth Mackenzie CBE for inviting this production. Finally, we have ADT’s A Quiet Language, with both its founding and current directors in conversation on a singular dance event like no other, created by this magnificent South Australian-born, international company.”
Tanztheater Wuppertal returns with Club Amour, led by Pina Bausch, revered as the “high priestess of dance,” and Boris Charmatz, a pioneering figure in French conceptual dance. This production brings together Bausch’s iconic Café Müller and two works from Charmatz’s repertoire, offering a profound exploration of love and desire. This fusion of talents and artistic expressions promises a memorable experience for festival attendees, following the success of previous performances like The Rite of Spring/common ground[s] in 2022 and Nelken in 2016.
The third highlight, A Quiet Language, celebrates the 60th anniversary of the Australian Dance Theatre (ADT). Directed by Daniel Riley, the work pays homage to the company’s groundbreaking legacy in contemporary dance, exploring themes of identity, culture, and resilience across Australian history. Riley shared, “We’re incredibly excited to be launching into our 60th anniversary year at the 2025 Adelaide Festival. A Quiet Language takes inspiration from the founding spirit of the company, and the fearlessness of our founding Artistic Director Elizabeth Cameron Dalman OAM. This is a work that celebrates our ongoing connection to identity, culture and country here on Kaurna Yerta. We can’t wait to tell a story that is deeply connected to time and place, at a festival that means so much to South Australian audiences.”
The Adelaide Festival is scheduled to run from 28 February to 16 March 2025. The full programme will be launched on 4 November this year, with tickets going on sale to the general public from 26 August.
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